We the Humanities - are you?
Friday, 21 February 2014
Jessica and Kristina would love to feature University of Reading staff as curators - get in touch!
Two University of Reading PhD students are set to launch a new social media based initiative to showcase the creativity and diversity of the humanities.
The brainchild of Jessica Sage and Kristina West, @wethehumanities Twitter account and blog will feature a new tweeter (or curator) each week who will tweet about what they do within the field, encouraging conversations with an audience ranging from lifetime humanities specialists to the mildly curious.
The account is also backed up by a blog, available at http://wethehumanities.wordpress.com, to provide a place for further discussion than the constraints of Twitter allow.
This is the first international ‘rotation-curation' Twitter account for the humanities, which hopes to follow the success achieved by the science platform @realscientists. This describes itself as "real science from real scientists, communicators, writers, artists and clinicians... bringing science to you" and has over 9,000 followers.
Jessica Sage said: "Our aim is to engage with people from around the world, exposing them to research, experience and ideas they perhaps didn't know existed, and to reiterate the place of the humanities in our cultures. Already we've got poets, teachers, researchers, museums and even a few scientists and business people following the account, and our aim is to grow to attract more people from outside the discipline."
The first curator will be Louise Jackson, Head of Learning Enhancement at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance. A specialist in arts-based pedagogy and Widening Participation, her current research is exploring notions of neoliberal politics and the fetishisation of higher education. In 2013, she was awarded a National Teaching Fellowship by the Higher Education Academy, the highest award for teaching in HE.
Louise said: "I am excited to have been invited to be the first guest curator for the @wethehumanities project. The humanities encompasses such a variety of activity through a range of disciplines and practices and I am truly intrigued to see what the curators produce. This project has the capability to expose the exciting work that is carried out under the rather large umbrella of the humanities to a wider audience and from my own perspective, giving voice to areas of activity that might not be so generally understood or recognised".
Kristina West added: "We encourage anyone working within the humanities who might be interested in curating the account to get in touch. We aim to create a vibrant, international community to raise awareness of the diversity, relevance and challenges that encompass what is called the humanities."
If you would like to be a curator for We the Humanities, email: wethehumanities@gmail.com
Launch curators:
24/02/2014: Louise Jackson, Head of Learning Enhancement at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance.
03/03/2014: Dr Danielle Thom is an Assistant Curator in the Sculpture department of the Victoria and Albert Museum, and a Teaching Fellow in the History of Art department at UCL. She holds a PhD in History of Art from UCL, which focused on satirical print culture in 18th-century London, and its relationship to the development of a bourgeois 'public sphere'. Her current research interest is in the social reception of sculpture, and its representation in comic and bawdy prints of the 18th and early 19th centuries.
10/03/2014: Aidan Byrne is a senior lecturer in English and Cultural Studies at the University of Wolverhampton, specialising in Welsh literature, 1930s literature, political fiction and representations of masculinity. Apart from work, he's concerned by political attacks on the humanities and education in general, is a prolific blogger and tweeter (plashingvole.blogspot.com / @plashingvole). Leisure pursuits include contemporary classical music, theatre, fencing, cycling and photography.
Disclaimer: The views expressed at the @wethehumanities Twitter account and blog are those of the weekly guest editor and not those of the administrator or previous/subsequent curators.