Welcome to 2022 in the School of English and Drama.
We’re excited to welcome our students back to campus for our second semester later this month and to meet so many potential new students at our offer holder days and events.
January UCAS deadline for equal consideration is 26 January 2022. We would love to receive an application from you before this deadline. Please contact sed-admissions@qmul.ac.uk if you need help with undergraduate admissions.
PhD application deadline January 19 for QMUL and January 28 for LAHP. Please contact sed-research@qmul.ac.uk if you need any help with these.
Our offer holder days are a great chance to meet students and staff from the course to get a feel for the course and inspiring community you could join.
Martin Welton (Drama) featured issue of Ambiances Just published – co-edited by Chloé Déchery (Paris 8 Vincennes) and Martin Welton (QMUL), the second volume of a special issue on Staging Atmospheres in the journal Ambiances: The International Journal of Sensory Environment, Architecture and urban Space.
Tobi Poster-Su (Drama) writes onSculpting China: Critical Puppetry and the Formation of Diasporic Identity for Critical Stages
The article explores the ways puppetry might resist and disrupt racial constructions of identity in Tobi Poster-Su’s performance as research project Chang and Eng and Me (and Me).
Award-winning writer and historian Professor Jerry Brotton (English) and journalist Shafi Musaddique explored Tudor links with the Islamic world with the British Library.
Links and Opportunities
Student Opportunity
I Am You Anthology Project – working with young people on the Equality Act
Happy new year and we hope you are well. We are writing to you about an exciting upcoming student opportunity. The Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre (QMLAC) http://www.lac.qmul.ac.uk/ are bringing together an inter-disciplinary student working group to run an exciting project with 9 and 10 year old children. The project will build on the current work of the QMLAC I Am You project (http://www.lac.qmul.ac.uk/clients/community-projects/i-am-you/) which runs workshops in local primary schools on the Equality Act.
This opportunity will teach students about the protected characteristics in the Equality Act 2010, and support and empower them to write personal reflections (poems / stories etc.). These reflections will them be compiled into a hard copy anthology with a launch event in the spring where we will host a recital for the young people to present their work to their families.
We are looking to bring together a group of:
3 Law students
4 English students
3 Drama students
2 Marketing students
Students can be from any year of studies (post graduate or undergraduate) as long as they are committed, engaged and available for the entirety of the project.
Together the team will be trained to design and deliver;
a training video and document to launch the competition to local 9 and 10 year olds,
a judging panel to select the best contributions to for the anthology,
The first compulsory meeting for this project will be held online from 3-5pm on the 19th January where the team will come together and plan the project.
How to get involved?
If you are interested in being involved in this unique interdisciplinary opportunity please send a CV and cover email explaining why you are interested tolac@qmul.ac.uk by Monday 17th January at 10.00am. We will aim to let applicants know if they have been successful noon on the 18th January. Please be aware that the first session is compulsory and so we encourage all applying to ensure they are free 3-5pm on the 19th January.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to get in touch with the QMLAC team at lac@qmul.ac.uk.
LAHP 2022/23 Collaborative Doctoral Award Projects Recruiting
Performance-based co-creation with young people as political activism: contextualising and disseminating the work of Fevered Sleep
Collaborative Doctoral Award in collaboration with Queen Mary University of London and Fevered Sleep
Thanks to all of our students, staff and friends for their support in this tough year. We have had some highlights even in these times and want to take a pause to reflect…
1. Guardian Good University Guide Success
The School of English and Drama has been named #2 for Drama, #6 for Creative Writing and #25 for English in the latest Times Good University Guide 2022.
Mojisola won the prestigious award for her play ‘Family Tree’ which premiered at Greenwich + Docklands International Festival 2021 in September. We took first year drama students, alumni and ambassadors to the show which tells the story of Henrietta Lacks, whose cells were harvested without her permission and used until now in science experiments.
Martin O’Brien in ‘The Last Breath Society (Coughing Coffin)’ performed at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, August 2021, image by Holly Revell.
Dr Martin O’Brien from the School of English and Drama has been announced as a winner of the 2021 Leverhulme prize. Dr O’Brien’s work explores the performance and representation of illness and disability and stems from his experience of living with a severe chronic illness.
5. Lois Weaver performed Last Gasp: A Recalibration at Barbican
‘Returning to the stage after almost two years, two icons of lesbian-feminist theatre gather us in the same room, but not as the same people. Speaking directly, they question the demise of ageing bodies, civil conversation, and a sustainable planet. Shaw’s poetic musings are interspersed with Weaver’s micro dance essays in which she wryly upends ‘how to’ mania.’
6. Warren Boutcher’s Text Dive Global projected awarded €2 Million
TextDiveGlobal will investigate multiple texts from around the continent and the world and will produce an interdisciplinary literary history of Europe and its global connections for the period between the mid-sixteenth and mid-seventeenth centuries.
Andrea Brady has had three books published in 2021 – check out her work on her website here.
Jerry Brotton’s fellowship at the University of Columbia next Autumn.
Micaela Signorelli’s CPE Large Grant of £10,000 to work with Shana Swiss and Stage 3 Company (in association with People’s Palace Projects).
Deven Parker and Michael Gamer have finally managed, amidst various Covid delays and archive closures, to finish photographing all of the playbills from the British Library that they require for the Romantic Melodrama project. The total image count is now around 160,000. Now all they have to do is find all of the melodramatic needles in that massive haystack.
Charlotte Jones ran a successful in-person Symposium on “The Paris Commune at 150” featuring a sparkling range of international speakers.
Isabel Rivers gave a paper on ‘Joseph Angus as Moral Philosophy Tutor at Stepney and Regent’s Park’ on 28 October 2021 to the online Opening the Angus Seminar at Regent’s Park College, Oxford.
Among its many successes this year, People’s Palace Projects (based at QMUL) were awarded £149,966 from AHRC for another phase of their work in Brazil’s Iron Quadrangle: “Roots of Resilience: building secure societies through preserving cultural heritage”
Did we miss a nice thing that happened in 2021? Leave a comment below…
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
Expressions of interest from Queen Mary colleagues in all disciplines are welcome as part of an interdisciplinary research project on ‘Solitude and Social Difference’. The aim is to investigate how the social divisions and inequalities of our society affect people’s experiences of solitude and loneliness.
The project is still at development stage, and any expressions of interest or questions can be directed to Barbara Taylor (b.g.taylor@qmul.ac.uk)
The Journo Resources Fellowship is an intensive scheme to support people looking for their first break in journalism. It offers a paid commission for our website, bespoke training in both job hunting and reporting skills, 1-2-1 mentoring, and a supportive community to help you take your first steps within the journalism industry.
Sign up to get trained and become part of the fight for Climate Justice in East London.
Be.Green is a free 4-month programme that builds young climate activists. We are part of an exciting borough wide initiative, JustFACT, which brings together partners from across the borough to work towards a socially just food and climate transition.
Be.Green participants are engaged in a series of workshops from local changemakers to national troublemakers who are working on innovative and inspiring climate projects, receiving workshops from Organise, R-Urban, Sunny Jar and London Leap, amongst others.
After soaking up the learning you will work on real life projects and campaigns which will create or support change in Tower Hamlets. Our first cohort have been engaged in Be.Green since July 2021 and have attended a range of exciting workshops and events, and made a trip to COP26! They have also created a Zine which showcases local people’s views towards climate change and highlights some key issues which you will be able to view in print and online by December 2021.
Our second cohort is due to start in January 2022 and applications are now open. Please express your interest here!
Talkaoke Skills Lab is a hybrid cross-border creative development opportunity, exploring the question of what does a creative and socially engaged practice means in the global community, where technology plays an ever increasing role?
The programme is for UK and Uganda-based artists, performers, writers, creative producers, cultural programmers and everyone who is interested in pushing the boundaries of socially engaged creative practice.
I’d love to invite your team and your wider network of collaborators to consider getting involved. You could alsovhelp us getting the word out to the world via a social media post or sharing of our existing Twitter post / Facebook post.
Looking forward to speaking with you soon!
Hello friends of Raze! We hope you’re all doing okay in these wild wintery times! We’re writing to you with news of a fabulous new call-out which we currently have open!
If this sounds like something you’d be interested in, you’ve two weeks left to apply! Got a friend who’d be perfect for it? Share it with them!
– are you a queer writer based in London? – do you have a short story of around 2,500 words (15-20mins)? – would you love to have it recorded & creatively sound designed? – would you & your work benefit from the support of a dedicated team of queer arts producers? – do you want connect with other more experience queer storytellers? – do you want your stories, to reacher wider audiences?
THE COMMISSION Application Deadline: 29.12.2021 You will will receive: – a £350 commission fee – expert directorial support in the recording of the story – creative sound design & production support – weekly check-ins & support with the Raze Team – guidance on network support & relationship building -Your work published as the first instalment of our Raze Sounds audio series
As ever, thanks for supporting all the work we do & making it possible for us support incredible queer performance!
Final year UG Drama Students from Performance in The Gallery led by Martin O’Brien are putting up a live-art exhibition space tomorrow from 1100-2100 as part of their final performances.
There will be live performances including durational works, photographic and video installations as well as other set installations from the 18 students on the module being presented all throughout ArtsOne and ArtsTwo.
Audiences are welcome to walk in and out throughout the day as they please and a schedule is provided with the specific times of artist performances. Some refreshments will also be provided.
Everyone is welcome to come and support the artists in their final works.
Full programme with works and titles to be released soon but get a flavour of where and when in the table below…
Student
Gallery Space
Performance Time
Ellie
RR1
11.00-13.00
Clera
RR1
13.30-15.30
Eirini
RR1
16.00-21.00
Tallulah
RR2
15.00-21.00
Joana
RR2
15.00-21.00
Arzum
RR2
15.00-21.00
Thomas W
RR2
15.00-21.00
Tom L
Pinter
14.00-16.00 – Live action 18.00-21.00 – Exhibition
Gus
Pinter
14.00-17.00
Pianka
Pinter
18.00-21.00
Lammin
Pinter
18.00-21.00
Sophia
G18 (Film Studio)
11.00-13.00
Megan
G18 (Film Studio)
14.00-16.00
Issac
G18 (Film Studio)
17.00-20.00
Bet
FADS
20.30-21.00
Emma
FADS
15.00-18.00
Maria
Arts One Foyer
11.00-21.00
Ata
Arts One Foyer (streamed from remote location TBC)
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
Book Launch: Bad English: Literature, Multilingualism, and the Politics of Language in Contemporary Britain (2020) by Rachael Gilmour. A convivial conversation between Rachael, Nisha and Juliette will be followed by a reception.
Come to Queen Mary’s Great Hall at the People’s Palace for a Victory Day concert featuring Naz & Bolly Flex, Mumzy, Nish, Khiyo, IMD, Iksy, Taal Torongo and DJ Osmani Soundz.
Mojisola Adebayo (Drama) has been shortlisted for the Alfred Fagon Award for Best New Play of the Year for ‘Family Tree‘. Family Tree is inspired by the life of Henrietta Lacks whose cells were unlawfully used in medical trials for hundreds of years.
Rehana Ahmed and Nadia Atia (English) are guest editors of the latest edition of Wasafiri Magazine titled: House of Wisdom: Libraries and Literatures of Islam.
Alumnus Tomiwa Owolade’s book has been acquired byAtlantic and W.F. Howes This is Not America: Why We Need a New Conversation about Race. Tom studied BA English Literature and graduated in 2018 and Nathalie Grey profiled him for Black History Month last month.
Craft Podcast Over the last year, Wasafiri’s Publishing Director, Malachi McIntosh (with support by members of the Wasafiri team) has been hard at work designing and recording Craft – a literary podcast featuring a range of international writers, including Daniel Mella, Chen Chen, Bernadine Evaristo, and Raymond Antrobus. Craft removes the constraints of the interview form, allowing guests to explore their work and processes on their own terms, and creating an immersive and intimate experience for the listener. The first episode with Nina Mingya Powles launched last month. We are proud that Wasafiri Magazine is based at Queen Mary University of London.
Solitudes Project podcast Spaces of Solitude wins Lovie Silver Award for the podcast episode ‘The Mind’ won Silver in Individual Episode category! The episode was produced by Natalie Steed, presented by Hetta Howes (PhD graduate) and curated by Akshi Singh.⠀Huge thanks to contributors Sarah Garfinkel, Denise Riley and Adam Philips.
Tiffany Watt-Smith (Drama)’s new book Bad Friend: A Love Story, a “necessary and timely” meditation on female friendship has been acquired by Faber & Faber.
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
Craft is brought to you by Wasafiri, the magazine of international contemporary writing. Check out our website (www.wasafiri.org) for outtakes from this interview that didn’t (quite) make the final cut, and much more from writers all over the world.
REMINDER: Upcoming event in week 10 – a talk by Ed Charlton (English, QMUL). Register by email, or through this form: https://forms.office.com/r/FeUpKRUKEU
Join us for the first focused engagement symposium on Interpersonal Violence and Violence Reduction hosted by SMD Crisis Network. Speakers include our very own Paul Heritage (Drama/People’s Palace Projects). The new Queen Mary & SMD Crisis Network is pleased to host our first focused engagement symposium on Interpersonal Violence and Violence Reduction. We aim to connect researchers from across all Schools & Faculties in the University who have an active academic interest in this area, and to explore new directions and collaborations for future research, education and engagement.
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
Join Rachael House, legend of the comic strip and queer zine scene, for a free two-hour zine making workshop in the Art Studio on the theme of queer Wonderland.
Talks Programme
Hochhauser Auditorium, Sackler Centre 11.30 – 15.00
Join Dr Kiera Vaclavik, Curator Alice Power, Queer Bruk founder Akeil Onwukwe-Adamson, and Quiplash for insightful talks about queer communities and identity.
11.30 – 12.00 Alice is a Boy’ with Dr Kiera Vaclavik
This talk explores the instability about identity at the heart of the Alice books and shows how ‘gender blind’ casting of the central role was for many years a feature of theatrical adaptations.
13.30 – 14.00 Finding queer communities through digital rabbit holes with Alice Power
Many journalists have put the blame of the closure of LGBTQ venues on social media and dating apps. Assistant Curator of Architecture and Urbanism, Alice Power, however, contends that from its inception the internet has been a vital tool community building for marginalised groups.
14.15 – 15.00 Making LGBTQ intersectional Wonderlands with Queer Bruk and Quiplash
This panel highlights two organisations striving to cultivate intersectional queer spaces to counter the mainstream gay scene.
ECRs Work in Progress Seminars
We would love to invite you to the first session of the ECR Work in Progress Seminars at the SED! The event will take place on Wednesday December 8th, 4:00-5:30pm atArts Two, 3.20. We will be hosting two speakers from the School of English, and the panel will be followed by a Q&A.
Dr Deven Parker – Byron’s Poetic Cartographies
This paper examines cartography as a popular and hotly contested form of representing the Peninsular war and argues for its centrality to the poetics of Byron’s Childe Harold. I explore how innovations in mapping, coupled with the British public’s desire to visualize the events of the war, created a new market for published military maps. The popularity of these maps coincided with the rise of body of poetry I term “cartographic war poetry” that was directly informed by and sometimes even published with popular war maps. I demonstrate how cartographic war poetry remediates the perspectives of the maps themselves, deploying a series of formal and textual strategies to anesthetize military violence and advancing the government’s case for continuing a war facing significant opposition. Byron seeks to intervene in these literary and political contexts, replicating the perspective of both military maps and cartographic war poems in order to expose its ideological underpinnings. Toggling between the distant, birds-eye perspective of war cartography and a much closer view, Byron reveals, I argue, the problem with cartographic representation: that its guise of accuracy and objectivity actually furthers violence.
Dr Clare Stainthorp – Freethought Dialogue and Debate in the Secular Review/Agnostic Journal
The freethought movement’s periodicals grew and sustained a space in which atheist, agnostic, and secularist ideas could be developed and debated during the second half of the nineteenth century. Reading, writing for, and editing periodicals built social networks, imagined communities, and feelings of shared endeavour. Nonetheless, the freethought movement was not built on a single homogenous platform; factionalism and infighting were rife. Debates and dialogues looked both inward and outward, and proliferated in various ways. This paper focuses on the Sunday weekly periodical that began life in 1876 as The Secular Review: A Journal of Daily Life and was titled The Agnostic Journal and Eclectic Review in 1907 when it ceased publication. I will explore how dialogic forms (specifically verbatim debate reports, imagined dialogues, readers’ letters, and correspondence columns) functioned and consider how the heterogeneity and multivocality of freethought was navigated by those involved in the movement.
Teaching and Learning for Neuro and Physical Diversity
Sumita Majumdar and Daniel Oliver wrote a chapter together for this book that’s just come out.
Inclusivity and Equality in Performance Training focuses on neuro and physical difference and dis/ability in the teaching of performance and associated studies. It offers 19 practitioners’ research-based teaching strategies, aimed to enhance equality of opportunity and individual abilities in performance education.
Challenging ableist models of teaching, the 16 chapters address the barriers that can undermine those with dis/ability or difference, highlighting how equality of opportunity can increase innovation and enrich the creative work. Key features include:
Descriptions of teaching interventions, research, and exploratory practice to identify and support the needs and abilities of the individual with dis/ability or difference
Experiences of practitioners working with professional actors with dis/ability or difference, with a dissemination of methods to enable the actors
A critical analysis of pedagogy in performance training environments; how neuro and physical diversity are positioned within the cultural contexts and practices
Equitable teaching and learning practices for individuals in a variety of areas, such as: dyslexia, dyspraxia, visual or hearing impairment, learning and physical dis/abilities, wheelchair users, aphantasia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and autistic spectrum.
This lecture will explore the formative influence of art school education within post-punk music culture. It will address the work of electro-pop and industrial music pioneer Fad Gadget (a.k.a. Frank Tovey) as a response to the avant-garde shock tactics of experimental performance by staff and students in the Fine Art department at Leeds Polytechnic in the mid-1970s. The presentation is based upon Butt’s forthcoming book No Machos or Popstars: When the Leeds Art Experiment Went Punk (forthcoming Duke University Press, 2022).
Our very own Di Beddow is featured in this exhibition in Cambridge.
This exhibition looks at the rich history of poetry about Cambridge, by focusing on poems and poets concerned with the places of the city. From Geoffrey Chaucer to the lesser-known Mary Davys, Sylvia Plath to William Wordsworth, poets both inside and outside the University have been moved to write about different areas of Cambridge. As well as transporting readers as far as Grantchester and Trumpington, these poems also help us shed new light on central locations, such as the Mill Pond and Market Hill.
Yesssssss you read that right! We’re offering 100 masters’ scholarships at 18 Preferred Partner universities in the areas of:
Media and Journalism
Tech
Sustainability
Policy
Law
Creative Content
We ask university partners to commit to tackling Islamophobia on campus and in higher education. Wondering why your preferred university isn’t on our list? Reach out to them and ask them to join our programme! Want to learn more about the scholarships?
The Women & Power festival at Shakespeare’s Globe will ask some of the most important questions of our moment. Join the conversation to discover the role that theatre, music, art and poetry can play in exploring the intersections of gender, race and class that are at the centre of social change today. How does the work of Shakespeare speak to this moment of gender revolution? How can we use Shakespearean performance to tell our own stories of oppression and assault?
This festival includes performances, panel events, a scholarly symposium and workshops that will spotlight and prioritise the work and the voices of women of all backgrounds.
Ever wondered what it’s like to work as a designer at Google? Or what the team look for in a great design portfolio? On Wednesday December 1st, Creative Lives in Progress is teaming up with Google Creative Lab to host a portfolio review for emerging designers. Apply to take part via Homerun.
Good to Go Festival at Theatre Deli London highlights artists whose work was cancelled due to the pandemic.
History of Political Ideas Seminar, Institute of Historical Research:
Shatema Threadcraft (Vanderbilt), ‘The Labors of Resurrection: Black Women, Death Work and the Making of the Black Counterpublic Sphere’
Wednesday 24 November 17.15 – 18.30 GMT
The seminar takes place on Zoom. To attend please register here. You will then be sent a link to join on the day.
Channel 5 Eggheads Opportunity
Eggheads is back for a second series on Channel 5 and we are looking for teams to take part.
Teams can be made up of friends, family, colleagues or members of clubs – whether you quiz regularly, started during lockdown or maybe this will be your first time.
Each team will consist of 4 team members and 1 standby.
If you beat the Eggheads you could win a cash prize. If you don’t the prize fund rolls over.
We would love it if you could share our flyer (attached) on social media, or forward it to people/students/colleagues who you think would be interested.
The closing date for applications is midnight on 10th December 2021 so don’t miss out on applying!
Thursday 2 December / Reference Point / £3.50 entry (+fees) / Tickets We’re excited to be celebrating the winner of the 2021 White Review Short Story Prize, sponsored by RCW, at Reference Point on 2 December. This year’s prize was awarded to RZ Baschir for ‘The Chicken’. On behalf of the judging panel, Preti Taneja said that the story ‘announces her as a brilliant new talent.’ Join us for short readings, followed by drinks in Reference Point’s bookshop and bar space. Issues of The White Review will be on sale, as well as Reference Point’s unique collection of first editions.
Theatre publishers Nick Hern Books are bringing their first-ever pop-up bookshop to acclaimed London new-writing venue the Bush Theatre for two days only on Friday 19 and Saturday 20 November! Choose from a massive range of playscripts and books all at amazing, one-off bargain prices, with hundreds available for just £2. Find out more
Further sources of interesting events, opportunities and jobs are…
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
Free event this Sunday in the People’s Palace Great Hall
The remarkable story of 1971’s Stepney Words, with Chris Searle, Stepney Words poets, historians, activists and today’s young voices.
In 1971, English teacher Chris Searle was sacked from a school in Stepney for publishing his students’ poems about their perspectives on the world around them. His students, joined by others from local schools, went on strike and marched from the East End to Trafalgar Square to demand justice. Fifty years later, Chris and his pupils, with historians and grassroots activists, reflect on Stepney then and now, student strikes then and now, and the continuing radical potential of poetry. The afternoon will end with performances from today’s young poets.
Speakers include: Chris Searle, Alan Gilbey, Tony Harcup, Judith Suissa, Ken Worpole, Julie Begum, Rob Waters, Tom Woodin, Angela Hancock, Alan Dein, Nadia Valman with poets Dillon Kalyabe and Becksy Becks.
Want to know how literary realism renders quantitative facts qualitatively perceptible? Don’t miss Prof. David Kurnick’s talk on “The Erotics of Large Numbers” next week!
Please join us for the launch of a new book Entanglements of Two: A Series of Duets, edited by Karen Christopher and Mary Paterson, and published by Intellect Books. The event will include contributions from Karen Christopher, Mary Paterson, David Berman (Physics, QMUL), Andrea Milde and Jemima Yong.
QUORUM committee is excited to invite you to a free seminar hosted by QUORUM at Queen Mary University and online on 24 November: This lecture will explore the formative influence of art school education within post-punk music culture. It will address the work of electro-pop and industrial music pioneer Fad Gadget (a.k.a. Frank Tovey) as a response to the avant-garde shock tactics of experimental performance by staff and students in the Fine Art department at Leeds Polytechnic in the mid-1970s. The presentation is based upon Butt’s forthcoming book No Machos or Popstars: When the Leeds Art Experiment Went Punk (forthcoming Duke University Press, 2022).
Thursday 25 November, 7.00pm – 8.00pm UK time – Online – Free, but booking is essential
A strong emotional attachment to the memory of empire runs deep in British culture. In recent years, that memory has become a battleground in a long-drawn ideological war, inflecting debates on race, class, gender, culture, the UK’s future and its place in the world. Peter Mitchell’s Imperial Nostalgia surveys the scene of the imperial memory wars in contemporary Britain, exploring how the myths that structure our views of empire came to be, and how they inform the present. Taking in such diverse subjects as Rory Stewart and inter-war adventure fiction, man’s facial hair and Kipling, the Alt-right and the Red Wall, Imperial Nostalgia asks how our relationship with our national past has gone wrong, and how it might be improved.
Peter Mitchell will be discussing his book and the issues it raises with Nadine El-Enany, Reader in Law at the Birkbeck School of Law, and Gargi Bhattacharyya, Professor of Sociology at the Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging, UEL.
Kathryn Yusoff Reading group: Week 8 Monday 15 November 1-2:30pm
We’ll be reading “Inhumanities” from A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None (U of Minnesota P, 2018). A brief introduction will be given by Ananya Mishra. Chair: Charlotta Salmi.
The seminar will be IN PERSON in Laws: 3.08-D and ONLINE. Please register via the following link:
Thursday 18 November 2021 6-7pm GMT | 7-8pm CET | 1-2pm EST
The enduring power of storytelling is undeniable and the printed book has proved resilient, even in the face of digitization and the global pandemic. So what does the future have in store for reading, storytelling and the ‘text’ in a world where visual media is increasingly dominant? How do advances in digitization change the way we read and experience texts? And how does this change the way that books and other kinds of textual media are made?
Our esteemed panellists will draw on their own research projects to explore these questions and to demonstrate how important research from across the humanities is in shaping our understanding of the past, present and future of our cultural heritage and production. Register for the event here.
New Possibilities for Performance Eastside Projects
ONLINE: Saturday 4 December, 11am–1pm Pay what you can (£7 suggestion), Free to EOP
BSL interpretation and live captioning What is at stake in experiencing performance? How is this experience mediated, live and direct in close physical contact or mediated and transmitted via technology and screens? What does it mean to make performance, now in a pandemic and post-pandemic world? Where is performance made and shown, and by whose authorship?
This event will explore what is currently at stake in performance across all live contemporary art forms, reflect on the current climate for making and sharing performance and build collective conversations in response to a series of urgent questions and provocations by guest contributors. Guests include Barak adé Soleil artist, dancer and co-director of Live Art Development Agency, Joe Moran choreographer and director of Dance Art Foundation, Louise O’Kelly curator and founder of Block Universe, Lucie Mirkova, Head of Artistic Programmes at DanceXchange, and SERAFINE1369 dancer and artist.
The event will start with a series of provocations exploring ‘what is at stake in performance now’. With responses engaging with current concerns within choreography, contemporary art, live art, artistic practice and beyond. We will explore what is at stake in the live experience, and what a removed viewing through a screen or device may add or take away from the observer.
This event is “pay what you can” to allow for flexibility depending on your income, the suggested amount for those with secure income is £7 READ MORE BOOK TICKET
Are you keen to gain a year’s experience working in a theatre for young people? Half Moon Theatre is looking for an enthusiastic and dedicated Creative Learning Assistant to support all aspects of the company’s extensive programme working with young people in Tower Hamlets.
Each year, Half Moon works with around 26,000 workshop participants and has around 25,000 audience members. Half Moon is a theatre for young audiences which tours nationally and specialises in artform development and new writing. Our participatory work and professional theatre programme have equal status and are mutually enriching.
The post is a fixed term one-year contract, paid at the London Living Wage, funded by the Jack Petchey Foundation Internship Programme.
The Jack Petchey Internship development programme is designed for young people who are leaving further or higher education and starting out in the youth/charity sector – or young people who have done one or two years of employment and are looking to transfer into, or take their next career step in, the youth/charity sector.
We particularly welcome applications from residents of Tower Hamlets.
Please email a CV and covering letter (maximum 1 side A4) demonstrating your experience and abilities to : beccy@halfmoon.org.uk (Please also send your completed Equal Opportunities Monitoring form)
Closing date for applications: Friday 26 November 2021 at 10am Interviews: w/c Monday 29 November 2021 Starting date: Monday 10 January 2022
Computacenter roles are now open and they have some awesome opportunities for both placement years and graduate programs.
What do Computacenter do? In simple terms, you’d be joining a company who delivers digital tech solutions to some of the biggest organisations in the world. They have opportunities across Business Management, Project Management, Technical Consultancy, and Sales.
Placement Years – £17k, Locations across the UK, Add real value from Day 1, Hands on experience and the opportunity to learn and work on innovative solutions for our customers.
Graduates – £30k starting salary, Locations across the UK, Structured support programme designed to fast track your learning and development in a business that really cares about it’s employees.
Interested? Follow the link below to their Future Careers page to find out more.
Director of Admissions Dr Charlotta Salmi and the team would love to receive applications from you for the following courses which are now open to apply online:
Welcome to our digest full of interesting events, opportunities and schemes that may help you meet collaborators, improve their career prospects or simply broaden your horizons.
For many years, Tower Hamlets Council and Queen Mary University of London have been proud to support A Season of Bangla Drama, an annual festival which brings the borough’s communities together each November to celebrate the magic of theatre as well as the arts and cultural traditions of Bangladesh.
As we mark the 50th anniversary of the Independence of Bangladesh, this has been renamed the Freedom and Independence Theatre Festival.
The themes in the title have inspired the plays and events that make up this year’s programme. We are delighted that we are continuing to profile British Bangladeshi theatre as an important way to spotlight key events of 1971, tell untold stories, and reach out to new audiences.
The variety of plays on offer cover topics including the plight of women, the tales of freedom fighters, the journeys of refugees such as the Rohingya and Vietnamese, as well as the power of protest.
There will be a fringe programme of events including a Bengali heritage walk, film screenings, an international youth writing project, talks and exhibitions.
The festival will also provide opportunities for audiences to participate through Q&As, and to be immersed in the richness of poetry, music and dance.
This is a fantastic way to learn about the history, legacy and impact of what unfolded half a century ago.
For the full programme listings, please visit our What’s On page.
To celebrate the publishing of his new book The Unbreakable Student: 6 Rules for Staying Sane at University Nic will be sharing some of his best hints and tips with our student ambassadors before giving you the chance to ask your own questions. The free live event will be happening on Wednesday 10th November at 2pm.
Are you interested in getting into the field of factual television production? #ProductionUnlocked has a day packed with all the tips and tricks you need to create great factual content
Sign up now for the award-winning We Speak Employment online programme. Improve your speaking confidence and employment opportunities with mentors from companies including Just Eat, Investec and Google.
Your place would be fully funded by our corporate partners. During live weekly online sessions, you’ll build your confidence around how to contribute to discussions, speak comfortably at job interviews and speak in front of groups.
The programme take place once a week over 4 weeks. You can choose from dates starting in mid November. Participants will receive a Certificate of Achievement. It’s a friendly and relaxed environment so perfect if you feel less confident speaking.
Sign up as soon as possible at www.wespeak.co/apply (2 minute form). The opportunity closes on Monday 8 November but places may run out earlier.
While commonly associated with hedonism and excess, the word ‘decadence’ has a much richer set of connotations, including a taste for decay, delight in uncommon sexual and cultural practices, and the upturning of moral hierarchies. For this event, we’ve selected some of the most innovative scenes from Remy de Gourmont’s Lilith (1892), in a new translation by Dan Rebellato; the first act of Jean Lorrain’s Ennoïa (1905), translated into English for the first time by Jennifer Higgins; Djuna Barnes’s brilliant one-act play The Dove (1923); and a little-known text that was well ahead of its time by Izumi Kyōka called Kerria Japonica (1923). The curators and translators will also be offering short introductions to each of the performed texts.
Expect an unusual and expansive evening filled with femme fatales, sadomasochistic pleasures, queer desires, and the fall of humankind.
Curated by Dr Adam Alston and Professor Jane Desmarais | Directed by Jonathan Meth | Performers: Lauren John Joseph, Georgia Sansom, Sadao Ueda, Yuriri Naka, Eric Stroud and Adam Alston.
INSTAGRAM LIVE Q&A: Every Thursday at around 2pm we host a live Instagram Q&A. So far we have had a ball with Karina Lickorish Quinn, Michael Craske (and honey his pug!), Isabel Waidner and Martin Welton. Want to take part? Email us or DM on Instagram.
TIKTOK: We’re excited to launch our new social channel which we hope to give a platform to many students voices in the coming months.
The Freedom & Independence Theatre Festival runs from 5-28 November 2021 and will comprise an intercultural programme marking the 50th anniversary of Bangladeshi independence. Activities will include 12 theatrical performances, exhibitions, curated talks and seminars. Queen Mary is a proud partner and one of the highlights on campus is:
The Laboratory of Psychical Research 13-16 November | 4.30pm | Senate House The wooden panelled Court Room at Senate House will play host to a reimagining of the historic National Laboratory of Psychical Research 1925-1930 by the celebrated paranormal investigator Harry Price.
Nisha Ramayya (English/Creative Writing) will be reading poetry alongside a talk by Adham Faramwy one of the six artists shortlisted for the 2021 Film London Jarman Award. This weekend gives you the opportunity to view their films alongside a special live online programme that explores their different practices through talks and performances.
Shane Boyle: “Waiting for Ships to Die”: Ever Given & Salvage Spectacles Tuesday 16 November | Royal Central School of Speech and Drama “This talk considers Ever Given within an extended history of salvage spectacles so as to consider the continuity of our logistical present with the empires of the past.”
Working With Machines 17 November | Online ‘Are we just feeding machines our own biases as we “train” up living machines?’ An online discussion of the Living With Machines project at the Alan Turing Institute. Prof. Ruth Ahnert is Principal Investigator on the flagship Turing project ‘Living With Machines’, and a Professor of Literary History and Digital Humanities at Queen Mary University of London.
Alumni Angles Podcastfeaturing FAB Website Editor, Editorial Assistant at Faber & Faber, and the voice of the world’s first digital model, Ama Badu (English BA, 2018), is joined by Founder of The History Hotline podcast and Oral History and Project Officer at Wesley’s Chapel, Deanna Lyn Cook (English and History BA, 2018).
Madeleine Levy (English and Drama graduate 2011) Madeleine talks about her new book, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a Cat: Surviving the education system with Asperger’s, where she and others share their experiences of navigating the education system with autism. Madeleine also talks about why she started her own theatre company for people with autism and the important lessons she learned and shared during her time at university.
Artist-in-residence, the award-winning illustrator Sophie Burrows, has created a series of artworks in response to research stemming from our project. An online exhibition of her work, as well as sketchbooks and notes on the process, can be found here.
The Astronaut Alone In our latest blog, researcher Jeffrey Mathias writes about NASA’s isolation chamber, used to put astronauts to the test in the 1950s. Read the post
kitt price (English) and Aleksander Kolkowski recreate the experience of ‘thinking-in’, when thousands of listeners engaged in radio telepathy experiments during the 1920s and 30s on Resonance FM. Listen here
Nisha Ramayya (English/Creative Writing) and Akshi Singh Wellcome-funded project on experiences of solitude in relation to race and migration. his project is part of the bigger Pathologies of Solitude project led by Barbara Taylor. With poet Rachel Long and coordinator Tasha Pick, the team has organised a series of creative writing workshops in association with Hackney Migrant Centre and Praxis, featuring inspiring sessions on names, spaces for sleeping, and collective processes of recollection & documentation.
Nisha will also be performing as part of an encounter between poetry and music Treble Heaven at Café Oto on 30 November with sonic dramaturg MJ Harding. Find out more
The Freedom & Independence Theatre Festival runs from 5-28 November 2021 and will comprise an intercultural programme marking the 50th anniversary of Bangladeshi independence. Activities will include 12 theatrical performances, exhibitions, curated talks and seminars.
It will facilitate a dynamic cultural exchange between youth, elders and marginalised groups across the UK Bangladeshi, Palestinian, Rohingya, Somali, Vietnamese and London’s East End communities, celebrating in diverse modes and media the themes of freedom and independence.
Queen Mary University of London has been a key partner on the festival since its inception with events happening on campus in our ArtsOne Building.
Bengali History Walk by Swadhinata Trust A poet will be joining this year’s Banglatown walk to add a new dimension to this engaging, interactive slice of local history
Future 001 Xuriyo by Numbi ArtsFuture 001 Xuriyo is an Afro-Futurist project that tries to imagine the possibilities of a Somali future
Use Your Words by Arts Without Borders Come along and hear how young writers have got creative and honed their craft using the themes of independence and freedom
Ummsiyah by Arts Without Borders This is a celebration of Palestinian arts and culture as well as the lived Palestinian experience
When Madonna was Dying by BSK This play tells the story of the women activists in 1971 in the UK who were the forerunners in raising voices for freedom
