UM student awarded Farsons Foundation Prize

Kirsty Grech, who recently graduated from the University of Malta with a B.A. Honours in European and Global History, was awarded the Farsons Foundation Prize for best History honours thesis (2020).

The Prize was set up in February 2014, as part of a Memorandum of Understanding between Simonds Farsons Cisk plc, the Farsons Foundation and the University of Malta. The Award is funded by Farsons for the seventh year running. The selection of the winning thesis is made by the History Department.

Kirsty’s thesis, entitled ‘New Spain: Aspects of Life in 16th-century colonial Mexico,’ focuses on the experience that the Nahua society in the city of Tenochtitlan underwent under Spanish imperial rule. It steps away from eurocentrism by focusing on the colonised, and the slow but steady eradication of an indigenous culture, conversion to Christianity, the remodelling of an entire city along Spanish lines and the creation of a new social hierarchy based on ethnicity.

The Prize was presented by Mr Michael Farrugia, Director at Simonds Farsons Cisk and Trustee on the Board of The Farsons Foundation, himself a graduate of History from Edinburgh University. Mr Farrugia congratulated Ms Grech for her performance, and expressed his hope that the prize would continue to act as an incentive for students to aim for excellence.