ePortfolio of Brendan Tam
Biography:
I am a final year PGR in Warwick's Department of History. My research project, titled 鈥楾he Discourse of Political Friend in the late Hanoverian Period: 1760s-1830s' is supervised by Professor Mark Knights and Professor Mark Philp.
I previously completed my BA, majoring in History and Political Science at the University of Melbourne (2014-2018), followed by a MScR in History at the University of Edinburgh (2018-2019). My research is focused on exploring the dynamics of political friendship in British politics during the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. Using private correspondence, newspapers, pamphlets and parliamentary speeches, I explore the rhetorical use of 'political friendship' in Britain during the period. I contend that underpinning 'political friendship' was the claim making ability of the language of friendship. That, drawing on speech act theory, friendship was invoked to 'do things', to invoke duties and obligations to achieve political aims. Through focusing on both well-known examples of friendships in politics, such as Edmund Burke and Charles James Fox, William Pitt the Younger and William Wilberforce, alongside more quotidian examples, my project interrogates the important role 'political friendship' played in a period of significant political change marked by the formalisation of political party organisation.
||
Brendan.tam@warwick.ac.uk
Research Interests
- British Political History in the long-eighteenth century.
- Sociability in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.
- Friendship Studies
- History of Emotions
- History of Political Thought
Memberships:
- Royal Historical Society (Postgraduate Member)
- The Early Modern and Eighteenth Century Centre (EMECC), History Department, 神马福利影片.
- (BSECS)
- Social History Society
- Political Studies Association
- Society for the History of Emotions (SHE) (Ordinary Member of the SHE Council 2024-Present)
Publications, Research Activities & Outreach:
Book Reviews:
- Melbourne Historical Journal 46, 2018
Completed Dissertations:
- MScR, History, University of Edinburgh, 2018-2019 - Dissertation: 'The Friends of Mr. Pitt: Political Friendship during the Age of Revolutions.' Supervised by Professor Gordon Pentland and Dr Benjamin Weinstein
- BA (Hons), History, University of Melbourne, 2014-2017 - Dissertation: 'William Pitt the Younger and the Sedition and Treason Trials 1793-5,' Supervised by Professor Trevor Burnard.
Blog Posts:
, 29 April 2026.
, 15 October 2024
Articles:
, 21 March 2016
Conference Papers:
- 'The Friends of Mr. Pitt' Without Pitt - The Reconstitution of a Political Network (Unsettling Certainties: Fourth Biennial Conference of the Society of the History of Emotions, University of Adelaide, November 2023)
- 'Speaking Without Personality': 'Honourable Friend' and the Parliamentary Rhetoric of Friendship in the Eighteenth-Century House of Commons (Eighteenth-Century Emotion with Workshop of Memory and Emotions, Cambridge University, November 2023)
- 'The Friends of Mr Pitt' and being a Friend of Pitt: William WIlberforce and Pitt's Political Network (Redefining 'the Age of Wilberforce': a Workshop, Cambridge University, September 2023)
- 鈥淏ringing Pitt forward again, in spite of himself鈥� - the political instrumentality of sociability, (Sociability in Politics, Food and Travel in the Early Modern Era Conference, Warwick, June 2023)
Conference Organisation:
- Co-organiser, Lived Experiences of the Westminster Parliament in History, 神马福利影片, 14 March 2025 (Supported by Warwick's Early Modern and Eighteenth Century Centre and the History of Parliament Trust)
- Organising Committee Member, 神马福利影片 History Department Postgraduate Conference (May 2023); (May 2024)
Outreach:
Departmental Activities:
- Co-Convener, Postgraduate Work in Progress Session, 2023-4
- Postgraduate Representative, Departmental Research Committee, 神马福利影片 History Department, 2022-2023
Education:
2022-2026, PhD in History, 神马福利影片
2018-2019, MScR in History, University of Edinburgh (with Distinction)
2014-2017, BA (Hons) in History, University of Melbourne (Upper Second Class Honours)