Commemoration and Creativity
POSTGRADUATE FORUM
COMMEMORATION AND CREATIVITY
Saturday 10 March 2018, 9am-5pm
Oxford Brookes University, Headington Campus, Headington Road, OX3 0BP
This exciting Postgraduate Creative Forum explores and compares the ways in which commemorative practices across cultures both contribute to and challenge post-war reconstruction and reconciliation. The one-day event is aimed at postgraduate students across the Humanities and Social Sciences. You are invited to showcase your work in short presentations (max. 5 minutes) and there will also be discussion and activities exploring how creative and sensorial thinking might illuminate and enrich your research.
This is an opportunity for you to experiment with innovative ways of presenting your research in a short format. You might, for example, focus on a question such as: What is the keystone of my argument? Can I summarise my thesis in a sentence? What is my most important finding so far? The rationale is that distilling and presenting the essence of your research will help you to think about it in a new way and thereby produce fresh insights.
We invite submissions on any aspect of post-war commemoration. Please send an abstract of 250 words and a short biography (max. 150 words) in a single Word document to catherine.gilbert@ell.ox.ac.uk by Monday 29 January 2018. Applicants will be notified of the outcome in early February.
Possible topics for presentations include, but are not limited to:
- The modes and genres of post-war commemoration
- The beneficiaries of post-war commemoration
- The ways in which post-war commemoration contributes to reconstruction and reconciliation
- The future of post-war commemoration, including digital commemoration
- The politics of post-war commemoration
- Post-war commemorative monuments and/or museums
- Post-war commemoration and place/space, ecology and the environment
- Post-war memory
- Post-war commemoration and trauma
- Commemoration in relation to post-war displacement, migration, settlement and belonging
- Diasporic / exilic post-war commemoration
- Post-war commemoration and the body
- Comparative post-war commemoration
‘Post-war’ can relate to any conflict and we welcome submissions addressing commemoration across cultures and time periods. AV equipment will be available and you are welcome to use PowerPoint.
In addition to the presentations, the day will offer two sessions designed to explore how creative and practical activities can extend and transform academic thinking:
• Three of our Series poets-in-residence, Susie Campbell, Mariah Whelan and Sue Zatland, will lead a Poetry Workshop, in which they will read their own poems and invite you to think about how the cognitive processes involved in creating poetry might be applied to academic research and writing.
• Dr Justine Shaw (University of Oxford) will lead a Candle-Pouring, in which you will create your own memory candle scented with ‘rosemary for remembrance’ (Hamlet). As you do so, you will be invited to explore ways in which an understanding of the senses and the body might contribute to your own academic practice.
The day is FREE to attend and will include lunch and refreshments.
A number of small travel bursaries (up to £50) will be available. If you wish to apply for a travel bursary, please include a short paragraph (max. 300 words) in your application, detailing how your work fits with the themes of the Series and how your research will benefit from attending the Postgraduate Forum.
Click here to view the event listing.
