BU Research Blog

Bournemouth University is closely involved the international conference organised by HISSAN in Kathmandu this week.  HISSAN is the overarching organisation of over 1,100 independent higher education colleges and secondary schools in Nepal. Together with 16 education partners from Nepal and abroad HISSAN runs the first ever International Conference on Quality Education in Federal Nepal to help build the future education system in the new federation. The conference will be held in Kathmandu on 22-23 February this week.

This is a broad-spectrum education conference bringing together delegates from colleges and universities who represent a wide-range of disciplines taught at colleges across Nepal, from Computing to Management and from Engineering to Public Health.

Our intention is that delegates from Nepal can discuss and learn from education innovations in their own country as well as from abroad. There will 31 interesting sessions over two days, including some exciting plenary presentations.

Speakers are from different academic disciplines representing views from Management Studies, Education, Public Health, Law, Nursing, Disability Studies, Engineering, Disaster Management, Human Rights Research, Ageing, Road Safety Research and Science & Technology.

Many different countries are represented at the conference. Apart from papers on Nepal, there will be presentations or speakers from China, India, Bangladesh, the UK, Israel, Vietnam, the USA, and Sweden.

Different speakers will be addressing various aspects of education and education development, including Prof. Stephen Tee from Bournemouth University. He will be addressing the question: ‘What Can Nepal Learn from the Latest UK Technology-Enhanced Teaching Learning?’    Other interesting contributions in the programme, that caught my eye, include Prof. V. G. Hegde from the Faculty of Legal Studies at the South Asian University in Delhi (India) who will be presenting a paper called ‘Implementation of Right to Education in a Federal Context: Lessons from India and Nepal.’  And also the paper by Prof. Qin Jie from the Southwest University of Political Science and Law in Chongqing (China) who will be talking about ‘The Chinese Belt and Road Initiative and Higher Education in China.’

Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

The Women’s Academic Network (WAN) has been a not-so-quietly growing feature of academic life at BU since September 2013. For many women academics (those in the know) it offers an annual programme of events, activities and career support in a vibrant and open or lively and confidential environment. Sometimes these events are geared specifically for women academics and women PGR, but many are open-to-all colleagues and students.

The success of WAN, being non-corporate, depends very heavily upon the hard work of its co-convenors galvanised by the wider goodwill and enthusiasm of women colleagues. Plus we have a small but invaluable annual budget to run operations – thank you ULT! But despite having 24 hours written into the WAN co-convenor yearly workload allocation (nowhere near enough, believe me) we sometimes struggle to get the message out about our great events, to advertise membership to women colleagues (especially new colleagues to BU), and to effectively manage our rather clunky, home-made communication systems.

But things are changing! We hope to have our own BU webpage at long last, to revive and update our languishing Facebook page, keep up the tweets and to create real posters round BU to promote events. Through these means we plan to reach out more effectively to all those people who may not know that there is a forum here of like-minded, pro-women colleagues for every faculty and corner of BU. It’s called WAN. Because as one of our keen member’s has just expressed it, ‘WAN is the most collegiate forum at BU’. We think so too.

So here is a handy list of upcoming WAN events for your diaries, where we hope to see more colleagues interested in supporting and/or joining our ever-expanding network:

March 8, 2018 International Women’s Day (IWD) with WAN, 12.00-15.00, Fusion.

There are a number of IWD events going on at BU every year. Here is ours for 2018 which is open-to-all:

SPEAKER EVENTS FOR IWD:

Josie Fraser (she of the ‘In the Valley of the Trolls’ talk) speaking about the online harassment of girls and women. Title: ‘Speaking Out Online: “all your base are belong to us…”’

BU’s Dr Sue Sutherland’s research documentary Village Tales, which used film techniques as participatory research methodologies with village women in India to self-document their lives.

Plus Professor Gráinne Conole (HEA, National Teaching Fellow) candidly telling us about her amazing and challenging journey to being a 4* international professor. Facilitator Professor Debbie Holley of CEL.  Title TBA.

Lunchtime refreshments served.

Register at: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/womens-academic-network-international-womens-day-tickets-40100804586

SPEAKER EVENT (open-to-all) – April 19, 17.00-19.00 pm, EBC.

Title: ‘Girls Interrupted: Young women’s life stories reflecting on growing up in Post-Katrina New Orleans and the impacts on their gender identities and sexualities’.

 Speaker: Dr Lisa Overton, Lecturer Politics at Middlesex University and Course Convenor for War, Conflict and Development at Birkbeck University.

This ethnographic study draws on gender and disaster scholarship, feminist trans/methodology and queer theories to explore how growing up after Hurricane Katrina affected young women’s life course, particularly their gender and sexual identities.

Drinks and canapé reception.

Register at: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wan-speaker-eventgirls-interrupted-young-womens-life-stories-reflecting-on-growing-up-in-post-tickets-43165392852#tickets

SPEAKER EVENT (open-to-all) – April 26, 12.00-14.00, LAWRENCE Lecture Theatre, Talbot

 Speaker: Dr Helen Fry

Title: ‘Historian Dr Helen Fry unwraps “A very secret war: Bugging the Nazis in WWII”’

During WW2, British intelligence bugged the conversations of over 10,000 German prisoners-of-war at three clandestine stately houses. Trent Park in north London was reserved for Hitler’s Generals and in an astonishing turn of events, they were housed in luxurious conditions and were lulled into a false sense of security. By the end of the war, there were 59 German generals under one roof. They relaxed and became unguarded in their conversations, and inadvertently gave away from of Hitler’s most closely guarded secrets.

(see also Guardian article by Helen on this topic, 17 Feb 2018)

Lunchtime refreshments.

Register at: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/historian-dr-helen-fry-unwraps-a-very-secret-war-bugging-the-nazis-in-wwii-tickets-42281992578

SPEAKER EVENT – May. Full details: TBA

Speaker: Professor Rosalind Gill, City University London

Title: ‘The Cult(ure) of Confidence, a critique of the ‘Lean In’ messages aimed at women to explain their failure to reach the upper echelons of every aspect of society.

About the speaker: Professor Gill is known for her research interests in gender and media, cultural and creative work, and mediated intimacy. For the last decade she has made a significant contribution to debates about the ‘sexualization of culture’. She enters this contested and polarized field bringing an emphasis upon difference – particularly the ways in which differently located groups are positioned by and in relation to sexualization – and upon new ways of thinking about the relationship between culture and subjectivity – how what is “out there” gets ‘in here; to shape our sense of self.

Registration pending. For further queries please contact WAN co-convenor Dr Frances Hawkhead fhawkhead@bournemouth.ac.uk

WAN SECOND RESEARCH SEMINAR, May 23, 1-day event

The Second Women’s Academic Network Research Seminar: ‘Reclaiming the academy: Scholarship, gender and consumerism’.

By popular demand we are holding the second WAN seminar, which is open to all BU colleagues, PGR and external academics. The theme of this year’s seminar focuses on the transitions of the academy in neo-liberal politicised spaces and how these are influencing the roles and expectations of academics and students, with a particular focus on women and scholarship.

 Keynote speakers: Professors Maggie Berg (Queen’s University, Canada) and Barbara Seeber (Brock University, Canada), authors of the Slow Professor: Challenging the culture of speed in the academy.

 Call for papers

We invite papers that relate to the above theme as well as papers that focus on gender-based research and/or are sponsored by WAN (open-to-all)

Deadline for submission of abstracts for consideration is March 9, 2018.  Please submit abstracts to WAN co-convenor Professor Sara Ashencaen Crabtree at scrabtree@bournemouth.ac.uk

Register at: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-second-womens-academic-network-research-seminar-reclaiming-the-academy-scholarship-gender-and-tickets-41105120522

Finally if you want to know more about WAN or would like to join the network, please contact any of the WAN co-convenors:

Dr Frances Hawkhead, Dr Lorraine Brown,  Dr Jayne Caudwell or Professor Sara Ashencaen Crabtree

We are very excited about this! Come and join us! Book through organisational development 

Brexit and Immigration: Impact on Local Businesses in Dorset

One of the hotly debated issues in Brexit focusses around immigration. In this session we will be exploring these issues and discussing how proposed immigration systems are likely to impact on the incentive of immigrants to live and work in the UK—and will look more locally about the impact it may have in Dorset, especially on our tourism and hospitality sectors.

Professor Jens Hölscher will run the event on 20.6.2018, 10:00:00 AM – 12:30:00 PM in F109 (tbc).

The Doctoral College would like to present the Febraury monthly update.

This monthly update is for PGRs and their supervisors to outline upcoming research skills and development opportunities including events, workshops and networking opportunities supported by the Doctoral College. In this update we would like to promote the 3 Minute Thesis (3MT®) event, R.E.D talks, the Researcher Development Programme for 2017-18, and the 10^th Annual Postgraduate Conference.

We are very happy to announce that registration for the 10th Annual Postgraduate Conference is still open. To book onto the conference please go to the Researcher Development Hub on the website. These exciting development opportunities are taking place now so check out our application processes and booking information to advance your current skills, knowledge and networks.

Don’t forget to check out the Doctoral College Facebook page. 

Following the success of our inaugural 2017 Conference held at the University of Glasgow, this year’s conference will be hosted at Newcastle University on Tuesday 26 and Wednesday 27 June 2018.

The Conference Organising Committee is delighted to invite submission of abstracts for poster presentations. Please refer to call for abstracts final  https://connectedeverything.ac.uk/activities/conference-2018/ for abstracts for further information.

Submissions should be made via https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=connectedeverything2018.

Poole is a key marine hub on the South Coast of England. Home to the Port of Poole, a major regional asset, and major actors such as Sunseeker International, the RNLI and Wärtsilä, the town also counts an array of marine-related organisations in a variety of business activities.

Purpose of the focus group was a Review of the Scope of the Marine and Maritime Economy
Roundtable discussions addressed:
– Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats for the marine and maritime industries on a local, national and international scale
– What should the priorities of the Poole Marine Hub be: short, medium, long term

Stakeholders include Actisense, Aish Technologies, Borough of Poole, Bournemouth & Poole College, British Marine, Brittany Ferries, Condor Ferries, Jenkins Marine, Local Nature Partnership, National Trust, Poole Harbour, Poole Harbour Study Group/ Southern IFCACommissioner, Poole Harbour Study Group/ Southern IFCA, RNLI, Rockley Park, Royal Navy, Sunseeker, Poole Museum and Perenco/ Wytch Farm.

Bournemouth University was represented by Professors Jens Holscher, Nigel Jump, Sangeeta Khorana and Associate Professor Davide Parrilli.

Narrowing the gaps: 30 years after the transition started
and 14 years after enlargement – where are we on
convergence?
Conference organised by the European Trade Union Institute
(ETUI)
Brussels, 25 January 2018, 14h30-17h00
European Economic and Social Committee

ETUI organised a conference to openly debate effects of transition and EU integration on the
Central and Eastern European countries and what this means in terms of upwards convergence
for the region.
The Central and Eastern European countries have gone through an intense economic transition
over the past 30 years and joined the European Union 14 years ago with the aspiration to have an
upwards convergence with the then EU-15. Research is showing that while convergence has
clearly occurred, this has not benefitted all regions and groups in society equally.
In addition recent research has concluded that the economic models on which the CEE countries
have built their convergence could become a trap for future developments in the region. Against
this backdrop, the conference will assess if current economic models and policies are
responding the regions aspiration for upwards convergence, and if not what then needs to be
done about it. Questions to be addressed are : what economic structure are relevant for the
future development of the region? How can collective bargaining contribute to this? What is the
role of the European institutions in ensuring upwards convergence? etc.
The conference is coinciding with the retirement of ETUI Senior researcher and Head of Unit
“Economic, employment and social policies” Martin Myant, whose research agenda has strongly
contributed to the thinking about the effects of transition and EU integration on the CEE
countries. A drink will be held in his honour at the end of the conference.

Jens Holscher took part in the round table discussion as invited speaker.