Home > Eric Hobsbawm

Hobsbawm was born in Alexandria and grew up in Vienna and Berlin. He moved to London in 1933 and was educated at St Marylebone Grammar School and King's College, Cambridge, where he graduated with a PhD in history and joined the Communist party in 1936.

In 1947Events January January 1 British mines nationalized January 1 Nigeria gains limited autonomy January 1 The Canadian Citizenship Act went into effect January 3 Proceedings of the United States Congress are televised for the first time. January 10 United Na, he became a lecturer in history at Birkbeck CollegeBirkbeck (sometimes still called Birkbeck College is a College of the University of London. It aims at working people who want to study for degrees in the evenings. Its main building is on Malet Street in Bloomsbury. The College takes its name from George, University of LondonThe University of London founded in 1836, is a federation of colleges which together constitute one of the world's largest universities. Somewhere between 10 and 20 percent of all UK students attend one of its colleges, which include some of the most pres. In 1970Events January events January 1 Construction begins on Arcosanti, by Paolo Soleri, in Mayer, Arizona, located 65, miles north of Phoenix, Arizona. January 1 Unix epoch at 00:00:00 UTC. January 12 Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian civil war. January, he was appointed professor, and in 1978Events January January 1 The Copyright Act of 1976 takes effect, making sweeping changes to United States copyright law. January 1 Air India's Boeing 747 explodes near Bombay 213 dead. January 4 Referendum in Chile supports policies of Augusto Pinochet. he was made a Fellow of the British AcademyThe British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established by Royal Charter in 1902, and is a fellowship of about 750 scholars. The Academy is self-governing and independent. Election as a F.

In 19561956 is a leap year starting on Sunday. see link for calendar) Events January January 1 End of Anglo- Egyptian Condominium in Sudan. January 16 President Gamal Abdal Nasser of Egypt vows to reconquer Palestine January 26 1956 Winter Olympic Games open in, he spoke out against the SovietThe Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR ( Russian: ; tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik (SSSR) also called the Soviet Union ( ; tr. Sovetsky Soyuz , was a state in much of the northern region of Eurasia that existed from 1922 until 1 invasion of Hungary and left the British Communist Party to join its Italian equivalent.

He worked with the magazine Marxism Today during the 1980s and supported Neil Kinnock's modernisation of the British Labour Party.

One of Hobsbawm's interests is the invention of traditions, national and otherwise. He has spent considerable effort in exposing the artificiality of many "traditions" that nation states use to justify their own existence and importance.

Hobsbawm has written extensively on a broad and diverse selection of subjects during the course of his illustrious career as Britain’s' most cosmopolitan and internationally renowned Historian. As Marxist historiographer he has focused on in-depth analysis of the 'dual revolution' (the political French revolution and the industrial British revolution) and how their combined effect lies behind the predominant trend towards liberal capitalism today. Another re-occurring theme in his work has been banditry, a phenomenon that Hobsbawm has tried to place within the confines of relevant societal and historical context, and thus countering the traditional view of it being a spontaneous and unpredictable form of primitive rebellion. Outside of academic historical writing, Hobsbawm has written (under the pseudonym Francis Newton-taken from the name of Billie Holidays' Communist trumpet player) for the New Statesman as a jazz critic and has numerous essays published in various intellectual journals, dealing with anything from barbarity in the modern age to the troubles of labour movements and the conflict between anarchism and communism. His most recent publication was the autobiography, 'Interesting times'