About
Dr Simon Brooks is an interdisciplinary scholar who works across many fields including history, the history of ideas, multiculturalism, political theory and public policy. He also has an interest in language planning.
His seminal monograph, Why Wales never was (2017), argues that the collapse of the Welsh language in 19th century Wales, and non-development of a significant national movement, can be attributed to the strength of liberal universalism in Wales at that time.
In 2018, he published an autoethnographic study of a Welsh-speaking community in north-west Wales, Adra (Home).
His latest book, to be published this year, Hanes Cymry (A History of the Welsh), will be the first book-length general history of ethnic minorities in Wales.
Dr Brooks has published previously a monograph on the Enlightenment, and co-edited a book of collected essays on language planning.
He is the General Editor for the University of Wales Press of a series of intellectual biographies, Dawn Dweud.
Dr Brooks has been appointed to advise Government as a member of the Welsh Language Partnership Council. He currently chairs the Council’s Group on use of Welsh in the community following the Covid-19 crisis.
He is a member of the University’s Morgan Academy.