Instagram becoming Historygram: How may PhD candidates or young historians benefit from that social media?
What is going on with history on Instagram? These last few years posts about history have been blooming all around the Instagram sphere. You may find short videos about 14th century Irish castles, but also humorous Elizabethan restitutions, and photographs of medieval manuscripts. A myriad of historians have started creating their own accounts, mixing both personal authenticity and professional exigence.
Besides, sharing their passions and projects, Instagram may particularly help PhD candidates and young historians to stand out in that sea of content and people and better display their research[1].
To answer those questions, I have asked two talented women, Beth Reid[2], and Dr Lizzie Rogers[3], to respond to a questionnaire in order to display their points of views.
On the question of the reasons for the creation of their Instagram account, Beth particularly emphasised her love for its visual features and mentioned that Instagram has stayed “very positive […] people are so friendly and encouraging.” Dr Lizzie Rogers tended to agree, she explained that she “really enjoyed sharing pictures of historical places.” However, they both decided to avoid Twitter because of its “very toxic environment” and also as Dr Lizzie mentioned because it can be “quite anxiety-inducing.” She described that Instagram helped her when she finished her PhD “and was worrying about ‘what next?’” by allowing her to share what she loved: “I felt like I could write whatever I wanted on there, so just shared things I was interested in […] it felt a lot less pressurising than constantly sharing academic projects or research.” Instagram helped Dr Lizzie Rogers to better transition out of the “postgraduate space.”
Moreover, I also asked them how Instagram can help them professionally speaking. Beth pointed out the importance of her account “for her writing career and future as a historian.” Indeed, she received “incredible opportunities through networking on Instagram.” She is for instance a regular writer for “Hidden Scotland” which has one million followers on that social media. Besides, I met Beth when I was in Scotland and thanks to her incredible content and her passion for medieval female history, a
publishing house offered her the amazing opportunity of writing her own book.
Dr Lizzie Rogers underlined the beauty of Instagram and how it can be a good way to “connect with others, find your niche” and also encounter primary or secondary sources that she “might have not come across otherwise.” Given that she has a successful history blog, she mentions that it is difficult to know whether opportunities emerge thanks to her blog or to Instagram. Nonetheless, she explained to me “the coolest things [she has] been able to do” such as appearing on podcasts, consulting on “an article about young women in Regency England for ELLE Magazine” and most importantly “writing an opinion piece on the 2022 adaptation of “Persuasion” for BBC History Magazine,” they have “been huge milestones for [her].” [4]
However, even though historygram reveals tons of information about mysterious places, paintings, jewels or castles thus allowing certain historical periods or places to be known (especially places like Scotland or Wales), I need to shed light on the other side of this great community of instagramers. In one of our conversations, Beth and I talked about the anxiety around social media and its ephemeral side. Indeed, it is complicated to get known in this sphere and the new algorithm does not help the small creators of content. As Beth mentioned, some videos might do well and some of her reels have been seen by millions of people. On the contrary, some do not work as well. It is difficult to know the reasons why some videos reach more people and others do not. Some very well researched reels might not reach a lot of people contrary to those travel reels with trendy songs and montages. Thus, it highlights the difficulties that those situations can foster if social media become the historian’s main professional activity.
Therefore, in my opinion, I would say that Instagram is more than necessary for historians since it allows them to reach a broader audience and to talk about specialist subjects to non-specialist people, that is what Dr. Tracy Borman and Dr Owen Emmerson, two renown Tudor historians, mostly do with their accounts. They reveal the stories and lives of the Tudor and Boleyn characters through the use of stories or short videos. Thus, it seems that the combination between the social media world and the academic one is still preferred especially by researchers, but we tend to see more and more historians on personal missions receiving funds from the National Trust like Alice Loxton, followed by more than 900,000 followers, or collaborations with local private and public places to reveal the beauty of hidden and secluded places. We still have to point out that those missions and the importance of social media are definitely more common and accepted in the English-speaking countries than in France.
To conclude, historians have found a new way to tell history by firstly understanding the importance of community and of sharing knowledge while displaying the beauty of research.
Bibliography
Beth Reid
Her Instagram account: @historywithbeth
https://www.instagram.com/historywithbeth/.
Her latest article: ‘The Siege of Urquhart Castle’, Hidden Scotland (blog), 5 December 2021, https://hiddenscotland.co/the-siege-of-urquhart-castle/.
Dr Lizzie Rogers
Her instagram account:@historylizzie
https://www.instagram.com/historylizzie/.
Her blog: https://historylizzie.co.uk/
People mentioned.
Tracy Borman
Her Instagram account: @tracy.borman
Website : http://www.tracyborman.co.uk/
Owen Emmerson
His Instagram account: @drowenemmerson
His website: https://drowenemmerson.com/
Alice Loxton
Her Instagram account: @history_alice
Her website: https://aliceloxton.com/
[1] @historywithbeth, posted on February 18th, 2022.
[2] Beth Reid recently completed her postgraduate studies which focused on elite women in 14th century Scotland. She is now working on her own book about Women in the Scottish Wars of Independence and potentially intends to apply for a PhD. On Instagram, she is followed by more than fifty thousand people and publishes gorgeous videos of Scottish villages, countryside, or castles.
[3] Dr Lizzie Rogers is a historian who specialises in women’s history, reading and collecting historic houses in the 18th and 19th centuries. She is now a freelance writer and researcher in Savannah, Georgia. She shares with her 2,600 followers her passion for Jane Austen, art, and historic women and monuments.
[4] @historylizzie posted on October 5th, 2022.
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
olopez (21 avril 2023). Instagram becoming Historygram: How may PhD candidates or young historians benefit from that social media? EN-globe. Consulté le 10 novembre 2025 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/oe7k


