Bøker av Martin Johnes

A radical reinterpretation of the effect of excluding Welsh from schools on the fortunes of the language. Most people in Wales know that some children in the nineteenth century were victims of the Welsh Not, a wooden board hung around the necks of children who were heard speaking Welsh. Use of the Welsh Not was often followed by a physical punishment, and it is often named as a key reason for Welsh decline. Despite how well-known the Welsh Not is, this is the first study that interrogates where, when, and why it was used. This book is an account of the different ways children were punished for speaking Welsh in nineteenth-century elementary schools and the consequences of this for children, communities, and the linguistic future of Wales. It shows how the exclusion of Welsh hindered pupils from learning English, the very thing it was meant to achieve. Thus, gradually over the century, Welsh came to be used more and more in schools, making them a more effective mechanism in the Anglicization of Wales.

From the very beginnings of Wales, its people have defined themselves against their large neighbour. Wales: England's Colony? shows, that relationship has not only defined what it has meant to be Welsh, it has also been central to making and defining Wales as a nation.

This ground-breaking book examines the story of Wales since 1939, giving voice to ordinary people and the variety of experiences within the nation. This is a history of not just a nation, but of its residents' hopes and fears, their struggles and pleasures and their views of where they lived and the wider world.

A brand new Pocket Guide which charts the concise history of sport in Wales since 1800. The book locates the character and structure of sport within the wider social, political and economic context that shaped it.