Master of Arts in History

January 15, 2009 by Tara Brabazon

Tara's Master of Arts was a research degree based in the History Department at the University of Western Australia. It was titled "Framed pretty little Eloi? Beatle Photographs and the Construction of Image." It continued Tara's exploration of the limits of written dissertations, with sonic footnotes included as part of the final dissertation.

It was graded Passed with Distinction in 1992 by two examiners, Professor John Fiske and Professor Iain Chambers.

The Masters took an under-researched path through Beatle history. It investigated the transformations to Beatles iconography beyond the 1960s, with discussions of poster industries, the reissue of Beatle albums on compact disc, the Abbey Road Crosswalk and Liverpool's emerging tourism industry focussing on the band.

Two articles and a book chapter were published from this thesis:

“From Penny Lane to Dollar Drive: Liverpool and a Beatle-led recovery”, Public History Review, Vol. 2, 1993, pp. 108-22

“Reclaiming the visual world: Beatlemania, Beatle photographs and a female gaze”, in P. Hetherington and P. Maddern (eds.), Sexuality and Gender in History, (Perth: Optima Press, 1993)

“We’re one short for the crossing: the reading of a wall,” Transformations, Visual Memory Special Issue, http://www.transformationsjournal.org/journal/issue_03/pdf/brabazon.pdf, Vol. 3, 2002

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