On Tuesday the 17th of April 2018, Isabelle Habib, Beth Richards and Jareer Aldaoud visited the Middle East Centre (MEC) Archive at St Antony's College, Oxford, which has a remarkable record of Britain's long and close association with the Middle East.
Elizabeth Monroe and Albert Hourani founded the MEC Archive in 1961 in order to preserve, and make available for research, the papers and photographs of individuals and organizations that have served in the Middle East. The British Omani Society helped establish the Oman Archive and in 2008 awarded a grant of £3,598.52 for the Charles Butt Project, which is a preservation and digitization project. The project consists of a selection of 300 images of Oman arranged in 12 themed photo galleries covering the following categories: agriculture, boats and coast, buildings and landscapes, camel races, Charles Butt, flowers and nature, food, military, oil and technology, parades and displays, people and HM Sultan Qaboos Bin Said Al Said.
The very knowledgeable archivist Ms Debbie Usher gave us a tour of the facilities of the building that was designed by Zaha Hadid and selected a fantastic range from the Omani Archive for us to browse. We saw amazing images of 1970's Oman, as well as recorded documents from the Sultan’s Armed Forces.
Afterwards Ms Usher invited us for lunch at the St Antony's College Dining Hall followed by tea. It was an amazing day and we got a taste of what it's like to be a student at the University of Oxford.
Finally, we would encourage anyone undertaking research on the Middle East to visit the Middle East Centre Archive at St Antony's College.
On the 22nd June, Beth and Jareer set off on their research trip to Oman as one of the final stages of their internship. Read full story
On Tuesday the 27th of March 2018, in collaboration with the Cultural Attache Office and The Omani Students Society in London (OSSL), The British Omani Society was delighted to host Sharifa Albarami,... Read full story
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