Last week, Luís Trindade, Zélia Pereira and José Neves had three new projects related to the 25th of April funded by the FCT as part of the “25th of April and Portuguese Democracy” call.

The project “Memory and Revolution. An oral history archive of grassroots politics in the 1974-75 revolutionary process“, coordinated by Luís Trindade, aims to “develop an oral history archive with militants from the Portuguese Revolution”. Focussing on grassroots politics, the project team will carry out “interviews with militants and will use this source in public discussions about social memory and in drawing up an innovative history ‘from below'”. Besides the principal investigator (PI), the team will include Francisco Bairrão Ruivo (IHC and Aljube Museum), Joana Craveiro, Ricardo Noronha, Rita Lucas Narra, Rita Luís and Victor Pereira (IHC), and Miguel Cardina (CES — University of Coimbra).

Zélia Pereira and Pedro Aires Oliveira (co-PI) proposed a project focused on the decolonisation of East Timor: “Auditing Decolonisation in Timor-Leste, 1974-82: the Riscado Report“. The PIs explain that East Timor was “the only territory where the process of negotiation with local political forces did not lead to independence”, but rather to invasion by the Republic of Indonesia on 7 December 1975. “The process that led to this outcome remains one of the most controversial issues of the end of the Portuguese empire,” but “the recent declassification of a collection of documents relating to these events sheds new light on this critical historical moment.”

Finally, José Neves and Diego Palacios Cerezales (co-PI, Complutense University of Madrid), through IN2PAST, had their project “Revolution, towards the history of the concept. Analysing portuguese parliamentary debates, 1821-2024“. Focusing on the “idea of revolution”, which has shaped “ways of intervening and interpreting reality all over the world”, the team will analyse “the frequency and meanings of the use of the term revolution/revolutions in Portuguese parliamentary debates”, contributing “to a history of the concept in Portuguese political culture”. The PIs are joined by Joana Dias Pereira, Daniel Alves, Rita Luís and José Miguel Ferreira (IHC), João Mineiro (CRIA ISCTE), Paulo Silveira e Sousa (CHAM — NOVA FCSH), Ana Drago and Miguel Cardina (CES — University of Coimbra), Goffredo Adinolfi (CIES ISCTE), Tiago Fernandes (CEI ISCTE), and Bruno Damásio (NOVA IMS).

With total funding of around 75,000 euros, awarded by the FCT under the protocol signed with the Mission Structure for the Celebrations of the 50º Anniversary of the Revolution of 25 April 1974, the projects will run from 2024 to 2026.

Picture: © FCT