Research seminars

IHCA: Cross-Institute Research Seminars 2010-11: Autumn Semester

Sharon Young
Restoring the Country House: Lucy Hutchinson’s Elegies  

Lucy Hutchinson’s Elegies, a collection of manuscript poems dating from 1664-68, were written to lament the death of her husband, the regicide Col. John Hutchinson; however, the poems also attempt to provide a legacy for republicanism. This paper explores the way that Hutchinson reworks the spaces and structures of the country house and associated poetic genres to explore the experience of republican defeat and political retirement.  

5pm; Wednesday October 13th; Woodbury 137  

Prof  Francine Tolron (University of Avignon)
New Zealand: Advertising and Identity  

Prof Tolron is Professor of English and Commonwealth Studies at Avignon University and has spent some time in New Zealand.  

1.15pm; Tuesday October 19th; Woodbury 137
   

Dr Mikel Koven
From Mondo to Flesh Eaters: Italian Cannibal Film as Ambivalent Ethnographic Film  

The cycle of Italian Cannibal movies, although short lived, drew its influence from the “mondo” documentaries of the 1960s and influenced the cycle of Italian Zombie movies, which emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s. While exploitation cinema in general,  and Italian exploitation cinema in particular, has always played with ambivalence, the ambivalences played out in the Cannibal cycle reflect similar dynamics to those at play in the quasi-ethnographic agenda of the “mondo” films. This presentation traces that history.
Warning: this presentation will contain images and discussions which some may find offensive.  

5pm; October 27th; Woodbury 137    

 

Drs Mehreen Mirza and Barbara Mitra
Dilutions of Ethnography: Ethnography Lite  

There appear to be divergent understandings of the term ‘ethnography’.  For example, within the field of media audience research, there are studies that claim to have conducted ethnographic research, but which lack the rich, multi-layered detail that is commonly associated with ethnography as conducted within the disciplines of Sociology and Anthropology. Drawing on the authors’ own experiences of research, as well as a consideration of some classic audience research studies, we will argue that there needs to be much greater clarification and consistency in relation to use of the term ethnography. We raise this as an important issue requiring discussion if there is to be achieved a more consensual understanding of what it means to conduct ethnographic research across different disciplines.  

5pm; November 10th; Woodbury 137    

 

Dr Paola Botham
Spider Girls in Santiago and Glasgow  

This paper explores two theatrical representations of the ‘Spider Girls’, a gang of underprivileged teenagers who climb apartment buildings to steal clothes and jewellery in affluent areas of Santiago. Chilean dramatist Luis Barrales employs local codes in his portrayal, while Kathy McKean’s version relocates the action to Glasgow in order to highlight the damaging effects of a global consumer society. The paper examines both plays’ dramaturgical strategies to approach a marginal experience that is not immediately available to the theatre makers (or their average spectator).  

5pm; Wednesday November 24th; Woodbury 137    

 

Dr Wendy Toon
Bat Bomb: Japs, Bats, Nuts and Tiger!  

World War II led to many important military and technological developments. While the atom bomb was the most significant, it was not the only unconventional weapon developed by the Americans. Surprisingly, and now even perhaps laughably, Project X-Ray began development of the oft overlooked ‘bat bomb’.  These were exceptional times and exceptional solutions to the Japanese ‘problem’ needed to be found.  This paper explores the development of the project, its high profile supporters, including President Franklin Roosevelt, and the reasons behind the idea. It will reflect particularly on the American assessments of Japan and the Japanese, which made such a project possible.  

5pm; Wednesday 8th December; Woodbury 137

IHCA: Cross-Institute Research Seminars 2010-11: Spring Semester

Dr. Paul Elliott
Toward an Embodied Film Theory  

 

Since the late 1990s critical and cultural theory has challenged the primacy of the visual in human understanding. Disciplines as wide-ranging as architecture, anthropology and sociology have begun to look at the broader spectrum of sensual experience and how the non-visual senses such as smell and touch contribute to both ontology and epistemology.  This paper traces how some recent film theorists and philosophers have made use of notions such as synaesthesia, phenomenology, physical sound reception and haptic vision to challenge the predominant discourses of spectatorship that are based in vision and the spectatorial gaze.  The paper is a first step towards defining, characterising and deploying an embodied film theory - one that arguably comes closer to describing and analysing the real experience of cinema than more traditional concepts of the sensually removed viewer.  

5pm; Wednesday 23rd February; Woodbury 137    

Karin Aveyard
The Place of Communication and Consumption: cultural geographies of cinema exhibition and attendance in contemporary rural Australia  

The public exhibition of films in rural Australia takes place in a wide variety of settings, ranging from modern multiplexes located in larger towns through to older-style single screen cinemas that operate in more remote places. This paper will examine the characteristics of these diverse viewing situations and explore the significance of cinema-going as a social and cultural event. It will also look at how global and national trends, such as the transition to digital cinema projection, are reshaping rural film exhibition.  

5pm;  Wednesday 2nd March; Woodbury 137    

 

Dr John Parham
A Concrete Sense of Place: Punk and the City  

This paper argues that one aspect of the alienation which pervaded Punk was a negative attitude towards a degraded, urban physical environment.  The paper suggests that, as a consequence, Punk formulated its own version of what ecocritics have called a ‘toxic discourse’ and that this took two forms: the unpalatable aesthetic of first wave Punk (represented by X-Ray Spex)  and a more mainstream second wave Punk that sought to politicize rather than alienate its audience (exemplified by The Jam).  The paper will end by considering the work of the ‘punk-poet’ John Cooper-Clarke.  

5pm; Wednesday 23rd March; Woodbury 137    

 

Prof Jean Webb
Hungry Cities:  a discussion of approaches towards the environment in contemporary English children’s literature  

Contemporary English children’s literature reflects contemporary interest in, and concern towards, the environment and the impact of human actions.  This paper will discuss three differing approaches, typified by the following texts: Philip Reeves’ Mortal Engines (2001), Michelle Paver’s Wolf Brother (2004) and George Saves the World by Lunchtime (2006) by Jo Readman and Ley Honor Roberts.  Mortal Engines is science fiction projecting into a post-apocalyptic world whereas Wolf Brother is set in the Stone Age and explores living in a close relationship with nature.  George Saves the World by Lunchtime, produced in association with the Eden Project, is a fantasy story encouraging environmentally responsible attitudes in children.  

5pm; Wednesday 30th March; Woodbury 137    

 

Dr Nicoleta Cinpoes
Handling Ophelia  

Apart from taking on board the rich and conflicting material readily provided by the playtext, contemporary stage productions of Hamlet also engage with a whole history of ‘snatch’-ing and re-fashioning Ophelia for projects that range from historicisms to feminisms, textual imperialism to performance studies, early modern conduct manuals to contemporary teenage behavioural disorder studies, pre-Raphaelite painting to cinema and pornography, and from Goth iconography and Manga Shakespeare to music, fashion brands and the computer games industry.  Looking at some recent productions of Hamlet, this paper explores the stage struggle to ‘recuperate’ an Ophelia that both discursive criticism and visual objectification bury prematurely (albeit by different means and with different aims) when claiming, like Laertes, “The woman will be out”.  

5pm; Wednesday 4th May; Woodbury 137