Here's the final set of brief summaries providing links to recent reviews of academic literature on Cornwall. You're now (almost) up to speed. In an important article on contemporary Cornwall Joanie Willett shows how population growth and gentrification have failed to solve Cornwall's endemic socio-economic difficulties while exacerbating a growing housing crisis and fragmenting local … Continue reading Population growth and gentrification, marine tourism and a 15th century social climber
Category: reviews
Heraldry and medieval identity, the 1549 rising and choughs
Save yourself all the bother of having to read them - here's the fifth instalment of very short summaries of some recent academic takes on Cornwall ... Nigel Saul ascribes the Carminow family's myth about their coat of arms to the family's sixteenth century decline while going on to claim the Cornish identity was by … Continue reading Heraldry and medieval identity, the 1549 rising and choughs
Gothic Cornwall, daffodil pickers and mining heritage
Impress your friends with your wide knowledge of recent academic work on Cornwall ... Tanya Krzywinska and Ruth Heholt claim that Cornwall has inspired Gothic novelists and explain the composition of 'Gothic Cornwall', simultaneously exciting and disturbing, attractive yet terrifying. Constantine Manolchev presents the narrative of a daffodil picker from Bulgaria working on a Cornish … Continue reading Gothic Cornwall, daffodil pickers and mining heritage
Stuart loyalism, early language revivalists and islandness
Another three micro-summaries of reviews ... James Harris digs into expressions of loyalty in Restoration Cornwall and finds they were the result of a well-organised Tory propaganda campaign. In a second article James Harris compares seventeenth century attempts to revive the Cornish language with the situation in south-west Wales and identifies the lack of support … Continue reading Stuart loyalism, early language revivalists and islandness
Cornish language, the care community and witches
In case you missed a series of (mostly) short reviews of a selection of recent academic literature that I put on this site in the latter part of 2023 here's a one-sentence summary of each to save you having to read them. To make it digestible I'll limit it to three and drip in the … Continue reading Cornish language, the care community and witches
The railway and Cornish identity
Last week I summarised an article which called for the Church of England to take account of regional identities and specifically the Cornish identity. This week I review another article which takes as its subject the Cornish identity. This one assesses the ways in which the railway has contributed to that identity. (For a more … Continue reading The railway and Cornish identity
Challenging negative stereotypes of Cornwall and its people
Believe it or not, the Cornish can occasionally be the butt of stereotypes. We’re ‘slow’, ‘backward’ or ‘living in the past’. Sometimes we collude with these, for example through the use of dreckly, turning the stereotype back onto its users in an ironic and postmodernist way. This is good for a laugh but some of … Continue reading Challenging negative stereotypes of Cornwall and its people
Legend, history and selfies at Tintagel
In its marketing strategy for Tintagel English Heritage decided to emphasise its legendary aspects and links to the Arthurian myth. The only problem with this was that there were actually no physical objects at the site on which they could anchor the legends. So they installed some in the shape of the statue of the … Continue reading Legend, history and selfies at Tintagel
‘A hideous and wicked country’: travellers on Cornwall
We all know Cornwall is a picturesque place. In fact, although it is viewed as such now, it wasn’t always seen in that light. The countless images of Cornwall’s cliffs and coastline that are produced and circulated by visitors and locals alike these days would have come as a surprise to the travellers of the … Continue reading ‘A hideous and wicked country’: travellers on Cornwall
Fishy business: research on Cornwall’s inshore fisheries
Two relatively recent articles on the Cornish inshore fisheries and the men employed in them are reviewed here. The first looks at access to healthcare and identifies the constraints facing ‘fishers’. The second contrasts the Cornish inshore fisheries with the coastal fisheries of Tuscany. It identifies the strategies employed by the small-scale fishing sector in … Continue reading Fishy business: research on Cornwall’s inshore fisheries
Cornish studies resources 