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PROGRAMME RELEASED for FMC Postgraduate Researcher Conference 5 Dec 2018

We are two weeks away from our Second Annual Faculty of Media and Communication PGR conference. Below you will find the programme for the conference showcasing the diverse areas of research within our PGR community that will be presented throughout the day.

Official registration for the conference on December 5th is available via Eventbrite. Registration is open for all FMCers, free, and closes November 27th. There are a limited number of tickets for the beer tasting option for Dr Sam Goodman’s Keynote, so if you are interested in securing one of those spots please register as soon as possible. Over half of those tickets have already been claimed:  https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/second-annual-fmc-postgraduate-researcher-conference-2018-tickets-51544624359

However, if you are not apart of the FMC and interested in these presentations don’t fret! We would love to have your presence, insights and participation on the day. If you are interested in any of our programming and have any questions please contact Alexandra Alberda (she would love to hear from you) at aalberda@bournemouth.ac.uk .

Conference Programme

9:00 – 9:30am: Registration Check-in and Wristband Collection

9:30 – 10:00: Introduction

Prof Iain MacRury, Deputy Dean for Research and Professional Practice

Prof Candida Yates, Professor for Culture and Communication

Jo Tyler, PGR Broadcast Podcast

Welcome from Conference Committee – Alex, Steve and Mel

 

10:00 – 11:20pm: Panel 1 – Beyond the Image: Animation and Video Games

Chair: TBD

10:00am: Bibi Ayesha Noormah Soobhany – The Machine Brain

10:20am: Nurist S. Ulfa – Revisiting Consumption Play: Digital Virtual Consumption among Child Consumer

10:40am: Alex Tereshin – Automatically Controlled Morphing of 2D Shapes with Textures

11:00am: Valentin Miu – Real-time 3D Smoke Simulation with Convolutional Neural Network-based Projection Method

 

11:20 – 11:40 am: Tea and Coffee and Comfort Break

 

11:40 – 1:00pm: Panel 2 – Augmented Reality and the Body

Chair: Jill Nash

11:40am: Miguel Ramos Carretero – Efficient Facial Animation Integrating Euclidean and Geodesic Distance Algorithms into Radial Basis Function Interpolation

12:00pm: Ifigeneia Mavridou – Designing a System Architecture for Emotion Detection in Virtual Reality

12:20pm: Mara Catalina Aguilera Canon – Interactive real-time material removal simulation for acetabular reaming training in Total hip replacement procedures

12:40pm: Farbod Shakouri – Connected Tangible Objects for Augmented Reality Narratives

 

1:00 – 1:15pm: 3MT Presentations

Chair: TBD

1:00pm: Aaron Demolder – Shared Perceptions: Recording 3D Video to Improve Visual Effects

1:03pm: Sydney Day – 3D Facial Reconstruction from Obscured Faces using Trained Neural Networks

1:06pm: Robert Kosk – Synthesizing Space-Time Features for Ocean Heightfields Enhancement

1:09pm: Jack Brett – Gamification of Musical Learning Experiences

1:12pm: Jo Tyler – The Aurality of the Antihero  Adaptation as curation for graphic narratives

 

1:15 – 2:00 pm: Lunch FG06 (for registered attendees)

  • You are encouraged to check on the Doctoral College Live Exhibition over in Kimmeridge House during this time.

 

2:00 – 3:40pm: Panel 3 – History Repeating Itself: Broadcasting Political Tensions

Chair: TBD

2:00pm: Hua Li – Democracy in the News!

2:20pm: Sara Aly – The Dynamics of Meso-public spheres: Media Usage in Egypt during the Uprisings

2:40pm: Searchmore (Itai) Muridzo – Managing Public Service Broadcasting in Turbulent Times: A Case of Zimbabwe’s 2017 Coup

3:00pm: Ícaro Joathan – The evolution of the permanent campaign: a general review of the criteria to measure this type of strategy

3:20pm: Ian Robertson – With God on Our Side: A Comparative Study of Religious Broadcasting in the US and the UK 1921-1995: The Impact of Personality

 

3:40 – 3:50pm: Tea and Coffee and Comfort Break

 

3:50 – 5:10pm: Panel 4 – Environments of Now: Media Perspectives

Chair: Salvatore Scifo

3:50pm: Rehan Zia – Light, Time and Magic

4:10pm: Kenneth Kang – Switching around the Constants and Variables in International Environmental Law

4:30pm: Daniel Hills – Agents’ understandings, procedures and engagements with consumer emotional state as a targeting tool within the advertising industry: A Practice Theory approach

4:50pm: Siobhan Lennon-Patience – Jaywick Fights Back – Poverty Porn or Community Resilience?

 

5:10 – 5:30pm: Comfort Break and Keynote Set-up

 

5:30 – 6:30pm: Keynote – Dr. Sam Goodman

Critical Drinking: Approaches to Interdisciplinary research practice through British Beer Culture

Chair: Alexandra Alberda

UK drinking culture is currently at the height of its renaissance. The market in craft beer and spirits is buoyant, with a raft of new independent bottle shops, breweries and distilleries opening each year, whilst supermarket alcohol aisles are heaving with a range of new options as ‘Big Beer’ conglomerates try to ride the wave of this unexpected trend. The high-street pub is likewise transformed; though many rural pubs are closing as stricter legislation on drink-driving comes into force, those in urban centres have been regenerated (for good and ill) into spaces that are increasingly egalitarian when it comes to gender, though conversely exclusive in terms of class, and wealth. However, these developments and the popularity of the drinks they advocate are not as modern as they initially appear, and in fact draw on the iconography, tastes and sensibilities of the British past, especially those of the British Empire. Through focus on the interrelation between history and the present-day, this session asks pertinent questions of a significant contemporary cultural movement. It considers Britain’s various regional, national and international drinking communities past and present, and the questions around gentrification, masculine/gendered and national identities, health, well-being and excess that exist within them, as well as analysing the links between cultural history and representation within a contemporary media context.

This talk will also illustrate how the field of ‘Drink Studies’ offers a means of bridging the fluid boundaries of humanities research across a range of disciplines, and for both scholarly and public audiences. Drawing on research conducted at the British Library India Office Archive and supported by the Wellcome Trust, the talk will draw focus on the advantages of interdisciplinarity through the lens of drinking, arguing that the development of flexible theoretical approaches to traditional subjects offer researchers new ways of working within historical studies, medical humanities, and contemporary media, culture and society. In addition, the talk will be accompanied by three tasters of modern British beers that have been chosen to pair thematically with the subjects under discussion, and to illustrate that how researchers approach a subject can be as impactful as the research itself.

Dr Sam Goodman

Senior Lecturer in English & Communication, JEC (FMC)

sgoodman@bournemouth.ac.uk

@drsamgoodman

 

6:30 – 7:30pm: Reception in FG06

 

 

Open Event: Creativity and Marginality

You are warmly invited to participate to the final dissemination event of our AHRC e-Voices: Redressing Marginality International Network, titled Creativity and Marginality. The event will take place on December 5 (4pm-8pm), Lawrence Lecture Theatre and The Lees Gallery.

The Creativity and Marginality Symposiumwas conceived of, following a series of workshops and events held in the UK, Kenya and Brazil, as part of the AHRC E-Voices: Redressing Marginliaty Network (evoices.cemp.ac.uk). This network focuses upon marginalized groups across different geographical regions that are using technologies in a range of ways to bring voice to their experiences of marginality.

In this symposium BU academics across faculties will present their own research which resonates with the theme: addressing creativity in practice, research method and outcome and with socially marginalized groups. The symposium will be followed by the opening of an exhibition featuring a small selection of pieces presented at the ShiftEye Gallery in Nairobi Kenya. It will also include some pieces from other projects. Finally the evening will conclude with a screening of the documentary Aji-Bi: Under the Clock Tower (2015) by Moroccan director Rajaa Saddiki. A film about a group of Senegalese migrant women working as hairdressers and stranded in Casablanca.

Check the program and register here!

REGISTRATION NOW OPEN: Second Annual FMC Postgraduate Researcher Conference 2018

Firstly, we would like to take the opportunity to say thank you to all of the researchers who took the time to submit their abstracts for next month’s Second Annual FMC Postgraduate Researcher conference. The conference committee was particularly delighted to see the exceptional quality and diversity in submissions this year, and only further underlines the level of research being undertaken here in the Faculty of Media and Communication. We will respond to all applicants by Friday 9th November (today).

Conference Keynote Speaker – Dr Sam Goodman

In addition to this year’s fantastic collection of papers, we would like to say a massive thank ‘brew’ and warm welcome to our own Dr Sam Goodman, Senior Lecturer in English & Communication here in the Faculty, who will be delivering the keynote to close our conference:

Critical Drinking: Approaches to Interdisciplinary research practice through British Beer Culture (details below)

In addition to Sam’s talk, there will be a complimentary optional beer tasting, comprising of three tasters of modern British Beers that have been chosen to pair thematically with the subjects under discussion. So come along and ease the ‘ale-ments’ of researching with this fantastic closing event.

Although the tasting is free of charge to all FMC staff and postgraduates, we would kindly ask you to register as early possible, as places are limited, and it would be ‘un-beer-able’ if you were to miss out!

Registration

Registration is now open to all FMC staff and postgraduates, and can be accessed via the Conference’s Event Bright Page here:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/second-annual-fmc-postgraduate-researcher-conference-2018-tickets-51544624359

Through this link you will find registration for both the conference and the additional optional beer tasting. All of our conference speakers are required to register, so if your abstract is successful we still ask you to register (link above).  If you have any questions or queries regarding registration or the tasting please do not hesitate to email Alex: aalberda@bournemouth.ac.uk.

With a larger and more diverse line-up of papers, talks, and events than ever before, we can’t wait to see all of you at this year’s Second Annual FMC Postgraduate Researcher conference on the 5th December.

The Conference Team

Alexandra P. Alberda

Graphic Medicine and Curatorial Practice

T: @ZandraAlberda

Stephen Allard

Socio-digital Poetics

T: @fictiondissy

Melanie Brown

Copyright Law and Cultural Heritage

Mbrown@bournemouth.ac.uk

#FMCPGRcon18

Call for Presenters: Second Annual FMC Postgraduate Researcher Conference 2018

After the success of last year’s conference, we warmly invite you to the Second Annual FMC Postgraduate Researcher Conference 2018 on the 5th December 2018. This all day conference is open to all Postgraduate Researchers from the Faculty of Media and Communication, so whether this is your very first conference, or you are a seasoned presenter, we want to hear from you.

This year’s conference aims to be more diverse and dynamic than ever before, so whatever your research, there’s never been a better opportunity to share your work with us in a warm and welcoming atmosphere.

We are accepting 15-minute presentations, 30-minute workshops, or if you are a first year postgraduate researcher, a shorter 3-minute introduction to your research topic. The deadline for applications is the 2nd November 2018, now less than two weeks away; so don’t miss this fantastic opportunity to share your research with us.

Please email your presentation or workshop title enclosed with a 250-word abstract to mbrown@bournemouth.ac.uk by no later than the 2nd November 2018.

Can’t make the 5th December? Don’t miss out.

We appreciate that this may be a busy time for researchers across the faculty, so for the first time we will also be accepting the digital submission of papers. We welcome researchers to submit video uploads of papers, or to present remotely. If you would like more information about digital submission, or delivering a paper remotely please do get in contact with a member of the organizing team.

With a fantastic line-up of papers, workshops, and events don’t miss out on your chance to add your voice to this faculty-wide showcase. We look forward to receiving your submissions very soon.

– Steve

on behalf of the

The conference team

Alexandra P. Alberda

Graphic Medicine and Curatorial Practice

T: @ZandraAlberda

Stephen Allard

Socio-digital Poetics

T: @fictiondissy

Melanie Brown

Copyright Law and Cultural Heritage

mbrown@bournemouth.ac.uk

International Conference on Migration Health (Rome)

Two days ago Bournemouth University Visiting Professor Padam Simkhada presented our paper ‘Problems faced by Nepalese female migrants workers in the Gulf Countries: A quantitative survey’ at the International Conference on Migration Health in Rome, Italy [1].  The study reports on the health and other problems experienced by Nepali women migrants at their work place during foreign employment in Gulf Countries.  The paper is building on earlier research with the charity Pourakhi in Kathmandu which helps women who return from working abroad in trouble.  The first paper was publish earlier this year in the journal BMC International Health & Human Rights [2].  

The conference presentation was co-authored with BU’s Dr. Pramod Regmi and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, Ms. Manju Gurung from Pourakhi, Ms. Samjhana Bhujel from Green Tara Nepal, and Padam Simkhada, who is professor in the Public Health Institute at Liverpool John Moores University.

 

References:

  1. Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E., Bhujel, S, Gurung, M., Regmi, P. Problems faced by Nepalese female migrants workers in the Gulf Countries: A quantitative survey’ [Abstract: 238] presented at Internat. Conf. Migration Health, Rome, 1-3 Oct. 2018, http://istmsite.membershipsoftware.org/files/Documents/Activities/Meetings/Migration/FOR%20WEBSITE%20-%20ORAL%20accepted%20abstracts%20-%20session-bookmark.pdf
  2. Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen, E.R., Gurung, M., Wasti, S. (2018) A survey of health problems of Nepalese female migrants workers in the Middle-East and Malaysia, BMC International Health & Human Rights 18(4): 1-7. http://rdcu.be/E3Ro

Vianna Renaud, FMC PDA and doctoral student, chairs Student Panel on placements at annual ASET 2018 Conference

It was with great pleasure that I chaired a student panel session at the 2018 ASET Conference at the University of Nottingham. ASET, the UK Work Based and Placement Learning association is the leading professional body regarding placement learning and therefore it was wonderful to not only represent Bournemouth University but to also take part in this way.

With students from Ulster University, Southampton, LSE, Southampton, Leicester and University of Central Lancashire, the aim of the session was to encourage discussion around what universities can do to best support the placement experience in the eyes of students. With over 175 delegates from across the UK and Ireland, combined with the variety of backgrounds on the student panel, it was the perfect opportunity to gain their insight within an open and frank forum.

Given the reality of reducing resources within UK HE, critical questions around both central service and faculty based initiatives were asked. The main theme from the student panel was to engage students more with relative activities which included more interaction with final year students, alumni, industry representatives, etc. They agreed that universities need to think about the longevity of the student journey, from Open Days and first year, to final year. There needs to be a visible and clear link between employability activities with the academic curriculum, instead of the placement experience feeling like a bolted on experience. Students want to learn from their colleagues as it was felt that they share more realistic information in comparison to university staff. The concept of Placement PALS came up as a great initiative which for me was a highlight given that we have had this at BU for many years now. There was a consensus that the placement approval process was overall a tedious process, regarding of the software package being used, therefore keeping it as simple as possible was a key point. Another primary concern amongst the students was placement assessment and the importance of it being linked to future interviews for graduate roles. Therefore e-portfolios, a strong LinkedIn profile with recommendations, personal website or blog, amongst others, were discussed as the way forward in helping the student to make the most from the placement experience with a direct impact on their future.

This session contributed greatly to the overall theme of the conference, which was on our role as institutions to future-proof placements. Full conference proceedings will be available shortly at: http://www.asetonline.org/ You can also access the Good Practice Guides, ASET Viewpoints and other ASET publications on the website which are considered to be benchmarks in the sector.

 

BU NCCA Undergraduate Student Success at SIGGRAPH’18

The 45th International Conference & Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques  (SIGGRAPH’18), the international annual conference of the Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM, the world’s foremost computing society) was held in Vancouver in August.

Among the work showcased at the conference was the poster “Withering fruits: vegetable matter decay and fungus growth” by Bianca Cirdei  (Computer Visualisation and Animation – CVA, Level 6) from this year’s graduating cohort from the National Centre for Computer Animation (NCCA, Faculty of Media and Communication) and co-authored by Dr Eike Falk Anderson.

Poster presented at SIGGRAPH

The work, which was based on Bianca’s Innovations Project unit results extends and improves existing methods for procedurally simulating decaying fruit for use in computer graphics and visual effects, focusing on artist directability and visual fidelity. As the resulting visuals are quite impressive, this project was also one of the ten submissions featured in the SIGGRAPH’18 posters preview video.

Of the 74 posters presented at this year’s SIGGRAPH conference, 16 submitted posters, including Bianca’s contribution (poster 74), were invited to the first round of the prestigious ACM Student Research Competition (SRC) sponsored by Microsoft. Bianca’s submission was one of only four European semi-finalists and of those the only one from a UK institution. After presenting the work to a panel of experts, the submission made it into the second round and after the ACM Student Research Competition Final Presentation it won first place in the undergraduate category.

1st placed Undergraduate Poster at the SIGGRAPH'18 Student research Competition

After Ben Knowles (with Dr Oleg Fryazinov) who was awarded second place at SIGGRAPH’15 for “Increasing realism of animated grass in real-time game environments“, Teemu Lindborg and Philip Gifford (with Dr Oleg Fryazinov) who were semi-finalists at SIGGRAPH’17 for “Interactive parameterised heterogeneous 3D modelling with signed distance fields” and Quentin Corker-Marin (with Dr Valery Adzhiev and Professor Alexander Pasko) who achieved second place at SIGGRAPH’17 for “Space-time cubification of artistic shapes“, this is the first time that an NCCA student has won first place in this prestigious competition.

The work will now progress to the next stage of the competition, the Grand Finals in 2019, in which the first placed entries from almost 30 major ACM conferences will compete with one another.

Representing BU at the North South Irish Criminology Conference

I had the pleasure of presenting two papers at last week’s international criminology conference at my alma mater, University College Dublin (UCD), representing BU for the first time since joining last September. As with all international conferences, there was an eclectic mix of personalities, researchers, academics and practitioners, representing both sides of the border, as well as the UK, Canada and further afield. The field of criminology remains a niche area in the Republic (but growing slowly) and it was a pleasant surprise to see over 100 delegates at the two day conference presenting papers on prisons, probation, policing, offending, criminal law, victims and prisoners’ rights.

The conference opened with a keynote address by Prof Eamonn Carrabine from the University of Essex who gave an inspiring paper on what he (and others) terms the new criminology of war. Drawing on Mann, Klein and Ruggiero‘s work, he emphasised how war is an “image event”. Using war photography to support this thesis, he demonstrated the way in which war is an intense cultural production, in particular drawing our attention to the impact it has on the towns and villages that are bombarded, and the consequential (de)structural barriers to cultural evolution.

Jane Healy presents research findings at UCD’s criminology conference

 

The conference topic was “New Frontiers in Criminology” and there was certainly plenty of food for thought as to where criminological study might develop in the future, with other presentations that considered indigenous criminology, online crime and labour trafficking, for example.  These were complimented with more ‘traditional’ discussions around rape myths, desistance and youth justice. The majority of papers focussed on prisons, probations and police with only a limited number on victimology itself. My own paper highlighted the more unique forms of hate crime targeted against disabled people, including accusations of benefit fraud, the fluidity of both online and offline abuse, and the use or threat of sexual violence as a method of hate crime.

I jointly presented the only other hate crime paper at the conference with Dr James Palfreman-Kay from Equality & Diversity at BU.  Our hate crime project, which provides students with forum theatre scenarios to enable them to discuss hate crime in an interactive – and safe – way, was recognised by the panel audience as an innovative method of engaging in such a sensitive topic.

As new frontiers go, hate crime is an area ripe for research development in contemporary Ireland. Despite almost a quarter of a century of hate studies here in the UK, there is limited research in the Republic on this topic, with the exception of course of sectarian violence. There is currently no  hate legislation in the Republic, despite recent efforts and encouragement from the likes of Dr Jennifer Schweppe at the University of Limerick and a recent publication by Jennifer, Seamus Taylor, and others. Given the increasing hate crimes and incidents being reported in the UK, I really do hope to see the introduction of hate legislation in the Republic at the very least and would encourage potential PhD students to consider it as an avenue to contributory research.

Given the dearth of victimological papers (and hate studies) presented at the conference, we hope that we achieved our goal of introducting new avenues and ‘frontiers’ for future criminological research with colleagues overseas. We welcome further enquiries from home and abroad who might want to adapt or explore our methods or areas of enquiries. Their absence however did not detract from an interesting and enthusiastic gathering that highlighted so many other fruitful areas of research for me in the future. As an ECR, I left wanting to know more about everything from the demise of prisoners’ rights movements to the question of whether the State’s criminal justice system can ever be constrained through proportionality.  I am grateful to have been given the opportunity to attend the conference and would encourage others to look out for the “NSICC” in future years. Highlights of the event can be found by following @UCDLaw or #NSICC on Twitter.

Dr Jane Healy is a Lecturer in Sociology and Crime & Deviance in the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences and recently completed her PhD in disablist hate crime

Artificial Intelligence for Tourism and Hospitality workshop -IFITTtalk- Wednesday 28 November

BU Artificial Intelligence for Tourism and Hospitality – IFITTtalk
Wednesday 28 November 2018 – 09:00-17:00 FG06, Fusion, Bournemouth University, BH12 5BB, UK
Chairs: Professor Dimitrios Buhalis and Dr Nigel Williams eTourismLab, Department of Tourism and Hospitality, Bournemouth University – Supported by IFITT talks #BUeTourism #IFITT  https://tinyurl.com/BU-IFITT-AI


The (re) emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a service automation approach leveraging low cost computing and large datasets is impacting consumer experiences and is set to revolutionize tourism experiences. The ubiquitous and prevailing use of mobile devices for communication assures that stakeholders of such ‘consumer experiences’ are required to provide rapid responses to contextual queries made at any time, including within an experience encounter or activity at a destination level. AI tools that can make sense of real-time questions posed by consumers in context can provide significant value and increase engagement as well as reducing costs to destination organizations. The use of AI by tourism organizations is still low and this workshop will explore the opportunities and challenges of engaging AI as a customer co-creation toolset for industry and economic benefits. It will conclude with a scenario development exercise to identify possible futures for AI and Tourism along with a roadmap for the next 3 years of AI/Tourism development.

09:00 –09:30 Arrival and networking FG06

09:30-11:00 Artificial Intelligence for Tourism and Hospitality – theoretical perspectives 

© Professor Dimitrios Buhalis and Dr Nigel Williams : Artificial Intelligence for Tourism and Hospitality: From individuals to clusters
© Dr Iis Tussyadiah University of Surrey, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence
© Dr Luiz Mendes Filho, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, Smart Tourism developments
Dr Chulmo Koo, Kyung Hee University, Korea, Smart Tourism and Artificial Intelligence
Professor Hannes Werthner Vienna University of Technology, Austria – The future of Artificial Intelligence

11:00-11:30 Coffee and networking

11:30-13:00 Artifilcial Intelligence for Tourism and Hospitality – best practice 

Gergana Halatcheva, GHS Global Hospitality
Lee Mallon, Rarely Impossible
Jamie Sergeant This is Crown
Rowena (Copestake) Revill
Nikos Maniatis The Cato Bot
Rob Monster  DigitalTown
Tom Keeping Keeping Studio
Manolis Varouhas imonline

13:00 -14:00 Networking Lunch

14:00-15:30 Workshops Designing the future of Articial Intelligence in Tourism

15:30-16:00 Break and Networking

16:00-17:00 Conclusions  Research and Innovation agendas for the future
Chairs: Professor Dimitrios Buhalis and Dr Nigel Williams
AI Fusion: Future research – Projects  –  Publications  –  Best Practice Excellence  –  Education Innovations

_________________________________________________________________________________________

The Bournemouth University eTourism Lab Bournemouth University Department of Tourism and Hospitality  explores cutting edge information and communication technologies, alongside e-based strategic management and marketing for the tourism and hospitality industries. The eTourism Lab resides within the International Centre for Tourism and Hospitality Research (ICTHR) in the Department of Tourism and Hospitality, Faculty of Management at Bournemouth University.  The eTourism Lab offers global excellence in the field of eTourism in the widest possible sense which includes eTravel, eTransport, eHospitality and eCatering/Food. In addition it researches how social media is becoming critical for organisations to communicate effectively and compete globally. Latest research themes include online reputation and managing brands online; real time business management and marketing social media engagement, co-creation and interaction; augmented reality and gamification. Led by world expert Professor Dimitrios Buhalis the Lab is a research centre of global excellence.

For more information please contact Professor Dimitrios Buhalis  eTourism Lab Bournemouth University

Conference on Women Entrepreneurs and Innovators: Contemporary insights from Research and Practice

On 18th July, the conference titled “Women Entrepreneurs and Innovators- Contemporary Insights from Research and Practice” was held at the Talbot Campus. The conference brought together academics, entrepreneurs, professionals, and students to discuss cutting edge insights from theory and practice of women entrepreneurship.

The day started with Dr Mili Shrivastava, organiser of the conference, highlighting the importance of women entrepreneurship and introducing the speakers.  The first speaker was Professor Claire Leitch from Lancaster University. Prof Leitch is the editor of International Small Business Journal, a leading entrepreneurship field Journal. She presented her work on women entrepreneurship as a gendered niche and its implications for regional development policy. Following this stimulating talk emphasizing the role of geography for women entrepreneurship, Professor Helen Lawton Smith from University of London, discussed academic women entrepreneurs and research commercialisation by them at UK Universities. The third speaker was Erin Thomas Wang, founder of Makingmumpreneurs. com. She shared unique perspectives from her start- up journey.

In the afternoon session, Professor Lynn Martin, an academic entrepreneur from Angela Ruskin University, discussed her perspectives on women entrepreneurship from both research and practice. Following her talk, Dr Mili Shrivastava presented contemporary insights from her project with Gabriel Glixelli on women entrepreneurs in High technology industries. Finally, Ms Sarah Veakins, Marketing advisor of Outset, a government organisation advocating women enterprise talked about her experiences in supporting women entrepreneurs in the region and her perspectives on starting-up.

The Conference organically developed into a forum for compelling discussion on various aspects of women innovation and entrepreneurship such as gender, society, regional context and role of education that emerged throughout the day.  It became an innovative setting for stimulating discussion on cutting-edge research and practice of women entrepreneurship and innovation with entrepreneurs and academics coming together for an insightful and enriching day.