Imperial Wireless, the British Post Office, Anglo-Dominion and India relations c.1900-1930

该项目关注的是全球电信史上最非凡的里程碑之一：帝国无线链(IWC)。1906年，古列尔莫·马可尼首次构思使用长波发射机，但在一场政治丑闻和第一次世界大战爆发后，该计划被推迟。20世纪20年代初，马可尼无线电报公司冒着一定的财务风险，开发了创新的波束短波系统，并最终被英国政府用于国际捕鲸委员会。第一对“BEAM”电台于1927年在英国和加拿大开通，几年后，澳大利亚、印度、新西兰、南非和南美相继出现了类似的电台。它很快成为大英帝国最广泛使用的长途通信形式之一，并对老化的海底电缆业务构成了如此大的威胁，长期以来，海底电缆业务一直是大英帝国的“神经系统”，以至于英国政府最终被迫将较新和较旧的电报形式合并为当时最大的电信公司之一：电缆和无线。尽管帝国无线链很重要，但它的历史并不是系统的学术研究的主题。这个项目的目的是为了填补我们对早期无线电和无线电理解上的这一重大差距。在这个项目中，有很大的空间让任职人员发展他们自己的研究问题。可以探讨的领域包括：-IWC在促进或阻碍无线和无线电技术发展方面的作用，包括那些与马可尼和他的业务无关的技术发展。-IWC在全球各地的电台是如何建造和运营的。-IWC在鼓励出现专业和业余无线活动的地方文化方面的作用。-不同英国殖民地和领地对IWC的不同看法。-IWC所涉及的不同利益之间的冲突和结盟，包括商业、政治、法律、科学和技术。-IWC作为大英帝国和殖民一体化的工具的成功和失败。所有这些问题都将建立在对技术的历史和社会学解释的批判性理解以及对IWC的批判性视角的基础上，后者质疑整个计划以及马可尼对该计划的具体建议在多大程度上必然被视为对现有全球通信系统的改进。

This project focuses on one of the most extraordinary milestones in the history of global telecommunications: the Imperial Wireless Chain (IWC). First conceived by Guglielmo Marconi in 1906 to use long-wave transmitters, the scheme was postponed following a political scandal and the outbreak of the First World War. In the early 1920s, and at some financial risk, the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company developed its innovative 'beam' short-wave system and this was eventually adopted by the British government for the IWC. The first pair of 'beam' stations opened in Britain and Canada in 1927 and within a few years similar stations followed in Australia, India, New Zealand, South Africa and South America. It soon became one of the most widely used forms of long distance communication in the British empire and posed such a threat to the ageing submarine cable business that had long constituted the 'nervous system' of the British empire that the British government was eventually forced to amalgamate the newer and older forms of telegraphy into one of the largest telecommunication firms of its day: Cable and Wireless. Despite its importance, the history of the Imperial Wireless Chain has not been the subject of systematic scholarly study. The aim of this project is to plug this significant gap in our understanding of early wireless and radio.There is much scope within this project for the post holder to develop their own research questions. Among the areas that might be explored are:- The role of the IWC in fostering or obstructing technical developments in wirelessand radio, including those not associated with Marconi and his business.- How IWC stations around the globe were constructed and operated.-The role of the IWC in encouraging the emergence of local cultures of professionaland amateur wireless activity.- Differences in perceptions of the IWC in different British colonies and dominions.- Conflicts between and alignments of the diverse interests involved in the IWC,including the commercial, political, legal, scientific and technological.- The successes and failures of the IWC as an instrument of British imperial andcolonial integrity.All these questions will be underpinned by a critical understanding of historical and sociological interpretations of technology and a critical perspective on the IWC that questions the extent to which the scheme as a whole, and Marconi's specific proposals for it,were necessarily seen as improvements on existing systems of global communication.