Explaining History

How and why did Martin Luther King become involved in the civil rights movement in the South? What were his political and religious beliefs? How did visiting India change him?

How did Hitler's early years shape his future? What motivated him in his long years of destitution in Vienna? Why did he embrace the opportunity to fight for Germany so eagerly?

A break from the norm, here's a quick audio on how to think about studying history and sitting exam papers. If you've got some January exams coming up, listen to this, I've included a few thoughts on some general principals that examiners want to see.

Can we view Stalin's famines in the Ukraine and Kazakhstan in 1931-33 as genocides? Here is an examination of the legal and historical debate.

After 1917 there were radical changes to almost every walk of life, women, children and families all radically altered as service to the new Communist state took centre stage in everyone's lives. How did Lenin impose his own ideas of the role and the nature of individuals on the rest of Russia? Listen to this podcast for the answers.

Why did Trotsky, the hero of the Red Army and the most likely candidate to succeed Lenin, fail to become leader of the USSR after his death? How did Stalin use his position to build a powerbase of mass support?

The first in a series of podcasts on Lenin. This podcast looks at Lenin's early years and his development into a professional revolutionary.

This is the first in six podcasts designed specifically with students of Nazi Germany in mind. In the run up to exam time, I will examine some of the core questions behind the study of Nazism, and hopefully dispel a few myths or misconceptions.

Why was Hitler's government so chaotic? Was it part of an orchestrated chaos? What were the results of government ministries fighting one another to please the Fuhrer? These are essential areas to address at A Level and GCSE, listen to this recording for an analysis of these questions.

How and why did the Holocaust develop from persecution to mass murder? Was there a long term plan or did the chaos of Nazism drive events along? In exploring these questions, we can examine the historiography behind the Holocaust, and evaluate it with evidence.

Did the Nazis have to use mass terror to maintain support for themselves? Or did the German people have a far more complex and sometimes contradictory relationship with the regime that ruled them? This podcast explores the extent to which Nazism relied on terror and consent.

How did the February Revolution happen? Why did it escalate from a series of protests over food shortages to the abdication of the Czar and the establishment of the Provisional Government and Petrograd Soviet?

Before the revolution, Russia's aristocrats played a key role in Russian society, and presented themselves in 1917 as an alternative to the Czar. They were utterly destroyed as a social class by the Bolsheviks from 1918 onwards.

Why did Russia explode into violence and anarchy in 1905? How the the Czar react? Russia's experience in 1905 set the stage for the revolution in 1917 and showed to all sides, the Czar, workers, peasants and nobles, who could trust who, and how high the stakes were.

This is one of the most challenging things to get right when you are writing an essay, the bit right at the start. Getting clear on what an introduction is for and what you are trying to say is vitally important and this video will talk you through everything you need to know.