By Dr Irina Roldugina, Department of Russian, School of Modern Languages
As LGBT+ History Month approaches this February, Dr Irina Roldugina tells us about her project which examines how the HIV/AIDS epidemic influenced public perception of homo/sexuality, intimacy and public health in the USSR and post-Soviet Russia. The project received a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship and runs until April 2027.
One of the most thrilling aspects of being in the early stages of a research project is navigating the unknown. The questions we pose and the sources we uncover often take us in unexpected directions. When I first conceived my project, “Homo/sexuality, Intimacy, and Public Health: The HIV Epidemic in the Late Soviet Union,” it did not initially include transgender people as a central focus. However, as I delved deeper into the sources, I realised that my research extends beyond homosexual men and women. The open discussions of homosexuality during this period also brought to light issues related to previously silenced aspects of gender and sexual diversity.
Interview with Professor Vasilii Vasiliev who operated on transgender people published in Vechernyaya Moskva newspaper (The Evening Moscow), July 1992. The headline translates as: ‘Turn Me into a Man’ and highlights the new openness with which the issue was discussed.
Transgender Visibility in the late Soviet Media
My investigation has so far uncovered that not only homosexual men and women but also transgender individuals—who faced even greater marginalization in public awareness in the USSR — were well documented in both central and regional Soviet press in the 1980s. These records reveal that the discourse on trans rights was shaped within the broader issues raised by the perestroika (restructuring) policies initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader, in 1985. Gorbachev’s ambition to build a more humane socialist society inspired journalists to focus on themes of individual rights and the fight against social marginalization.
Transgender Issues in the Context of Perestroika
Perestroika introduced a new openness in discussing transgender issues, particularly within the medical and journalistic spheres. These discussions often paralleled debates about homosexuality, helping to demystify both topics. One of the first articles in the Soviet press that featured the direct speech of a transgender person for a broad audience appeared in August 1989—though I remain open to the possibility of earlier publications. This article, featured above, titled “Turn Me into a Man” and published in Vecherniaia Moskva, is groundbreaking for several reasons. Firstly, it challenges prevailing attitudes. The author of the article begins by contesting the dominant Soviet view that trans people were psychologically impaired. Instead, the piece asserts, “Transsexuals are psychologically normal people.” Secondly, the piece conveys a humanizing approach to trans experience. The article references individuals from various professions, including scholars, and reframes the issue as one pertaining to the “soul” (dusha), rather than pathology. Thirdly, the piece amplifies trans voices by providing a platform for trans individuals to share their experiences firsthand.
‘The open discussions of homosexuality during this period also brought to light issues related to previously silenced aspects of gender and sexual diversity.’
I want to share the aspect that struck me the most. When Soviet journalists wrote about trans people and gave them a voice, they sometimes concluded the articles with very personal details of their heroes. For example: Elena is a trans woman. She is married to Stepan. They are a normal Soviet family. They adopted a boy and a girl from an orphanage. Reading this in 2025 is striking, as it is now illegal for trans people in Russia to adopt children. Gender transition was banned in Russia in 2023, and even openly acknowledging one’s transgender identity is now prohibited. The Russian authorities see it as propaganda of abnormality and extremism.
Perestroika significantly altered the perception of transgender people. First, they became visible, at least within the pages of the Soviet press. Journalists and doctors played a key role in destigmatizing and depathologizing trans individuals, advocating for their right to receive medical care and be recognized as ordinary Soviet citizens. Moreover, trans people were not just subjects of journalistic focus; they often had the opportunity to voice their own experiences. This shift was framed by perestroika’s broader concepts, such as “lichnost’” (personhood), “dusha” (soul), happiness, and an emphasis on personal well-being and a more humane approach to individual problems.
The increasing visibility of transgender people in the late Soviet Union is just one dimension of the significant and largely overlooked by historians social changes of that era, which also included growing self-advocacy among homosexuals and a heightened demand for information about sex and sexuality, particularly in the context of the emerging HIV epidemic.
Dr Irina Roldugina is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in the Department of Russian with research interests in the history of homosexuality in the USSR, history of HIV perception, queer visibility and activism in the late Soviet Union. To find out more about Irina’s project, Homo/sexuality, Intimacy, and Public Health: The HIV Epidemic in the Late Soviet Union, please contact i.roldugina@bristol.ac.uk.
By Dr Charlotte Faucher and Dr Clare Siviter, Department of French, School of Modern Languages
2024 marked the 120th anniversary of the Entente Cordiale, a series of pivotal agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and France. In this blog, Dr Charlotte Faucher and Dr Clare Siviter reflect on the contributions made by colleagues in the Department of French to remember this special year, contributions which have also helped to enhance specialistand public knowledge on Franco-British relations.
Dr Charlotte Faucher worked closely with Dr Guillaume Perissol from the Institut français du Royaume-Uni to create When Marianne and Britannia Meet, an exhibition tracing the history of the Entente Cordiale agreements and their global repercussions. Lucy Frazer MP (Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport) and the French ambassador Hélène Duchêne opened the exhibition in London on 28 March. It then came to Bristol in June 2024. The formal opening at City Hall by the Lord Mayor of Bristol was followed by talks by Dr Faucher, Professor Martin Hurcombe and Professor Debra Kelly (University of Westminster). Together they discussed Franco-British relations: from the 1904 agreements to the 1908 Franco-British exhibition, which took place in London, to the role of a Bristol professor in strengthening Franco-British friendship during the two world wars. Around 80 people attended the event, and the exhibition was then on display for over 10 days at City Hall.
The exhibition was also presented in the rest of the Alliance Française’s UK network, including in Oxford and Cambridge, and at the Central Libraries in Manchester and Milton Keynes, as well as at the French Diplomatic Archives in Paris. The exhibition has been developed in partnership with the UK’s National Archives and French Diplomatic Archives, with support of Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking and the Friends of the French Institute Trust.
The exhibition brought together the original British and French copies of the Entente Cordiale, which are held at the respective national archives in Kew and Paris, for the first time since 1904.
When Marianne and Britannia Meet was also displayed at the British Library during “Rendez-vous at the British Library”, a symposium exploring the British Library’s rich French collections and celebrating the Entente Cordiale’s 120th anniversary on 6 December 2024.
The day kicked off with a ‘petit déjeuner FERN-UK’ – a breakfast lecture hosted by the French Education and Research Network UK, which aims to bring together and support UK-based French and francophone researchers – with Dr Faucher presenting on the history of the Entente Cordiale and responses to her co-curated exhibition.
Later that day, the British Library hosted two events under the umbrella title, ‘Rendez-Vous à la British Library’, which featured Dr Faucher, Dr Clare Siviter and Ros Schwartz of the Bristol Translates Summer School. Both events were organised by Sophie Defrance (Curator of Romance collections) and her colleagues at the British Library and supported by the French Embassy as celebrations of the Entente Cordiale’s anniversary. Throughout, the sheer scale of cultural exchange between the UK and France became apparent as we learnt that the British Library holds the second largest collection of material in French in the world.
Dr Charlotte Faucher moderates the first panel at the ‘Rendez-vous at the British Library’ event.
The afternoon symposium brought together academics, students, curators, translators and booksellers working from the 11th century to the present day, all using the British Library’s French Collections. The first panel, ‘France and the United Kingdom, Entente Cordiale’, was moderated by Dr Faucher and brought together the full spectrum of the academic career path, from Aude Moine presenting her PhD work on material culture through to the renowned expert in heraldry Michel Pastoureau on the British origins of the French tricolour flag. The next panel, ‘France and Beyond’, was chaired by Prof. Catriona Seth and featured two papers focusing on theatre by Dr Siviter and Prof Clare Finburgh-Delijani, who both used the British Library’s holdings of material from the French Revolution to think through questions of cultural and political production from 1789 to the present day. The three lightening papers also took us from the 1790s, starting in Saint Domingue with Dr Alex Fairfax-Cholmeley through to the British Library’s francophone African comic book collection with Daniel Lowe and its Endangered Archives Programme with Ruth Hansford.
Three shorter panels followed about translation, artists’ books, and medieval manuscripts before a joint visit to the fantastic ‘Medieval Women: In Their Own Words’ exhibition, which included a letter from Joan of Arc, featuring her first known signature, and which had left France for the first time to come to the British Library.
Dr Clare Siviter presents at the ‘Rendez-vous at the British Library’ event.
The evening continued to emphasise the importance and extent of Franco-British exchange with a final event, opened by Sir Roly Keating, the Chief Executive Officer of the British Library, and the French ambassador to the UK, Hélène Duchêne, who both reflected on the strengths of ‘London’s BN’ (shorthand for the British Library’s Parisian counterpart, the Bibliothèque nationale). This final session featured keynotes by the esteemed Professor William Marx of the prestigious Collège de France and the writer Artemis Cooper.
2024 brought an increased awareness of the Entente Cordiale in specialist and public understanding: from the historical participation of the Coldstream Guards in a ceremony at the Elysée on the anniversary of the signing of the agreement, through to the creation of the Entente Littéraire award, whose first award ceremony took place with Her Majesty The Queen and Mme Brigitte Macron. The 1904 meaning of Entente Cordiale has certainly changed over the past 120 years; nonetheless the governments and peoples of both countries overwhelmingly continue to value a close Franco-British bilateral relationship.
By George Thomas, Faculty Research Events and Communications Coordinator
As 2024 draws to a close, we caught up with some of our Faculty Research Centres and Groups to learn about their highlights from the academic and calendar year, as well as activities they are particularly looking forward to in 2025. This year’s blog is presented in two parts: one focusing on our Faculty Reseach Centres, the other on our Faculty Research Groups. To find out more about their research and how to get involved, contact details, social media accounts and website links are provided at the end of each entry.
Centre for Black Humanities
The Centre for Black Humanities has had a fantastic start to the 2024/5 academic year! We kicked things off at the end of the summer with a wonderful workshop session featuring our University of Cape Town-Bristol Fellow Dr Shanaaz Hoosain. The workshop, which explored themes of memories and identities in Dr Hoosain’s work, was co-convened with the Black South West Network (BSWN) and generously hosted in their incubator space. It was a rich event that invited participants to think through different global and local practices for co-creating heritage spaces with diverse communities. It also opened up new avenues for thinking about the BSWN’s UnMuseum project, which we are really excited to see! Whilst Dr Hoosain has now returned to UCT, we look forward to welcoming her back to Bristol in the Spring.
KMT, Maria Fernandez Garcia and MoYah discuss hip hop and gardening as forms of creative expression in the second Autumn Art Lecture at the Royal West of England Academy (RWA).
Across the Autumn, we have been busy hosting the 2024 Autumn Art Lecture Series. A longstanding highlight of the cultural life of the University, the Autumn Art Lectures have taken place every year (with exceptions for World War II and COVID) for more than a century and it was an honour to be asked to convene this year’s iteration. Under our theme ‘Creation & Liberation’, we brought together a rich and interdisciplinary chorus of speakers who invited the public to consider the potential for liberation offered by creativity in all its forms. Across four events that took us from the unexpected intersections of hip hop and gardening to the history and legacies of the Tudor court musician, John Blanke, we examined the threads of power, protest and art-making that weave together across the work of artists, writers and musicians. We have moved from Bristol’s Central Library to the RWA’s garden and from the local Jungle scene to celebrated novelist Monique Roffey’s imaginary island of St Calibri to celebrate artistic expression that challenges, uplifts, and liberates. It has been wonderful to showcase the amazing work being done by Centre members who have contributed to the series by organising lectures and chairing discussions. A special shout out to PhD students Lizzie Bowes and Marko Higgins for their stellar work on kicking off the series brilliantly and to Dr Leighan Renaud for wrapping it all up beautifully in her discussion with Monique Roffey!
Listen to DJ Krust talk about his life and career in the first Autumn Art Lecture at Bristol Library.
As we wind down TB1, we look forward to an equally active TB2. As the Centre celebrates a decade since its founding(!), we have been reflecting on our past, present and future(s). We have been thinking through the possibilities and implications for the work that we do after not only the fall of Colston, the murder of George Floyd and the reinvigoration of the Black Lives Matter Movement, but also after the race riots of this past summer and the closure of Black Studies and Black Studies-adjacent courses across UKHE. Watch this space for a programme of events and activities that we have planned over the next year to respond to these challenges and imagine a new future for the Centre for Black Humanities.
The two halves of the academic year highlight two different sides of the Centre for Medieval Studies (CMS): the first semester was full of visiting professors and the second will be filled with conferences. CMS hosted three distinguished visitors in TB1. Professor David Scott-Macnab (North West University, South Africa) was based at CMS as Leverhulme Visiting Professor (September-December). He enthused undergraduate students with a lecture on Gawain, gave masterclasses on editing to the English medieval research group and to the PhD students of the EU/UKRI-funded Doctoral Training Network REBPAF, and delivered the Annual Tucker-Cruse lecture. Visiting us from the University of Leiden and funded by Bristol’s Next Generation Visiting Researcher programme, was Dr Jelmar Hugen, a specialist in Middle Dutch literature, who gave a lecture on the literary history of Gawain to undergraduates and presented his current research on responses to the Grail story in our regular series of seminars. In partnership with the Italian Department, CMS also hosted Nick Havely (Professor Emeritus, University of York). As well as giving a fascinating and very well-attended talk for the Centre, pictured below, Prof. Havely co-taught Tristan Kay’s seminar on Dante’s Inferno in the Department of Italian; met with PGR students working in fields connected to his expertise; and gave an interview for the Italian student publication La Civetta.
Emeritus Professor Nick Havely delivers a lecture on Dante Alighieri before an audience.
2025 promises another rich programme of activities for our Centre. Nine CMS seminars are already scheduled for the second half of the current academic year, with speakers visiting us from leading UK and international institutions. We will host six major interdisciplinary conferences, including the Medieval English Theatre Society conference (29 March 2025), the French of the Celtic Worlds conference (9-11 April 2025), the Historical Sociolinguistics Conference (21-23 May 2025), the International Arthurian Society conference (September 2025), and the latest iteration of the hugely successful PG conference in medieval studies (24-25 April 2025). The CMS has also begun planning the large International Conference for Medieval and Renaissance Scottish Language, Literature, and Culture (Bristol 2026: icmrsllc.org). The CMS will again be well represented in sessions and a reception organized at the Leeds International Medieval Congress in the summer. Existing partnerships with Bristol Central Library and Bristol Archivesare ongoing and will culminate in the publication and launch of the catalogue of manuscripts in the city of Bristol (forthcoming in the CMS publication series with Boydell and Brewer), as part of Kathleen Kennedy’s British Academy-funded Cataloguing Bristol Manuscripts project. Impact activities with partner institutions such as Wells Cathedral, Aardman Animation, and Winterbourne Medieval Barn are also planned for 2025. An inaugural Summer School in Medieval Studies will bring students from around the world to study in Bristol in June.
The Centre for Creative Technologies (CCT) has had a dynamic and impactful year, involving interdisciplinary partnerships, and regional and international projects experimenting with creativity and technology: from a collaboration with Bristol Common Press on feminist poetic technologies to work with Knowle West Media Centre. Our aim for 2024 was to foster exchanges and create connections between academic researchers and the creative industry.
Learn more about the Centre’s collaborative work with Visiting Professor Stuart Candy.
CCT has organised a range of Friday Lunchtime Talks at the Pervasive Media Studio, from Bristol researchers to Zach Blas, all of which you can watch here. From July to November, the CCT and Brigstow Institute ran our second Alternative Technologies workshop series ran by Bristol researchers and Pervasive Media Studio residents. The Centre participated in an event at Knowle West Media Centre called ‘What if..? Seeds of Tomorrow Growing Today’ and co-director Ed King chaired a discussion with Brazilian media activist Felipe Fonseca. The year rounded off with co-directors Professor Ed King and Paul Clarke being involved in the ‘Caring AI’ workshop series on predictive AI in schools in Bristol, with Paul collaborating on sessions around data sharing, and Ed running games jams on ‘exposing bias in AI’ at Barton Hill Activity Club and Knowle West Media Centre. With talks, workshops, networking events and research seminars throughout the year, the CCT continues to take a leading fostering critical, creative, and socially engaged uses of technology.
Watch Centre members deliver insightful talks at the Pervasive Media Studio.
We are eagerly anticipating our Evening of Creative Technology, which will serve as the final event in the Alternative Workshop Series (2). Looking ahead to the new year, on January 23rd, an event at Watershed, co-hosted by the CCT, UWE’s Digital Cultures Research Centre, MyWorld, and both universities’ Impact Acceleration Accounts, will share the Narrative Technologies projects by Bristol and UWE researchers and professional creative technologists, which have each received seedcorn funding. Also in January, the CCT is looking forward to supporting the Voice, AI, Myth and Storytelling symposium co-organised by Prof. Genevieve Lively & Dr Francesco Bentivegna. We are planning another Friday Lunchtime Talk series following the success of 2024’s, so do get in touch if you work with or on creative technologies and would like to present. We are planning exciting activities for the reading group, including external speakers and creative writing opportunities. We will also continue to support early-career researchers with funding opportunities. Finally, we are excited for further collaborations with the Pervasive Media Studio and have been discussing developing further work in the area of creative community technologies with Knowle West Media Centre, CenSoF, and Ed King’s partners in Brazil. The AHRC and Arts Council’s Immersive Arts programme, which UWE are leading on with Bristol’s CCT as a partner, has started and the first round of applications comes in on 2nd December, so we are looking forward to seeing what artists want to explore with immersive technologies and experiencing the first work produced with the support of this programme in 2025.
2024 was another busy year for the Centre for Environmental Humanities. We have hosted talks by a wide range of visiting speakers, on topics from the history of the commons in England to aquariums at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, and the ‘Great Storm’ of 1987. We were especially pleased to host the renowned environmental historian Harriet Ritvo in May. We worked with the curator Georgia Hall to hold successful workshops on working with artists and creative practitioners, and in the summer many MA students, PGRs and academics took part in a field trip to Exmoor where we met with park staff to discuss creative responses to management challenge with a focus on the theme of ‘Elegant Conversation’. We welcomed the second cohort of students on our MA programme in September. The Centre’s co-directors took part in the inaugural meeting of the European Environmental Humanities Network in Utrecht in February, and we continue to develop partnerships across Europe and beyond.
Centre members visit Exmoor National Park for a workshop on ‘Elegant Conservation’.
In that vein, plans for 2025 include applying for an ERC Synergy Grant with colleagues at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and KTH Stockholm. We are also looking forward to a PGT/PGR showcase on 21 February, as well as the usual programme of talks and reading groups. We are also planning to submit a co-authored article on environmental humanities in practice for a special issue of PMLA, and discussions on the location for the 2025 field trip are already underway…
The Centre for Health, Humanities and Science (CHHS) has held a vibrant programme of events over the Autumn term. The programme opened with a talk by Dan Degerman (Philosophy) on ‘Mania and the Capacity for Silence’. Degerman spoke about silence and its many nuances in psychopathology, from the agony of enforced silence to ineffable, empty or unworded silence associated with the breakdown of articulation. The seminar generated a lively discussion, and was followed a couple of weeks later by a guest talk by Lorna Mitchell, Head of Library and Archives at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh. In a talk on the ‘Plant Humanities’, Mitchell focused on the significance of plants to our wellbeing, their role in social prescribing, and their crucial significance in the context of the development of new pharmacological treatments – as well as on the value of plants in their own right. She discussed the impact of climate change on biodiversity and plant habitats, and revealed the rich archival and other research resources available at Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh.
Dr Dan Degerman (Philosophy) introduces his research into silence and its many nuances.
Also in September, the CHHS held an all-day international symposium on Georges Canguilhem, the French physician and philosopher of science, organized by Federico Testa (Modern Languages), British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in French (Dr Testa has since moved to the University of East Anglia to take up a permanent lectureship). In October, another recent Bristol postdoc and current CHHS affiliate, Doug Battersby (now a Lecturer in Modern Literature at the University of Leicester), organized an online symposium on ‘Victorian Literature and the Health Humanities’, featuring Sally Shuttleworth (Oxford), Andrew Mangham (Reading) and Anne Stiles (Saint Louis University), with an audience of well over a hundred.
One of the highlights of the term was Bodies 2, an all-day event bringing high-profile writers to Bristol to talk about a range of health-related matters. Organized by CHHS board member John Lee (English), the event was opened by Benji Waterhouse, NHS Psychiatrist, stand-up comedian, and author of the bestselling book, You Don’t Have to Be Mad to Work Here (2024). Waterhouse presented a hilarious standup-performance-cum-book-reading that also raised serious social and ethical questions about the profession of psychiatry and, more generally, about NHS mental-health service provision. ‘Nothing is funnier than unhappiness’, as Samuel Beckett once put it, and Waterhouse’s opening talk about unhappiness was both funny and deeply moving. Other highlights included a talk by Anthony Warner (the ‘Angry Chef’) on ‘Ending Hunger’; an affecting talk by the palliative care consultant Rachel Clarke on her new book The Story of a Heart (2024), in which Bristol Royal Hospital for Children makes a prominent appearance. The day concluded with a talk by the neurosurgeon Henry Marsh on ‘Why are Hospitals so Horrible?’ In a poignant critique of the disregard with which hospitals in the UK are designed, Marsh pointed out that the architecture and design of UK hospitals, with their long corridors and their small and over-crowded wards, bears a closer resemblance to prisons than to places of healing and recovery. Marsh stressed the importance of colour, light, fresh air, and relative tranquility for recovery. He also highlighted the significance of artworks in allowing patients an imaginative release from their confinement in over-crowded wards.
Dr Rachel Clarke discusses her new book, The Story of a Heart, at the Bodies 2 event.
Looking forward, the CHHS will be hosting an equally lively programme in the new year. The first speakers, Simon Hall (University of Bristol) and Catherine Lamont (Arts Therapist), will be focusing on their project, ‘Prosthetic Futures: An Art and Science Collaboration on the Future of Reconstructive Prosthetics’, which is funded by Bristol’s Brigstow Institute. This will be followed by Andrew Gaedtke (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champagne), who will be speaking about his forthcoming monograph, Brain Narratives. Mark Paterson (University of Pittsburg), an expert on the body, senses, affects, and sensory technologies, will be visiting and speaking at the CHHS in April. In May, the CHHS will be hosting a talk by Helen Chatterjee, MBE, Professor of Human and Ecological Health at UCL and co-founder of the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance. Finally, in June, the Centre will be holding an event on online therapy: Marjo Kolehmainen (University of Jyväskylä, Finland), who holds an Academy of Finland/Finnish Research Council five-year fellowship on the topic, will be focusing on the ways in which online therapy reconfigures notions of intimacy and trust, with a speaker/respondent from Bristol Medical School.
By George Thomas, Faculty Research Events and Communications Coordinator
As 2024 draws to a close, we caught up with some of our Faculty Research Centres and Groups to learn about their highlights from the academic and calendar year, as well as activities they are particularly looking forward to in 2025. This year’s blog is presented in two parts: one focusing on our Faculty Reseach Centres, the other on our Faculty Research Groups. To find out more about their research and how to get involved, contact details, social media accounts and website links are provided at the end of each entry.
Bristol Digital Game Lab
If we imagine 2024 as an open world game, and the Bristol Digital Game Lab as player, then there’s lots to celebrate in terms of achievements (although there have also been challenges!).
In 2024, we brought in over £300,000 of funding for research, impact, and commercialisation projects, significantly increased our party size to 250 members, and saw an uptick in successful postgraduate applications. In July 2024, we embarked on a major quest, Game Conscious™ Characters, with industry lead Meaning Machine, which will see us assess how players respond to First Person Talkers, a new genre of video game. Teaming up with industry legends Ndemic and Larian Studios meant we could offer insights into the impact and the writing of video games respectively, which we delivered through sold-out workshops to audiences in Bristol and beyond. We initiated expeditions inspired by the interests of Lab members. This includes the development of a video game to tackle the complex topic of postnatal depression, knowledge-exchange around the ethics and use of AI Tools for Game and XR Storytelling, ‘concept’ game jams for partners including Natural England and the Centre for Sociodigital Futures, sponsorship for the UK premier of asses.masses, an epic, 7+ hour, custom-made video game about labour, technophobia and sharing the load of revolution, a conference on New Directions in Classics, Gaming, and Extended Reality, which brought together 24 academic and industry speakers from eight different countries, and Antiquity Games Night, a monthly online collaborative play series.
Are you a budding adventurer looking to join a group? To gain a sense of what we do in the Lab, check out the following video and see below for a glimpse into 2025.
Next year will see the Lab exploring new worlds, starting with a Cabot-funded symposium on Can Games Teach? Games and the Environment. We’ll follow this with another Can Games Teach? event on Games and History/Heritage. We’ll also be running a series of player studies, so watch this space for paid opportunities to get involved in cutting-edge gaming research! Then there’s the XR game jam for the AI Tools for Games and XR Storytelling project, a postgraduate roundtable on Game Development, further industry workshops and research seminars in the pipeline, and showcases where we’ll feature the games we’re creating. We’ll also be defining and testing a broader service offering through the Lab, including consultancy, game jams, and player studies.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank Dr Xiaochun Zhang, co-founder and co-director for several years, for all her hard work. Xiaochun will continue to support the Lab from her new home at UCL. In September 2024, we were delighted to welcome Dr Michael Samuel (Film and TV) as new co-director of the Lab.
To sign up to the Lab’s mailing list and to become a member, please visit our website. To follow our updates on LinkedIn, search for #BristolDigitalGameLab. You can also reach out to the co-directors: richard.cole@brstol.ac.uk and mike.samuel@bristol.ac.uk for further information.
Drinking Studies Research Group
The undoubted highlight of 2024 for the Drinking Studies Research Group (DSRG) was the hosting of the Drinking Studies Network’s triennial international conference at Bristol in March. We welcomed 40 speakers from across the UK and Ireland, as well as from Poland, Sweden, Denmark and the USA, with a great blend of early career researchers – our own Amy Burnett organised a panel on ‘Early Modern Drinking Establishments’ with ECRs from across Europe – and leading figures in the field, such as Geoffrey Hunt who flew in from San Francisco. We also hosted a hybrid session with colleagues in Australia and Japan to celebrate the launch of a partner research group: the AustralAsian Drinking Studies Research Group. We heard about subjects ranging from the growth of online sobriety communities, to the importance of Desi pubs, to the treatment of alcohol in popular music. You can read a full account of the conference and its key themes on the DSN website, here. The conference was a significant milestone for the DSRG, as it firmly established Bristol as one of the most important ‘hubs’ of the wider field of drinking studies.
Dr Stephen Spencer presents at the Drinking Studies Research Group’s international conference.
We are rounding off 2024 with another instalment in our series of ‘Project Talks’, where we welcome speakers who are leading major projects in the field of drinking studies to tell us about their research, and to advise us on the development of successful funding applications. We will be welcoming colleagues from the wider university when Karen Gray (School for Policy Studies, University of Bristol) and Martin Preston (School for Education, University of Bristol), along with horticultural therapist and activity leader Guy Manchester, come to share insights from their experience running the Hoppiness: Brewing in Care Homes project. This involved brewing beer with residents of care homes as a way of supporting wellbeing and forging social connection. In 2025 we have two events coming up that we are particularly excited about: a panel event on ‘Early Career Pathways in Drinking Studies’, which will bring together speakers with recent experience of navigating both academic and alt-ac careers post-PhD. We plan to run this is a hybrid event to benefit ECRs across the international Drinking Studies Network, not just those at Bristol. And we are also planning a grant-writing retreat in the spring to support the several members of the group who are working towards funding applications in this field.
The American Studies Research Group continues to expand and serve a growing demand from graduate students and academic colleagues studying the United States. We enjoyed welcoming new members from across the University in 2024 as we continued to run a diverse range of events, such as our PGR workshops, external speaker series, and academic roundtables. Some of the highlights of the last year included the hosting of a UoB Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professor, Dr Vanessa Northington Gamble, who delivered a set of lectures on the history of race and medicine in America. She also met with our graduate students and offered some important guidance on research and networks. In accordance with the U.S. Election, we hosted an exciting post-presidential roundtable, featuring Bristol colleagues from the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies (SPAIS) and History, as well as an historian from the London School of Economics, who together reflected on the recent result. We strengthened our partnerships, including one with American Museum in Bath, and recognize the additional financial support of the British Association for American Studies. We also continued to build several research and teaching links with North American universities.
Dr Lucas de Abreu Maia (Politics) responds to an audience question in the U.S. Election event.
The coming year presents many exciting opportunities for our Group. We aim to expand our membership further within the University and beyond. Our partnerships and our portfolio of events are aimed at engaging different audiences, including an event about Native American art in conjunction with the Rainmaker Gallery. We also running co-badged events, including a roundtable on American environmental history with the Centre for Environmental Humanities as well as a roundtable, examining the challenges and opportunities of studying race in America after the 2024 election. Such talks will help us reflect on and contextualize America’s upcoming 250th ‘birthday’ in 2026. We hope you will be able to join us!
In 2024, the Senses and Sensations research group continued to build its international reputation by hosting a series of virtual seminar papers from colleagues across North America, Europe and the UK. At the same time, we worked closely with colleagues at the Brigstow Institute to bring partners from the creative industry and heritage sectors into conversation with group members. We hope that, in time, this will stimulate new collaborations and generate ambitious, innovative and impactful funding applications. Finally, we were delighted to be able to host Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professor, Mark Paterson, from Pittsburgh University. Mark is a work-leading scholar of sensation, and his presence really injected energy and focus into our activity.
Benjamin Meaker Visiting Professor Mark Paterson delivers a talk on emotions and the senses.
Building on Professor Paterson’s visit in June-July, we have now submitted an ambitious application for AHRC Curiosity funding. This will enable us to build an innovative international research network that brings together sensory studies scholars and sensory ecologists. We are excited to (hopefully) win that grant and, if not, to pursue further avenues to realize our exciting and world-leading aspirations. In addition, we are focusing our internal conversations on two major challenges. The first is to explore ‘intangible’ sensations, from sense of place to sense of time. The second is to build capacity around Sensory Studies for a Planet in Peril. We hope that by focusing activity, we will inspire generative collaborations and new research partnerships.
The Early Modern Studies (EMS) research group is pleased to report on another fine year of activities. On 21 May 2024 we ran an event on ‘Engaging the Early Modern’: a round-table discussion on how our scholarship engages with the media, communities, the arts, industry, in co-production, and more. Another highlight was our annual Summer Symposium in July. This featured a keynote from Rachel Willie (Liverpool John Moores) on extraterrestrial travel, and six further papers from PhD, early career, and established researchers on topics including Shakespeare’s 1 Henry VI, the performativity of walking, the religious poetry of Justinian Isham, Shakespearean tragedy, and early modern mining and metalworking. On 30th October, as part of our ‘Early Modern Conversations’ strand, we ran an event on ‘Teaching the Early Modern’: specialists in early modern studies from across the Faculty, both academics and postgraduate students, gathered to share their experiences of teaching the early modern in history, art history, theatre, comparative literature, liberal arts, Italian, and English. The event allowed us to share best practice and to explore future directions for early modern pedagogy at cross-Faculty level.
Early Modern Studies members have plans to present at next year’s conference in Bristol.
At the time of writing, we are organizing a research celebration event that will take place early in TB2: an opportunity to shout about and celebrate major and minor research achievements and successes. Behind the scenes, EMS officers have been working hard in preparation of the Society of Renaissance Studies biennial conference that will be coming to Bristol in July 2025. This major event now has attracted 300+ paper and panel proposals from international delegates, and plans are afoot for a very busy conference featuring three keynotes, a concert, drama reading, and more. More info here: https://www.rensoc.org.uk/event/srs-11th-biennial-conference/.
By Emma Frazer, PhD Hispanic, Portuguese and Latin American Studies candidate, School of Modern Languages
To continue our series spotlighting PGR summer internship projects, PhD Latin American Studies candidate Emma Frazer tells us about working with Professor Martin Hurcombe and Associate Professor Fiona Spotswood on their interdisciplinary project, Fostering Inclusivity in Action Sports. With the project at an advanced stage in engaging with audiences beyond academic circles, Emma reflects on the invaluable lessons the experience has offered in developing and presenting her own research.
Over the summer of 2024, I conducted a six-week PGR internship with Professor Martin Hurcombe and Associate Professor Fiona Spotswood. I had previously assisted them with an event called Game On, which involved a documentary-screening and academic discussion group on women’s sports. This internship provided me with the opportunity to continue working with them. They have created a framework that works on Fostering Inclusivity in Action Sports (FIAS), with a focus on women in mountain biking.
My PhD is researching the ways in which playing football empowers women beyond the pitch, exploring the cases of Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro, where I conducted my ethnographic research. The FIAS project has also used ethnographic research, and is again exploring women in sports, but it is further along than my own research, which means it has provided me with a really useful insight into how my work could develop in the future.
In particular, during my internship, the FIAS project has been at the stage of working on impact and dissemination by exploring case studies and reaching out to wider audiences. They have been experimenting with different ways to present their findings within the mountain biking community and beyond, including sporting institutions, stakeholders and policy-makers. It has been invaluable to learn how projects can progress from the research stage and be disseminated to a wider audience, beyond academic circles, and how the impact of that can begin to be measured too.
To navigate through the framework, use the grey bar on the right hand side of the screen.
To view the framework in full screen, right click the above hyperlink and select first option.
My internship began with me working with their framework in the form of editing a presentation, as well as a short and long framework. By presenting their work in different formats of different lengths, I was able to see how the work can be adapted depending on the audience and the objective, with varying amounts of detail included. It also showed me the importance of strong, cohesive messaging, as well as clear, actionable goals. From there I developed a two-pager document myself for the project, which can be disseminated to organisations and stakeholders, but which can also be used as a policy brief.
Following the two-pager, I wrote up case studies of different women’s mountain biking organisations who have used the framework. This was a useful process as it showed me how I might include the case studies from my own ethnographic research within my PhD, as well as how they can be presented in the future dissemination of my work.
(L-R) Associate Professor Fiona Spotswood chairs a panel discussion with Sue Anstiss MBE, Aneela McKenna (Mòr Diversity), Aoife Glass, Zoe Woodman and Professor Jean Williams.
Finally, I was involved in the marketing strategy for how to effectively reach different audiences with the framework. Having done some research, it was clear that direct messaging to members of different mountain biking and action sports organisations would be the most effective method. These can range from local groups, such as Women Ride Bristol, to cycling institutions, such as British Cycling. I then reached out through various groups to pass on the framework.
As a result of the internship, I have been able to learn the dissemination process of academic work to a wider audience, as well as how to provide the tools so that the research can have an impact in the real world, and how to measure any impact it might have.
By Tom Baker, PhD Italian candidate, School of Modern Languages
In the first of a new series spotlighting PGR summer internship projects, PhD Italian candidate Tom Baker tells us about working with Professor John Foot on the Italian terrorist trials of the 1970s and 80s. Together, they created a database of trials mapping the activity of armed Left-wing groups who sought to overthrow the Italian state.
I undertook a PGR internship under the supervision of Professor John Foot during the summer of 2024. We worked together over the course of six weeks researching and documenting the trials of those accused of acts and affiliations in relation to ‘Red’ terrorism (perpetrated by armed Left-wing groups) in Italy during the ‘Years of Lead’. The ‘Years of Lead’, from roughly the 1970s through until the mid-1980s, was a period of societal unrest, with both Left- and Right-wing armed groups carrying out targeted assassinations, kidnappings, robberies, opportunistic shootings and bombings. After a terrorist act, it was often unclear which group was responsible, let alone which individuals within the group were involved. Thousands of such incidents required thorough investigation and unravelling, much like the complex networks of the terrorist groups themselves.
The photo above was taken by Paolo Pedrizzetti in Milan during the ‘Years of Lead’. The young man in a ski mask (centre) was a member of a far-left organization which pulled out their pistols and began to shoot at the police, killing policeman Antonio Custra on May 14, 1977.
There were many changes to Italian law to overcome terrorism in Italy. Changes to procedures, how long and where an individual could be detained, a tightening of prison facilities (to arrest the rash of breakouts) and special bomb proof court rooms with cages constructed. The starting point for our research begins after a notice for arrest was issued. Using digital archives of trial material, newspaper archives, books, interviews and other sources we began to piece together the complex tapestry of the Italian state’s attempt to prosecute the armed Leftist groups.
The project is an important one, as our research shows there exists no complete database of the hundreds of trials of accused Leftist terrorists in Italy. The fact that we focused on red terror as opposed to both red and black (Right) terror significantly focused the research, as to attempt both would dilute the project given the time constraints. As for a timespan, we decided on 1974 – marked by the arrest of the historical leadership of the Brigate Rosse (Red Brigades), the largest Left terror group during the Years of Lead – to 1994, when the Autonomia Maxi trial concluded. This trial was part of a broader legal process that began in 1979 and involved individuals accused of being the ideologues behind left-wing terrorism. A maxi trial, now more familiar with Mafia trials, is a good example of the changing procedures in judicial process during the Years of Lead. Several hundred people would be tried together under extreme levels of security. This security was necessary as several trials were postponed as Left-wing terrorists targeted and killed judges to halt the prosecution of their comrades and the revolution. Even today, trials of some Left-wing terrorists in Italy remain unheard, as the Italian state continues to seek extradition of individuals believed to be responsible.
A photograph from the trial of the historical leadership of the Brigate Rosse (Red Brigades) in Turin, 1976. The defendants, often caged, refused to recognise the court’s legitimacy and regularly attempted to disrupt proceedings.
Given the time constraints we faced and the sheer volume of material we decided it was best that I first focus on listing where this trial material can be found, so this project has an easy access point for continuity. Following this I researched individual acts of terrorism, read newspaper archives (il Manifesto, Il Messaggero, La Repubblica, Corriere della Sera) for police appeals and reports, the arrested suspects and their subsequent trials. From here, I would note the dates of the trial, in which court the trial took place, who the judges were and the outcome to build the database. Some individuals, particularly those most active in their organisations, appeared in court over a dozen times. Their sentences would often change, there were appeals, overturned convictions and a change to their status – such as benefitting from a law passed in this period for dissociation with armed struggle leading to a much lighter sentence.
On a personal note, starting an exciting project from scratch has helped me further develop my research skills and I have enjoyed the opportunity of working closely with my supervisor. We hope that this research will be a starting point in the complex process of collating the terror trials in Italy, bringing together the fragmented yet interconnected legal processes which ultimately ended in success for the state.
Tom Baker is a PhD candidate in the School of Modern Languages with research interests in labour history, deindustrialisation, transformation of work, social movements and oral history. To find out more about the project and database created with Professor John Foot, contact ks21162@bristol.ac.uk. To read more PGR summer internship projects, visit Arts Matter.
By Damien McManus, Professor Martin Hurcombe, Dr Charlotte Faucher, Dr Federico Testa, Louisiane Bigot
August 2024 marks 80 years since the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation in the summer of 1944, a decisive and highly symbolic moment in World War II. In celebration, the School of Modern Languages and Library Services, with support from the University’s Theatre Collection, the French Government’s Mission Libération, and AUPHF+, held an event in June to commemorate the D-Day landings and the importance of objets de mémoire (objects of memory) as powerful reminders of the struggle against oppression.
French Forces of the Interior (FFI) barricade, the liberation of Paris, World War II, 1944.
This event was held to mark the 80th anniversary of Operation Overlord, the landings in Normandy which took place in June 1944, and the subsequent liberation of France that year. Supported by the French Government’s Mission Libération, itcomprised an exhibition of photographic images and original documents selected from the University Libraryand the Theatre Collection; and a series of short presentations and discussions around the intellectual and cultural context and legacy of resistance to the Nazi occupation of France1940-44.Material for the exhibition was chosen from two areas of the collections: the University of Westminster War and Culture Studies Archive which is now housed at the University’s Library Services, and the Irving Family Archive, located in the Theatre Collection, also at Bristol.
A number of themes provided the focus of the exhibitionand traced aspects of the French experience of the war. The first of these reflected attempts to bolstermorale during the early days of the Occupationand included representations of life for French people in exile in the UK. Othersreflected how keenly the French in exile in the UK anticipatedLiberation, before the exhibition moved on to the aftermath of the Normandy landings, and the gradual lifting of the Nazi Occupation.
A major source for texts and images around these themes was La France libre [Free France], which was published first in London, then Paris, from November 1940 to December 1946, and which sought to fight against the acceptance of defeat, and advocate resistance and the restoration of freedom to France. Among the writings and images selected were satirical pieces depicting occupying forces as brutal simpletons in contrast to the more erudite French population; and intriguing adverts for a range of products from quintessentially French brands such as Michelin tyres to less well known and possibly more controversial items, to the French at least, such asMarmite. Photographs taken on the day of the liberation of Paris and of celebrating civilians in Normandy and the capital served to remind viewers of the relief felt at the end of the Occupation.
Image courtesy of the Irving Family Archive. Courseulles-sur-Mer is a coastal town in Normandy, known for its proximity to Juno Beach, one of the D-Day landing sites during World War II.
The Irving Family Archive provided some fascinating images of the planning and execution of the landings at Normandy. Laurence Irving, a prominent Hollywood set designer and Intelligence Officer with the Royal Air Force, specialised in the analysis of low-level reconnaissance photographs, some of which were displayed, marked up with vital information about coastal defences. Other images provided impressions of the destructiveness of war and powerful portraits of captured German equipment and vehicles.
Presentations and a panel discussion rounded off the day’s proceedings. Dr Federico Testaprovided an account of the tensions between the ideas of pacifism and justice, and in particular themoral and ethical dilemmas facing the French during WorldWar II.Professor Martin Hurcombespoke about Les Amants d’Avignon (The Lovers of Avignon] written by Elsa Triolet and published clandestinely under the pseudonym of Laurent Daniel, and focused on the roles of women in the Resistance, which have very often been overlooked. Dr Charlotte Faucherframed her talk around aphotograph of Résistantesfrom the BBC Yearbook 1945, taken when the impression among some British people was of well-fed French civilians at a time of rationing in the UK, and outlined her interviews with former female resistance fighters who firmly countered that view. Lastly, Professor Debra Kelly (emerita, University of Westminster, who kindly organised the donation of the War and Culture Studies Archive) discussed the 1946 novel, Siege of Londonwritten by (Mrs)Robert Henrey (sic), real name Madeleine Gall, a member of the French community in London.
Professor Martin Hurcombe provides historical context to visitors at the exhibition.
This was a hugely enjoyable exhibition to organise, and the presentations and discussions were fascinating, enlightening and full of debate. Perhaps the most rewarding aspect was the range of people who came to see the exhibition and to attend the discussions, from members of the public to groups of sixth formers from Bristol and Cardiff who were evidently very engaged with the collections, especially as they were directly connected to their A-Level studies.
By Dr Miguel García López, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Hispanic, Portuguese and Latin American Studies, School of Modern Languages
Dr Miguel García López tells us about a collaborative project which seeks to increase the visibility of LGBTQIA+ people in audio-visual media. With LGBTQIA+ characters in film and television productions consistently underrepresented, Miguel’s research is a timely intervention. The project recently received an AHRC Impact Acceleration Account Award and underlines the positive effect arts and humanities research can achieve.
Existing research on the social impact of audio-visual work underscores the stagnant and low levels of diversity in audio-visual media and focuses on the representation of diversity as a driving factor of structural change. Through my work on queer film and television in the Hispanic world, I’m interested in exploring how the 21st century has brought about important changes in terms of LGBTQIA+ visibility and discourses around diversity and inclusivity in Spanish-speaking contexts. This is how I came in contact with ODA (Observatory for Diversity in Audiovisual Media), which is the primary organisation monitoring, analysing, and providing public data on diversity levels in audio-visual representation in Spain. The organisation produces an annual report on the representation of LGBTQIA+ and minoritized communities in film and television and provides training and consultation services to filmmakers, filmmaking companies (Netflix, Prime Video), policy makers in governmental institutions (the Spanish Institute of Cinematography and Audio-visual Arts, the Ministry of Culture) and individuals on how to produce inclusive audio-visual works and embed inclusivity and diversity into events, communications, and activities.
Alba Flores, Spanish actor and LGBTQIA+ activist, at the ODA 2023 Awards ceremony.
Our project ‘Queer Screen Cultures in the 21st Century’ seeks to increase the visibility, inclusion, and agency of LGBTQIA+ people and minoritized communities in audio-visual media. Funded by the AHRC Impact Accelerator Account Knowledge Exchange Placement scheme, the project involves a six-month collaboration between Dr Miguel García López and ODA, which will help the partner organisation reach wider audiences through training and knowledge exchange activities, bringing together academics working in the fields of queer and film studies and non-academic members from the audio-visual industry. These will involve training and consultation events in Spain and the UK, the translation of ODA’s annual report into English and the creation of a transnational network through an online newsletter, enabling both the partner and the researcher to engage with key stakeholders, establish transnational links between Spain and the UK and develop a sustainable long-term collaboration. Dr Simon Brownhill, Senior Lecturer in Education, has also recently joined the project as Research Ethics lead and will support with data collection, analysis and dissemination.
Asaari Bibang, Frank T and Lamine Thior at the ODA 2023 Awards ceremony. Their podcast, No hay negros en el Tíbet (There are no blacks in Tibet), seeks to increase Black representation in Spanish audio-visual media.
I will work closely with the partner organisation, collaborating in the creation of the organisation’s annual report, providing academic research expertise in training and consultation activities, and helping ODA to establish a transnational network for the promotion of diversity in audio-visual media. We will combine our research on queer audio-visual culture, consultation and advising services and activities monitoring the representation of diversity in film and television to attain structural social change in the audio-visual industry in Spain and the UK. Our collaboration will provide a bi-directional space of learning and knowledge exchange for subjects with lived experience of discrimination and inequality and for stakeholders in the audio-visual industry seeking further diversity and inclusion. This placement will help us build and maintain an environment and culture that enables effective and ambitious knowledge exchange and impact, including development of skills, capacity and capability within the University and address cultural barriers for arts/cultural sector collaborations with Higher Education Institutions.
Dr Miguel García López is Senior Lecturer in Hispanic Studies and researches on queer representation in Hispanic film and television. He collaborates with UK filmmakers and organisations like the British Film Institute. To find out more about Miguel’s research and the ODA partnership, please contact miguel.garcialopez@bristol.ac.uk.
*Images taken from ODA’s official website (oda.org.es): ODA’s logo and images from this year’s ODA Awards ceremony, celebrating diversity and inclusion in Spanish audio-visual media.
By George Thomas, Faculty of Arts Research Events and Communications Coordinator
As 2023 draws to a close, we caught up with some of our Faculty Research Centres and Groups to learn about their highlights from the academic and calendar year, as well as activities they are particularly looking forward to in 2024. To find out more about our Faculty Research Centres and Groups and how to get involved, please see contact details and website links provided at the end of each entry.
Centre for Health, Humanities and Science:
The Centre for Health, Humanities and Science (CHHS) and its c. 200 members have been busier than ever this term and are looking forward to a number of exciting events in the new year. This academic year was inaugurated with a workshop organized by Dr Dan Degerman, a Leverhulme early-career fellow in Philosophy, on ‘Silence and Psychopathology’; this was followed by a colloquium organized by Kathryn Body, PhD student in Philosophy, on Loneliness and Shame in Health and Medicine, with speakers from the US, Hong Kong, Ireland and the UK. An event in November, co-hosted with the Wellcome-funded Epistemic Injustice in Healthcare project, brought together psychotherapists, doctors, and academics in Medicine and English Literature to talk about Trauma. The final event of the year, held in December, was an online colloquium on Modernist Literature and the Health Humanities organized by Dr Doug Battersby, a Global Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow in the English Department.
The Sensing Spaces of Healthcare showcase takes place on 14 February 2024
Highlights for Spring 2024 include a showcasing of Dr Victoria Bates’s UKRI-funded Future Leaders Fellowship project on Sensing Spaces of Healthcare, taking place on 14 February, followed by an early-career event on ‘Narrating Public Health Taboos’, a practice-based workshop with the artist Hannah Mumby, scheduled for 20 February. A talk on epistemic injustice by Professor Havi Carel and Dr Dan Degerman will be taking place in March. The annual Art Exhibition organized by Dr John Lee, featuring art works by students from the Intercalated BA in Medical Humanities, will be held at People’s Republic of Stokes Croft in May. On 11-12 June, the CHHS will also host a grant-writing workshop and retreat at Hawkwood College in Stroud. Last but not least, the new year will see the publication of Key Concepts in Medical Humanities (Bloomsbury Academic), a collection of essays on topics such as ‘health, ‘illness’, ‘neurodiversity’, ‘disability’, and ‘death and dying’, as well as approaches including ‘narrative medicine’, ‘graphic medicine’, ‘medicine and the visual arts’ and ‘’the Black health humanities’. The book is authored by members and affiliates of the Centre for Health, Humanities and Science.
The Centre for Creative Technologies has had a successful year, forming a community that brings together creative practitioners, academics, and researchers. Our Alternative Technologies Workshop Series offered a great chance to reflect critically on developing technologies within the Metaverse, Blockchain, AI and Mega-engineering, and connect University of Bristol academics with Pervasive Media Studio residents.
Dr Paul Clarke presents on the Centre’s panel ‘Affective Relations’ at the Zip-Scene conference in Prague
From these connections, we saw some successful applications that blossomed into projects from our Creative Technologies Seedcorn Fund; VR games and storytelling, platform cultures, mixed reality experiences of futures in Colombia, and creative skills in animation and co-production in Amazonia. The Future Speculations Reading Group has grown, and we will be expanding the sessions with the Centre for Sociodigital Futures with a focus on community and creative technologies. The summer term ended with our keynote speaker, Dr Eduard Arriaga-Arango, sharing his research on Afrolatinx digital culture and data decolonisation. Our July event, Queer Methodologies in Creative Technologies, has developed into a two-day event in November consisting of artist workshops and an open forum; Queer Practices and Creative Technologies. The Centre curated a panel, ‘Affective Relations: Empathy, imagination and care in immersive experiences’, at the Zip-Scene conference in Prague, one of the leading international extended reality (VR/AR/MR) and interactive storytelling conferences, which was also an opportunity to network with related Centres, academics and artists in this field.
Dr Francesco Bentivegna presents on the Centre’s panel ‘Affective Relations’ at Prague’s Zip-Scene conference
The Concept Game Jam, run with Bristol Digital Game Lab and sponsored by MyWorld, opened up conversations around Algorithmic Bias related to co-director Professor Edward King’s UKRI Project ‘Contesting Algorithmic Racism Through Digital Cultures In Brazil’. We plan to organise events to share this project’s progress, and are currently building the project page on our website with regular blogs for members to follow. Our Friday Lunchtime talk series at the Watershed will continue, as well as further collaborations with the Pervasive Media Studio. Our membership and scope have grown, and this year we hope to solidify connections between academics and PM Studio residents and develop our connection with Knowle West Media Centre by focusing on community technologies. We plan to organise a workshop series run by PhD and ECR centre members at the Pervasive Media Studio in the run up to our final summer event on community and creative technologies, with a keynote speaker.
2023 has been a busy year for the Centre for Environmental Humanities. Our first major event was a workshop in February on ‘the Future of the Environmental Humanities’, which brought together around 30 people from across the Faculty and beyond, together with Melina Buns from our partners at the University of Stavanger’s Greenhouse Center, and Michelle Bastian from the University of Edinburgh. This was a valuable opportunity to reflect on our existing strengths and think about strategies for the centre to develop and grow.
Thanks to the vagaries of the academic calendar, 2023 also saw two annual lectures! In June we hosted Professor Gisela Heffes from Rice University, who spoke on the aesthetics of toxicity in contemporary Latin America, and in November we welcomed Professor Imre Szeman from the University of Toronto, who discussed the future of clean energy and gave us a literary analysis of the environmental writings of Bill Gates…
Alongside these major events, we’ve been continuing with our usual programme of seminars, and have also introduced a weekly tea/coffee catch up, which has proved a valuable and relaxed space for the sharing of ideas, reading recommendations and plans. We’ve been delighted to welcome our first cohort of students on the MA in Environmental Humanities, who are already proving a lively addition to the CEH community.
We’ve begun a collaboration with a curator, Georgia Hall, on working with artists in the environmental humanities, thanks to a grant from the Faculty’s AHRC Impact Acceleration Account. We look forward to continuing this collaboration in 2024. We are also hard at work, alongside other research centres in the Faculty, on a bid for one of the AHRC’s new ‘doctoral focal awards’ on the theme of ‘arts and humanities for a healthy planet, people and place’.
The American Studies Research Group experienced an amazing 2023! Membership increased to include over forty staff and graduate students from across the Faculties of Arts and Social Sciences and Law. Beyond our steering group, we have established three sub-committees to advance strategic goals, including partnerships, funding, and events. Our graduate training initiative, led by Dr Thomas M. Larkin and Dr Darius Wainwright, was well attended and provided important support for our PGR students. Our regular speaker series garnered positive feedback through presentations by such scholars as Ian Tyrrell, Dr Lorenzo Costaguta, Dr Erin Forbes, Dr Kate Guthrie, and Beth Wilson. We also helped to organize and host the British Association of Nineteenth-Century Americanists (BrANCA) 6th Biennial Symposium, which drew scholars from across the world to share their latest research. Our partnership with the American Museum (Bath) inspired additional consultations and collaboration, while the strengthening of our research environment contributed to new publications, including articles by Jim Hilton, Paula K. Read, Victoria Coules and Professor Michael J. Benton, and Dr Thomas M. Larkin.
We are excited by our plans for 2024. We will be hosting Professor Vanessa N. Gamble (The George Washington University) as the Bristol Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professor. She will work closely with our group on funding and partnership development, as well as deliver four research presentations. We are pleased to continue hosting a range of external seminar speakers, including Nathan Cardon, Sharon Monteith, and Thomas Arnold-Foster. We are grateful for the financial support of the Faculty and the British Association for American Studies (BAAS).
The Early Modern Studies research group has had a very productive 2023. In May 2023, EMS organised the ‘Place and Space in the Early Modern World’ workshop (already reported on the Arts Matter Blog). In the summer we held our annual Summer Symposium featuring 4 panels of two speakers each, with papers ranging from early music to Anglo-Dutch identities; from stage corpses to Venus and Adonis; and from Philip Sidney’s translation of a devotional work to Shakespeare’s history plays and his will. The start of the new academic year (TB1) saw the occasion for a research celebration: many good news stories, research updates, and a celebration of two first monographs published by Dr Dana Lungu and Dr Gonzalo Velasco Berenguer. EMS will soon hold their annual ‘conversations’ event (Dec 2023); and for 2024 has further early modern events lined up.
Dr Sebastiaan Verweij opens the ‘Place and Space in the Early Modern World’ workshop
Since its inception, the Drinking Studies Faculty Research Group has been running a research seminar series with local, national, and international speakers to bring together local members and spark productive conversations. We have had flash talks from PhD students and local academics to get to know each other better as a group, and talks from experts in the wider field of Drinking Studies. Dr Deborah Toner (University of Leicester) joined us in June to talk about her experience of collaborative work and bringing history and policy together with international partners in South America. Dr Susan Flavin (TCD) joined us in September to talk about her interdisciplinary project on early modern brewing techniques including an exciting authentic brew which was tasted by the members of the project and examined by chemists and nutritionists to investigate much discussed questions around the ABV and nutritional qualities of these early brews. In the coming year, we are hosting the Drinking Studies Network conference at Bristol (March 2024) which will bring together local, national, and international researchers to discuss writing about alcohol.
The Screen Research group had a very successful 2023. We ran a series of workshops on video-essay making, which allowed participants to develop key technical and analytical skills related to video-essay production, and to gain insight into best practices when it comes to integrating video-essays as unit assessments. The sessions were delivered by leading experts in the field, including Prof. Catherine Grant. 2023 also saw the publication of Dr Miguel Gaggiotti’sNonprofessional Screen Performance (Palgrave Macmillan) and Professor Catherine O’Rawe’sThe Nonprofessional Actor: Italian Neorealist Cinema and Beyond (Bloomsbury), two monographs greatly shaped and informed by Screen Research events, sessions and partnerships. The short films Nothing Echoes Here (Hay, 2023) and Pouring Water on Troubled Oil(Massoumi, 2023), directed by group members, also had their festival premieres in 2023. We hope to continue this success into 2024.
Dr Miguel Gaggiotti’s new monographProfessor Catherine O’Rawe’s new monograph
We will be running further events and training sessions on video-essay production, an area group members have shown a particular interest in, which has led to an ongoing series of monthly video-essay work-in-progress sessions where members share their work and receive peer feedback. The video-essay is now being adopted as a form of undergraduate assessment in the Faculty, so we are also working on best practice for assessing it, and have invited Dr. Estrella Sendra of KCL to talk to members about using the video-essay as a pedagogical tool. We will also be running a one-day practice-as-research symposium in collaboration with UWE (in June 2024) as well as a joint book launch for Catherine O’Rawe’s and Miguel Gaggiotti’s monographs in early 2024, among other activities!
The Bristol Digital Game Lab showcased a vibrant array of events throughout 2023, providing a platform for scholars, students, and enthusiasts to delve into the multifaceted world of digital gaming.
The Lab initiated the academic year with a thought-provoking online roundtable on October 24, where experts and major UK game lab leads gathered to discuss the implications of the Video Games Research Framework (launched by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in May) on individual research, and how game labs, centres, and networks could support its aims. The event featured two esteemed keynote speakers: Prof. Peter Etchells, who was involved in drafting the Framework, and Dr Tom Brock, the Chair of British DiGRA.
‘Music and Sound in Games’, a collaborative event between the Game Lab and Digital Scholarship @Oxford
Following this, on October 31, the Lab collaborated with Digital Scholarship @Oxford and organised a hybrid panel and roundtable titled “Music and Sound in Games”. Expert speakers from both industry and academia dissected the impact of music on gaming narratives, characters, and emotional engagement. The digital roundtable facilitated by Dr Richard Cole further delved into critical conversations surrounding this fascinating aspect of game design.
November brought a Research Seminar in collaboration with the Department of Classics and Ancient History. Dr Dunstan Lowe, Senior Lecturer in Latin Literature at the University of Kent, presented on “History is not the Past”: Videogame Design and The Ancient Mediterranean. The seminar explored how video games portray ancient history, emphasising the diverse ways in which different genres and playstyles influence the conceptualisation of ancient worlds within digital games.
Towards the end of November, the Lab hosted an exciting inaugural event, the ‘Concept’ Game Jam, co-organised with the Centre for Creative Technologies and sponsored by MyWorld. The Game Jam challenged the 40 participants to explore how gaming mechanisms could shed light on the biases embedded in algorithms, especially in the realm of machine learning and AI. It stimulated creative thinking about the intersection of gaming and algorithmic bias and some teams came up with innovative working prototypes.
Bristol Digital Game Lab has expanded to over 150 members, gaining increasing international recognition
December will start with the Antiquity Games Night, a novel monthly online meetup organised by Dr Richard Cole and Alexander Vandewalle (University of Antwerp/Ghent University). Scholars, students, and designers will gather to play antiquity games, fostering an engaging space that blends academic discussions with gaming experiences.
Closing the year on a festive note, the Lab will bring back the “Festive Gaming” event on December 14. This event will invite participants to join in for an evening of social gaming, featuring the latest releases and playtests of upcoming games. The lineup included contributions from Catastrophic Overload, Meaning Machine, and Auroch Digital, providing a platform for networking, exploration, and celebration within the gaming community.
In summary, the Bristol Digital Game Lab’s 2023 events were a testament to the diversity and richness of the digital gaming landscape. From scholarly discussions on research frameworks and ancient history to hands-on game jams and festive gaming, the Lab succeeded in creating a dynamic space that catered to a broad spectrum of interests within the gaming community. The Lab has expanded to a network with more than 150 members, gaining increasing recognition internationally.
Looking ahead to 2024, we will be hosting an ECR/Postgraduate work-in-progress event in January, followed by a series of industry talks with a headline from Ndemic Creations, a roundtable on accessibility, as well as a conference on New Directions in Classics, Gaming, and Extended Reality. We look forward to seeing you there!
By George Thomas, Faculty of Arts Research Events and Communications Coordinator
The Autumn Art Lectures are here again and this year we are on the move!
2023 marks the 118th anniversary of the Autumn Art Lecture series. Conceived as a platform for Art and Art History in what was then University College Bristol, the series has remained a highlight in Bristol’s cultural calendar. Over the course of its lifetime, the series has explored themes ranging from the monstruous to the celestial, and hosted such luminaries as Kenneth Clarke, EH Gombrich, Toshio Watanabe, Laura Mulvey and David Olusoga. More recently, a commitment to making space for artists to discuss their own practice has added Paul Gough, Richard Long and 2022 Turner Prize shortlisted-artist Ingrid Pollard to the series’ list of prestigious alumni.
Last year to mark the centenary of modernism’s annus mirabilis, the series sought to challenge the concept of modernism as a monolithic entity. By paying particular attention to Blackness, Asian-ness, difference, and decolonisation, the series toppled the notion of a Euro-American Modernism which leaves the non-Western world out in the cold. Talks by Professor Simon Shaw-Miller, Professor Kenneth David Jackson, Jane Alison and Hammad Nasar from the 2022 series are available to listen back to on the University of Bristol’s SoundCloud.
Our theme this year coincides with Bristol 650, the year-long celebration that marks the anniversary of the 1373 royal charter, and will focus on some of the historical, cultural and conceptual spaces of Bristol. AAL2023 will be an opportunity not just to talk about Bristol and its (in)visible histories, but also to step into the city itself. Events will be hosted in venues that span Bristol – from the Cathedral at its heart on College Green, to Spike Island in the midst of the river that defines the city’s cosmopolitan past and present. Our speakers include curators, artists, and academics, who together will take us on a journey through both familiar and unfamiliar aspects of the city’s history, including its place in the wider world.
The event series is open to all, and we look forward to welcoming you to the University of Bristol for these engaging talks.
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Our theme this year coincides with Bristol 650, the year-long celebration that marks the anniversary of the 1373 royal charter, and will focus on some of the historical, cultural and conceptual spaces of Bristol. AAL2023 will be an opportunity not just to talk about Bristol and its (in)visible histories, but also to step into the city itself. Events will be hosted in venues that span Bristol – from the Cathedral at its heart on College Green, to Spike Island in the midst of the river that defines the city’s cosmopolitan past and present. Our speakers include curators, artists, and academics, who together will take us on a journey through both familiar and unfamiliar aspects of the city’s history, including its place in the wider world.