Dr Timothy Peacock

  • Lecturer (History)

telephone: 01413304086
email: Timothy.Peacock@glasgow.ac.uk

Room 306, 10 University Gardens, College of Arts and Humanities, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G12 8QH

Import to contacts

ORCID iDhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-3116-9701

Biography

Dr Timothy Peacock is a Lecturer in History and War Studies, and Director/co-founder of the Games and Gaming Lab (UofGGamesLab) at the University of Glasgow.

He leads combined teams totalling up to 35 research assistants, interns and software developers as Principal Investigator (PI) for funded projects on research and educational gaming and simulation. These projects range from creation of research-informed tabletop wargames/Serious Games with policymakers to educational video games with heritage organisations, including Projects AWARE (Access to Wargaming in Education), Gamestorm, Tempest, Minecraft Ellisland, Earth Environmental impacts of Space Junk, and HeritAIge. 

In UofGGamesLab/GGLab since 2019 (first as Co-director and subsequently Director), he has been responsible for areas including strategic planning, experimental projects, and membership, building this to over 300 members. His varied Lab work has involved incubating and supporting research/Knowledge Exchange projects with colleagues in Subjects ranging from Astrophysics to Veterinary Medicine.

He has worked with public, private and non-profit/charitable sectors, including collaborations with organisations from the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority and St Giles' Cathedral to the Scottish Games Network.

Dr Peacock's cross-disciplinary research in History is underpinned by interlocking interests in areas including Nuclear, Spaceflight/Space Security, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Wargaming, Gaming and uses of history in games, and Politics.

These are also areas in which he has been approached to provide expert external Consultancy.

He has made media contributions, including to BBC, ITV and national newspapers, on subjects from Spaceflight history to gaming.

He has been invited by internal and external organisations to design and run research-led Serious Games and simulations from Arts and Humanities AI Cyber Resilience exercises to games around Nuclear and Space Diplomacy.

Dr Peacock’s work, grounded in his History research, brings together these interests to explore new ways of understanding and tackling societal challenges. His dual aim is to study the history of how organisations (don’t) learn and sociopolitical and military effects of new technologies.

Since 2019, he has been a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (RHS) and was a Visiting Fellow at the British Library Eccles Centre for American Studies from 2019-23.

His Manchester University Press monograph, The British Tradition of Minority Government (July 2018), uses declassified files to reveal hidden strategic dialogues in 1970s minority governments, making global comparisons and studying the 2017 Westminster Minority.

His articles range from YouTube discourses on Memetic Warfare (the uses of memes in war) to the cinematic legacies of nuclear testing and rethinking intelligence gathering during the Cromwellian Protectorate. His outputs similarly include leading development of research-informed games/simulations and published Parliamentary Evidence.

He has lectured at Glasgow since 2015, convening courses in American History, War Studies, Games History, and Intelligence/Security. His teaching has also included British/French/Japanese Imperial History and Modern European Socio-cultural History.

He has received national recognition for his leading role in technology enhanced learning and teaching, awarded the Royal Historical Society's UK Innovation in Teaching Award (2020). He also received Glasgow University Student Representative Council’s Highly Innovative Teaching Award (2022) and Teaching Excellence Awards at University-wide and College levels (2018). He is a member of the University’s Teaching Excellence Network.

Research interests

My key areas of research interest include:

  • Games and (War)Gaming History (including the uses of history in games)
  • Space Security and Spaceflight History
  • Nuclear History (including Nuclear Weapons Testing and Nuclear Diplomacy)
  • Artificial Intelligence (AI)
  • History of Technology (including sociopolitical and military effects of new technology)
  • Gamification/Use of games in learning
  • Modern American and British - Political/Military History (including minority governments/coalitions)
  • Early Modern Intelligence History

Research groups

Publications

List by: Type | Date

Jump to: 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2018
Number of items: 17.

2024

Keith, N. et al. (2024) Emerging Ecologies of Health, Heritage, and Habitat: Looking into Living and Working in 2033. [Exhibitions]

Peacock, T. N. (2024) Written Evidence: Implications of the War in Ukraine for UK Defence. Documentation. UK Parliament.

Peacock, T. N. , Porteous, R., Watson, P., Leeper Jr, M., Gurung, S., Macivor, J., Celico, G. and St Giles' Cathedral, (2024) Project HeritAIge - St Giles' Cathedral research-informed historical video game. [Website]

2023

Skeldon, K. et al. (2023) Research Firsts Exhibition. [Exhibitions]

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace speech on nuclear dangers has important lessons even after 70 years. Conversation, 08 Dec.

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Astroneer and the paradoxes of memory in historical space exploration gaming. Historical Games Network, October 20, 2023.

Wong, M. , Peacock, T. , Porteous, R. and Watson, L. (2023) Video Game Research Innovation Starter Toolkit: A Beginners’ Guide for Innovation and Industry and Community Engagement. Project Report. University of Glasgow.

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Oppenheimer the actor: the curious 1946 film Atomic Power featuring the scientist as himself. Conversation, 27 Jul.

Wong, M. et al. (2023) Education Evolved - SEvEN: Seven Voices, One Future. [Website]

2022

Peacock, T. N. (2022) ‘“Son – you’ll be a soldier one day”: reconceptualising YouTube discourses on participation in memetic warfare’. Digital War, 3(1), pp. 83-95. (doi: 10.1057/s42984-022-00051-8)

Peacock, T. N. , Barr, M. , Glasgow University Minecraft Society, and Ellisland Trust, (2022) Minecraft Ellisland. [Website]

2021

Peacock, T. N. (2021) From Crossroads to Godzilla: the cinematic legacies of the first postwar nuclear tests. Conversation, 22 Jul.

2020

Peacock, T. (2020) From Trinity to Trump: The Politics of Nuclear Memory in the 2020 Election. [Website]

Peacock, T. (2020) The Paradoxes of Power: Photographic records and postwar nuclear testing. [Website]

Peacock, T. (2020) Atomic Holiday Snaps? Depictions of ‘normality’ in the official photography of postwar atomic bomb tests. [Website]

Peacock, T. N. (2020) Cromwells "spymaster"? John Thurloe and rethinking early modern intelligence. Seventeenth Century, 35(1), pp. 3-30. (doi: 10.1080/0268117X.2018.1524786)

2018

Peacock, T. N. (2018) The British Tradition of Minority Government. Manchester University Press: Manchester. ISBN 9781526123268

This list was generated on Wed Dec 4 05:03:35 2024 GMT.
Number of items: 17.

Articles

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace speech on nuclear dangers has important lessons even after 70 years. Conversation, 08 Dec.

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Astroneer and the paradoxes of memory in historical space exploration gaming. Historical Games Network, October 20, 2023.

Peacock, T. N. (2023) Oppenheimer the actor: the curious 1946 film Atomic Power featuring the scientist as himself. Conversation, 27 Jul.

Peacock, T. N. (2022) ‘“Son – you’ll be a soldier one day”: reconceptualising YouTube discourses on participation in memetic warfare’. Digital War, 3(1), pp. 83-95. (doi: 10.1057/s42984-022-00051-8)

Peacock, T. N. (2021) From Crossroads to Godzilla: the cinematic legacies of the first postwar nuclear tests. Conversation, 22 Jul.

Peacock, T. N. (2020) Cromwells "spymaster"? John Thurloe and rethinking early modern intelligence. Seventeenth Century, 35(1), pp. 3-30. (doi: 10.1080/0268117X.2018.1524786)

Books

Peacock, T. N. (2018) The British Tradition of Minority Government. Manchester University Press: Manchester. ISBN 9781526123268

Research Reports or Papers

Peacock, T. N. (2024) Written Evidence: Implications of the War in Ukraine for UK Defence. Documentation. UK Parliament.

Wong, M. , Peacock, T. , Porteous, R. and Watson, L. (2023) Video Game Research Innovation Starter Toolkit: A Beginners’ Guide for Innovation and Industry and Community Engagement. Project Report. University of Glasgow.

Exhibitions

Keith, N. et al. (2024) Emerging Ecologies of Health, Heritage, and Habitat: Looking into Living and Working in 2033. [Exhibitions]

Skeldon, K. et al. (2023) Research Firsts Exhibition. [Exhibitions]

Website

Peacock, T. N. , Porteous, R., Watson, P., Leeper Jr, M., Gurung, S., Macivor, J., Celico, G. and St Giles' Cathedral, (2024) Project HeritAIge - St Giles' Cathedral research-informed historical video game. [Website]

Wong, M. et al. (2023) Education Evolved - SEvEN: Seven Voices, One Future. [Website]

Peacock, T. N. , Barr, M. , Glasgow University Minecraft Society, and Ellisland Trust, (2022) Minecraft Ellisland. [Website]

Peacock, T. (2020) From Trinity to Trump: The Politics of Nuclear Memory in the 2020 Election. [Website]

Peacock, T. (2020) The Paradoxes of Power: Photographic records and postwar nuclear testing. [Website]

Peacock, T. (2020) Atomic Holiday Snaps? Depictions of ‘normality’ in the official photography of postwar atomic bomb tests. [Website]

This list was generated on Wed Dec 4 05:03:35 2024 GMT.

Grants

Selected funding includes:

  • PI for "Project CO-GREAT: CO-created Gamified Resilience Engagement Accessible Toolkit (historical and current rail transport resilience involving flooding) - EPSRC DARe Flex Funding £49k (2025)
  • Co-I for "Sci Seedlets: Developing Product Pipeline for Plant Science Education" - IAA BBSRC/MRC £25k awarded (lead for £3.5k work package) (2023-25)

 

  • PI for "Project HeritAIge: Exploring new AI augmented approaches for translating heritage into research-led educational games" (Main Project) - GKEF + St Giles Cathedral £13.9k + £7.2k matched support (2023-24)
  • PI for "Project HeritAIge" (Pilot Initiative) - Interface SFC Standard Innovation Voucher £4.8k + £4.9k matched support (2023)

  • PI for “Project Tempest: Enhanced wargaming of flooding crises through cross-disciplinary application of computer simulations from space junk `Earth environmental impacts'” - NERC funding, £8k

  • Co-I for Project INASSEM (Innovators Assemble) - Aspect Consortium, £10k
  • PI for Project Gamestorm (Pilot Scheme) - Reinvigorating Research Funding, £23k (2022)

  • PI for Minecraft Ellisland - COVID Recovery Funding, £6.5k (2022)
  • PI for “Exploring new cross-college ways of simulating ‘Earth environmental impacts’ of orbital debris/disaster” - NERC Discipline Hopping, £3k (2022)

  • PI for Project AWARE -Learning & Teaching Development Fund and further funding from partner organisations, £13.5k (2021)

  • PI for Glasgow Wargaming Initiative (GWI) - Learning and Teaching Development Fund Grant, £4k (2020)

  • British Library Eccles Centre Visiting Fellowship (2019-23)

  • Cross-College Themes Funding - Games and Gaming Symposium (2019)

Supervision

I am very happy to supervise on topics in American and British Political, Military, Technological and Sociocultural History in the Modern Era. I have also supervised topics on different areas of Early Modern History.

My current broad areas of interest include:

  • Nuclear History (civil and military) – including nuclear weapons testing, wargaming, popular culture/filmic representations, intelligence, and memorialisation
  • History of Space and Spaceflight - including security, space debris, policymaking, simulations, cultural impacts
  • Games and Gaming - including the use of history in games (whether physical or electronic), heritage gaming, wargaming, game culture, the history of games/gaming, the uses of games in learning
  • AI (Artificial Intelligence) - including responsible uses of AI, history, gaming/simulation, technology impacts
  • Political, military and sociocultural impacts of new technology
  • Politics - including elections, minority government/coalitions

Current PGR supervision includes:

  • Hanna, Stephen
    Evaluating Military Intelligence in War: The Burma Theatre of World War Two as a case study in objective focused analysis
  • O'Leary, Eleanor
    Valuing the Gaming Community: Preserving MMOs Through Co-Creation
  • Pasternack, Rhys
    Dark Souls and the Borders of Belief
  • Yue, Mengyuan
    Cultural diversity and remote working of UK NGO Employees

Previous supervision

I have supervised on a range of subjects, Undergraduate & Postgraduate Taught/Research, including, for example:

  • We Choose to Go to The Moon':  An analysis of newspaper media perceptions and the development of a cultural legacy following John F. Kennedy's 1962 'Rice University' speech
  • ‘I’d like to tell you about what I’ve been going through’: An examination of the video game L.A. Noire’s treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder
  • Articulations of Inclusivity in In-game Concerts: a Multi-case Study
  • EU representations of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in security debates 
  • How did the US domestic press response towards atomic weapon tests change during the 1950s?
  • Max ‘glaubt, er ist John Rambo!’: Cinematic Narrations of the Afghanistan Heimkehrer in Comparison to the Vietnam Veteran
  • Manned Orbiting Laboratory: America's Manned Military Spy Program in Space
  • Media perceptions of the Postwar Occupation of Japan

Teaching

Awards

  • Highly Innovative Teaching Award - Students Representative Council, University of Glasgow (2022)
  • UK Innovation in Teaching Award - Royal Historical Society (£1k) (2020)
  • Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (FRHistS) (2020)
  • University Teaching Excellence Award - University of Glasgow (£2k) (2018)
  • College of Arts Teaching Excellence Award - University of Glasgow (£1k) (2018)

 

Current Teaching

Postgraduate

  • THE AMERICAN WAY OF WAR: FROM THE REVOLUTION TO THE WAR ON TERROR (HIST5021)
  • GAMES AND GAMING HISTORY (HIST5165)
  • INTELLIGENCE ANALYSIS AND POLICY MAKING (HIST5138 - IMSISS CORE COURSE)

Honours courses

I have given guest lectures/seminars/Master Classes in different Subjects at the University of Glasgow, on topics from Spaceflight History to the uses of Gaming in Education.

I previously gave lectures/seminars to the MLitt in War Studies and Global Security Core Courses on the subject of: 

  • NUCLEAR DIPLOMACY: FROM TRUMAN TO TRUMP
  • AIR BATTLE OVER JAPAN IN WW2

I previously taught the Honours courses:

  • THE AGE OF EMPIRE: CONQUEST AND COLONIALISM IN THE 19TH CENTURY AND BEYOND
  • ATOMIC DREAMS: SOCIETY, SCIENCE AND SOLDIERS IN NUCLEAR AMERICA, 1945-1979

I have also previously taught lectures/seminars on:

  • HISTORY 2AM: SOCIETY, CULTURE & POLITICS IN NORTH AMERICA HIST2002
  • HISTORY 2A: THE SOCIAL AND CULTURAL HISTORY OF EUROPE, 1500-2000
  • HISTORY 2B: AN INTRODUCTION TO GLOBAL HISTORY

Research datasets

Additional information

My roles involving Innovation, Research, Knowledge Exchange, Management and/or Public Engagement include:

  • HACK the ARC (Advanced Research Centre) Project Team member since 2023.
  • Member of Academic Networks including BAAS (British Association for American Studies), SASA (Scottish Association for the Study of America), HOTCUS (Historians of the Twentieth Century United States), SDOS (Social Dimensions of Outer Space), Space Research Network Glasgow.