In 2006, he moved to The Open University, where he helped to chair the production of a new module, "Empire: 1492-1975 (A326)"., which has been delivered by blended online and traditional methods to several hundred students yearly since 2009.[6] From 2009 to December 2015 he was director of the Ferguson Centre for Asian and African Studies, editing its series of online working papers.[7] He has also served as head of the Open University History Department, and in August 2016 he became inaugural head of the new School of History, Religious Studies, Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology (HRSSC). In 2016 he also chaired production of an entirely online dissertation module, A329 The Making of Welsh History, which trialled new methods of direct authoring of online modules, and of involving students as co-educators in an intensive and continuous online learning community.[1] The dissertations are online here.
Public engagement
Together with Dr Kevin Blackburn of NTU, Dr Hack led the historical consultancy behind the new Singapore heritage site, the Johore Battery, which opened in 2002.[8][9] They also took the lead in organizing the 2005 Forum with the Wartime Generation at the Singapore History Museum and The Japanese Occupation Conference, which was open to students and the public at what is now known as the National Museum of Singapore.[5][10]
He was also the Open University's lead academic on the BBC series Empire – which was first aired on BBC One from February to May 2012 as well as being issued as a DVD – producing a historical poster, of which more than 63,700 hard copies were distributed. The latter was expanded into the website "Selling Empire: The Empire Marketing Board". (OpenLearn, The Open University), which has informed public understanding of the Empire Marketing Board in particular.[11] Other radio and television work has included interviews for Radio 4's Terror Through Time series, and appearing on Crisis in Malaya, Black Ops episode 8, series 2 (2014), talking about the Malayan Emergency.
In 2012 he was expert witness in the Penang High Court, testifying on the historically contested and diverse ways and degrees to which people could be defined as 'communist' in Malaysia and Singapore.[12][13]
He is also involved with the Imperial War Museum in a collaborative studentship, jointly supervising doctoral research on The Impact of postwar counter-insurgency on the British military.[14][15]
Personal life
In 1989, Karl married Vanessa Jones. Together they have two daughters and one son. He is a member of Oxford Hawks Hockey Club and was formerly a member of Ceylon Sports Club, Singapore.
Selected books
Defence and decolonisation in Southeast Asia : Britain, Malaya and Singapore 1941-1967. Richmond: Curzon. 2001. ISBN9780700713035.
Did Singapore have to fall? Churchill and the impregnable fortress. London: RoutledgeCurzon. 2004. ISBN9780415308038. With Kevin Blackburn.
Colonial armies in Southeast Asia. New York, NY: Routledge. 2005. ISBN9780415334136. Edited with Tobias Rettig
Dialogues with Chin Peng: new light on the Malayan Communist Party. Dialogues and papers originating from a workshop with Chin Peng held at the Centre for the Study of the Chinese Southern Diaspora, Australian National University, Canberra, 22-23 February 1999 (Repr. ed.). Singapore: Singapore University Press. 2004. ISBN978-9971-69-287-2.Singapore: NUS Press, 2004). Chinese edition in 2006. Edited with C.C. Chin.
Forgotten captives in Japanese-occupied Asia. London: Routledge. 2008. ISBN9780415426350. With Kevin Blackburn.
Singapore from Temasek to the 21st century : reinventing the global city. Singapore: NUS Press. 2010. ISBN978-9971-69-515-6. Edited with Jean-Louis Margolin and Karine Delaye. Also University of Chicago Press.
Les décolonisations au XXe siècle : la fin des empires européens et japonais. Paris: A. Colin. 2012. ISBN978-2-200-24945-8. With Pierre Brocheux et al.
'Detention, Deportation, and Resettlement: British Counterinsurgency and Malaya's Rural Chinese, 1948–60'. Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 43, 5 (2015), pp. 611–640
'Everyone lived in fear: Malaya and the British way of counter-insurgency'. Small Wars & Insurgencies, 23, 4–5 (2012), pp. 671–699