About

The Centre was established in 2022 and builds on the achievements of the 2015-22 Hong Kong History Project.

Our aims and purpose

• To support and grow world class research on the modern history of Hong Kong, its local, regional and global history, its society, culture, economy and politics and its regional and global connections from the eighteenth century onwards.
• To nurture and develop academic talent in the field by training the next generation of researchers and support the development of an Early Career Network.
• To serve as an international hub for the discipline by hosting visiting staff and students and collaborating with an international network of institutions and scholars on projects, activities and events.
• To raise public awareness of the history of Hong Kong and its global relations with a core strand of our work focussing on public engagement and outreach with the Hong Kong diaspora.
• An important and exciting new development is the recently launched Hong Kong Collections initiative, the first of its kind in the UK, actively building a visual and textual archival collection, which will include an online open access platform hosting photographic and other material relating to the history of the city.

Achievements (2015-2025)

We have established a global reputation as a leading institution researching the history of Hong Kong evidenced by the academic journal articles, book chapters and monographs on a diverse range of topics relating to the city’s past. We are a thriving and growing community of scholars who have established global networks across the world including the UK, Singapore, Japan, Canada, China, Australia and the US.

The Centre invests in emerging talent and provides a structured programme of support, during this 10-year period the Project and Centre has supported 7 doctoral research projects with a further six in progress, four postdoctoral research fellows with a further two underway, some of whom have gone on to careers in academia, the civil service and archives.

We have an established and successful programme of events such as the ‘Speaker Series’, Early Career Network workshops, an annual conference and Hong Kong History Day, amongst other ad hoc events in which scholars exchange views, share findings and develop the study of Hong Kong’s regional and global impacts.

The Centre organises a well attended series of public engagement ‘History Salons’, which take place at the weekend attracting the local Bristol and UK-wide HK diaspora who want to learn more about the history of their city, with other workshops focussed on enabling participants to explore their family history. We have produced a successful series of YouTube videos, the ‘Hong Kong History Documented’, with another series ‘Hong Kong Academy’ currently in production.

You can find out more about the Centre’s team on the People page.