John Chircop is full professor in social and economic history, and chairperson of the Mediterranean Institute. He obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Essex in 1997 with a thesis on ‘The British Imperial Network in the Mediterranean 1800-1870. A Study of Regional Fragmentation and Imperial Integration’. Early in his doctoral studies he was awarded a Wingate Scholarship from the Hyam Wingate Foundation, London.
John Chircop’s main research is in the comparative socio-economic history of the British colonial domains in the Mediterranean, focusing mostly on: poor relief, social welfare, public health, quarantine, institutionalisation, colonial/postcolonial labour, forms of resistance, ideology and migration during the period 1800-1940s. Mediterranean historiography is yet another stem of his research work.
Chircop is also involved in Public Memory and Oral history. He has founded and still manages the Public Memory Archive and is now hands-on advisor to the National Archives on the setting up of an Oral, Sound and Visual Archive.
Prof Chircop has been awarded scholarships and bursaries to carry out archival research and fieldwork in various Mediterranean countries – including the Ionian Islands, Sicily, Tunisia and Tripoli – as well as in London, Oxford and Paris. He has conducted field research and reviewed public history/community cultural centres, museums and archives in Sicily, Cephalonia, Corfu, Tripoli, Tunis and Malta.
Chircop sits on the Scientific Committee of the 'Mediterranean Association for Historical, Social and Economic Studies', and on the board of the 'International Quarantine Studies Network' which he co-founded in 2013. He coordinates the research team 'The Body, Health and Food' at the Mediterranean Institute. He sits on the editorial boards of these international academic journals: Journal of Mediterranean Studies Mediterranean Review Mediterranean Knowledge Tunisian-Mediterranean Review of Social and Economic Studies and founding editor of the on-line 'Journal of Maltese History'.
Prof. Chircop is now vice-President of the Community of Mediterranean Universities.
Mediterranean Historiography
British colonialism in the Mediterranean
Social assistance, poor relief and hospitalisation
The body, health and food
Colonial medicine and quarantine
Public Memory, Oral History and audio-visual archives
Prof Chircop supervises research on social and economic history, mainly on public health, quarantine, hospitalization, body hygiene and social welfare, the labouring poor, charity establishments, poor relief, mutual aid and labour migration. He is at present also supervising postgraduate research on cultural management/heritage, oral and audio-visual archives, public memory, material culture and community museums.
