Lectures

The University of Oxford holds a number of prestigious annual lectures and events that bring some of the world's leading scholars to Oxford. Some of these lectures are dedicated to intellectual history whilst others are often of great interest to the community of intellectual historians at Oxford. On this page you can explore the links to find out more information. We also include details for upcoming lectures on our Events page.

The Carlyle Lectures

Dedicated to the History of Political Thought, these annual lectures cover a range of periods and geographical locations. Past lecturers include Quentin Skinner, Melissa Lane, Annabel Brett and Samuel Moyn.

Besterman Lectures

The Besterman Lectures in Enlightenment studies are hosted by the Voltaire Foundation and named after its founder, Theodore Besterman.

The Lyell Lectures

The Lyell Readership in Bibliography is endowed by a bequest from James Lyell (1871–1948). Each year since 1952, a distinguished scholar has been elected to deliver the lectures, usually six in number, on any topic of bibliography, broadly conceived.

The Isaiah Berlin Lectures

The Isaiah Berlin Visiting Professorship brings leading scholars in the history of philosophy or history of ideas to Oxford for a term in which they give a series of lectures.

The Dacre Lectures

Created in honour of Hugh Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton, Regius Professor of History at Oxford (1957-1980).

1280px high street oxford painting by turner 1810 crop

The James Ford Lectures in British History

The Ford Lectures in British History were founded by a bequest from James Ford, and inaugurated by S.R.Gardiner in 1896-7. Since then, an annual series has been delivered over six weeks in Hilary term.

Duncan Kelly (Univeristy of Cambridge), Worlds of Wartime: The First World War and the Reconstruction of Modern Politics

16 October

5th Anthony Gwilliam Annual Lecture 2026

Heena (University of Leicester), Beyond British Criticism: Religion, Print and Astrological Writings in 19th-century North India

19 October

South Asian Intellectual History Seminar

Book Discussion: Teresa Bejan (Oxford), First Among Equals: Visions of Equality Before Egalitarianism

19 October

Oxford Political Thought Seminar

18th Century World Map by Georg Matthaus Seutter

Gianamar Giovannetti-Singh (University of Amsterdam), Consider the Mantis: IKaggen, Means of Subsistence, and Misunderstanding Across the Cape Colonial Frontier

20 October

Global Intellectual History Seminar

Richard Laremont (State University of New York), From Ideology to Governance: The Transformation of Political Islam in the Twenty First Century

21 October

Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies

War & Peace Reading Group: Week 2

22 October