Dr Hiroki Shin FHEA

Dr Hiroki Shin

Department of History
Associate Professor in History of Energy and Environmental Humanities
125th Anniversary Fellow

Contact details

Address
Room 229, JG Smith Building
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

As a historian of energy, the environment and modern economies, my research interests include the histories of modern energy regimes, financial systems and transport. I am also active as a public historian, as I collaborate extensively with various museums.

Qualifications

  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, 2024
  • PhD in History, St Catharine’s College, University of Cambridge
  • MA in Area Studies (British Studies), University of Tokyo Graduate School
  • BA in Area Studies and International Politics, University of Tokyo

Biography

I am a historian of energy, the environment and modern economic systems (finance, trade and transport) from the eighteenth century to the present. I have written extensively on the historical evolution of modern energy regimes and the impact of energy-intensive societies on culture, everyday life and the natural environment in the Global South and North. Since receiving a PhD in economic history from the University of Cambridge, I have held various research and teaching posts at the University of York, the University of Manchester, Birkbeck College and Queen’s University Belfast.

I am currently involved in some major interdisciplinary research projects including the Future Island-Island project (as co-investigator), a part of the AHRC Green Transition Ecosystems scheme. I serve as a general editor for the Critical Energy Studies monograph series (MIT Press) along with Dominic Boyer, Cara Daggett, Penélope Plaza and Imre Szeman.

My current project examines the roles of cultural and heritage institutions in responding to today’s climate crisis as a way of envisaging society’s cultural adaptation to climate change. The project explores energy-related exhibitions and motion films in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, analysing how cultural media have shaped and changed the public’s understanding of energy technology and its future. In this project, I am working with several museums, science centres and other cultural institutions across the United Kingdom, Europe, Americas and Asia.

In addition to my work on energy history, I have published on the histories of transport marketing, paper currency and lotteries. 

Postgraduate supervision

Dr Shin welcomes enquiries about potential postgraduate projects on all aspects of energy history, environmental history and modern economic history.


Find out more - our PhD History  page has information about doctoral research at the University of Birmingham.

Research

My primary research interest is the evolution of modern energy regime at the national (especially Britain and Japan) and global levels. Between 2012 and 2015, I was co-investigator of the AHRC-funded major research project Material Cultures of Energy, an international research project that explored historical changes in energy consumption, infrastructure and energy culture from energy users’ perspectives. I subsequently led the Communicating Material Cultures of Energy project, based in the Science Museum London, which established an interdisciplinary, cross-sector platform for discussing the public communication of energy issues. I am currently working on two monograph projects: one on the history of Japan’s energy and the other on the decarbonisation of culture.

 

Financial History

I have just completed a monograph The Age of Paper: The Bank Note, Communal Currency and British Society, 1790s–1830s (Cambridge Studies in Economic History, Cambridge University Press), which is the first detailed examination of Britain’s transition to paper currency during the long eighteenth century. I am planning another research project to examine the long-term evolution of Britain’s credit currency system.

Transport History

Since my first research post at the University of York and the National Railway Museum, York, in the AHRC-Funded Commercial Cultures of Britain’s Railways, 1872­–1977, I have been interested in the cultural approach to transport history to discover the origin of hypermobility in our present time. I have published on the marketing of railway travel in Britain, railway advertising and on the culture of speed.

Public History

Public history is another strand of my academic interests. During my professional career, which cuts across research institutions and the museum sector, I have worked with numerous museums and businesses on exhibitions and public events. I have previously held positions at the Science Museum, London, and the National Railway Museum, York. Between 2021 and 2022, I was awarded a senior fellowship at the Smithsonian Institution in the United States to work on a research project Telling Stories of Energy in the Age of Climate Crisis: Energy Narratives in Climate Change Exhibitions, 1990s–2019.

Publications

Recent publications

Book

Shin, H 2025, The age of paper: the bank note, communal currency and British society, 1790s–1830s. Cambridge Studies in Economic History, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Wright, R, Shin, H & Trentmann, F 2019, Power, Energy and International Cooperation: A History of the World Energy Council, 1923–2018. Oekom Verlag.

Article

Shin, H 2024, 'Fukushima Before Nuclear Power: Developmentalism, Sub-States and the Landscape of Energy Extraction in Japan', Environmental History.

Shin, H 2018, 'Energy/Culture: A Reading Guide for Historical Literature', Science Museum Group Journal, vol. 9.

Divall, C & Shin, H 2018, 'Engineers v. industrial designers: The struggle for professional control over the British Railways Mark 2 Coach, c. 1955–66', Journal of Transport History, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 145-169. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022526618768417

Chapter (peer-reviewed)

Shin, H & Chappells, H 2021, The making of energy consumers: from mutual provisioning to mass markets and beyond. in J Webb, F Wade & M Tingey (eds), Research Handbook on Energy and Society. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 45-56. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781839100710.00012

Shin, H 2019, At the Edge of the Network of Power in Japan, c.1910s–1960s. in S Abram, BR Winthereik & T Yarrow (eds), Electrifying Anthropology: Exploring Electrical Practices and Infrastructures. Bloomsbury, pp. 101–119.

Chapter

Shin, H 2024, Japan: how has fear of energy scarcity led to techno-utopian inertia? in I Szeman & J Wenzel (eds), Energized: Keywords for a New Politics of Energy and Environment. West Virginia University Press.

Shin, H & Trentmann, F 2019, Energy Shortages and the Politics of Time: Resilience, Redistribution and ‘Normality’ in Japan and East Germany, 1940s–1970s. in J Brewer, N Fromer & F Trentmann (eds), Scarcity in the Modern World: History, Politics, Society and Sustainability, 1800–2075. Bloomsbury, pp. 247–265.

Shin, H & Trentmann, F 2019, The Material Politics of Energy Disruption: Managing Shortages Amidst Rising Expectations, Britain 1930s–60s. in Money and Markets: Essays in Honour of Martin Daunton. Boydell and Brewer, pp. 263–280.

Shin, H 2018, Between Luxury and Necessity: Electricity in Britain, 1920s–1950s. in H Shin, Y Tanaka & S Majima (eds), Objects, Desire and Sociability: History of Consumer Culture. Forum for History of Consumer Culture, Tokyo, pp. 66-73.

Book/Film/Article review

Shin, H 2024, 'Let There Be Light: How Electricity Made Modern Hong Kong: By Mark L. Clifford. New York: Columbia University Press, 2023. Pp. 312.', Technology and Culture, vol. 65, no. 3, 1010-1011. https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a933111

Shin, H 2024, 'Carbon technocracy: Energy regimes in modern East Asia. Victor Seow, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2021. pp. 376. 25 figs. ISBN: 9780226826554. Pbk. $27.50)', The Economic History Review. https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13380

Shin, H 2023, 'Ian M. Miller, Fir and Empire: The Transformation of Forests in Early Modern China Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2020. Pp. 265. ISBN 978-0-2957-4733-0. $40.00 (hardback).', The British Journal for the History of Science, vol. 56, no. 4, pp. 602-603. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007087423000602

Other contribution

Shin, H & Chappells, H 2021, Energy Communication Toolkit. Science Museum, London. <https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/sites/default/files/2023-09/Energy-Communication-Toolkit-pv1_web.pdf>

View all publications in research portal