uniof stirling_ arts & humanities graduate newsletter_ graduate newsletter
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This Graduate Newsletter contains all the latest news and updates for applicants joining the University of Stirling's School of Arts and Humanities in September 2012.TRANSCRIPT
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
Arts & Humanit ies Graduate Studies Newslet ter
WELCOME to the first issue of the School of Arts and Humani;es Graduate Studies Newsle?er.
This is the first opportunity we have had as a newly formed School to showcase the wide range of ac9vi9es taking place a c r o s s o u r p o s t g r a d u a t e programmes and research in the arts and humani9es. The School was officially launched in August this year and opens up the poten9al for more inter and mul9-‐disciplinary ac9vity across subject areas, staff and students. The new Head of School, Professor Douglas Brodie, has been keen to develop a dis9nc9ve iden9ty for arts and humani9es at S9rling, and this inaugural Graduate Studies NewsleIer provides evidence of a vibrant academic community.
This edi9on includes the latest n e w s f r o m o u r t a u g h t postgraduate programmes, as well as informa9on on research ac9vity. This academic session, we plan to publish three edi9ons of the newsleIer, with the second edi9on in March and the third in May. On the evidence of this edi9on, there will not be any shortage of news to report.
From our Division of Literature & Languages we hear from Paula Morris and Kathleen Jamie about the latest developments in crea9ve wri9ng, while Claire Squires provides details of latest visitors to our publishing studies
programme. There are also updates from colleagues in Modern ScoSsh Wri9ng and the Gothic Imagina9on.
From History and Poli9cs Mike Rapport provides details of student success stories and latest field trips. From our Division of Law and Philosophy we learn of new modules in Interna9onal Commercial Law, and Philosophy’s jo in t p rogramme w i th the University of St.Andrews.
We have news and updates on academic staff, visi9ng speakers and major conferences from the Division of Communica9ons, Media and Culture, as well as news of significant new masters programmes being launched by the School in 2012. We also have a focus on the recent gradua9on ceremony.
I hope you enjoy reading this first edi9on, and please keep an eye on our website for updates and breaking news from our four Divisions.
With best wishes,
Dr Richard HaynesDirector of Graduate StudiesSchool of Arts and Humani9esE-‐mail: [email protected] .
IN THIS ISSUE
Creative WritingPaula Morris and Kathleen Jamie
Stirling Centre for International
Publishing and CommunicationClaire Squires
MLitt Modern Scottish WritingScott Hames
MLitt Gothic Imagination
Dale Townshend
MRes Historical Research & History and Politics PhD NewsMike Rapport
LLM International Commercial Law
Hong-Lin Yu
PhilosophyPhilip Ebert
Communications, Media and Culture
Neil Blain
Media ManagementRichard Haynes
Strategic Public RelationsJacquie L’Etang
Film Studies NewsPhilip Drake
Graduate Focus
New Programmes for 2012-13
One Year On...
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
MLitt In Creative WritingPaula Morris and Kathleen Jamie
This is the first semester for the new MLiI/PhD in Crea9ve Wri9ng. Students in the prose-‐wri9ng strand began classes in September, and are already proving to be a l ive ly , ta lented, and highly mo9vated group. We have eight fic9on writers and one crea9ve non-‐fic9on writer, working on novels, stories and personal essays, as well as one PhD student, wri9ng a novel.
In addi9on to their weekly workshops and op9on classes, students have been aIending talks by editors, publishers and agents hosted by the S9rling Centre for Interna9onal Publishing and Commun i c a9on . T he ML iI students are already busy with two joint ventures: working with
students from the Centre to form their own publishing collec9ve; and mee9ng with crea9ve wri9ng postgrads at the University of Strathclyde to help plan a one-‐day conference in the spring.
Crea9ve Wri9ng students have their own prescribed pathway for the Arts Research Training module, including a seminar on crea9ve wri9ng pedagogy and working as a writer. We opened the semester with an inspiring talk ‘Civic Memory: An Argument On the Character of ScoSsh Culture’ given by Andrew O’Hagan, our first ‘House of Words’ event at Macrobert Arts Centre. Several of the MLiI students recently aIended the ArtWorks Scotland annual networking event at Macrobert, to listen to reps from Crea9ve Scotland and Na9onal Galleries of Scotland, among others.
A masterclass with author DBC Pierre was held in S9rling on 14th November for a public reading, an event sponsored by the Booker Prize Founda9on. The MLiI students have also made plans for a weekend gathering at a B&B in Perthshire in early January – a chance, they tell me, ‘to catch up and compare progress during the long Winter break.’
Classes for students in the poetry strand of the MLiI will begin in spring 2012, when Kathleen Jamie returns from leave. The prose students will be con9nuing with their classes, and helping with plans for ‘Bloody Scotland’, a new crime-‐writers fes9val to be held in S9rling next September.
For more informa;on, visit: www.crea9vewri9ng.s9r.ac.uk/ or contact [email protected]
CREATIVE WRITING AT STIRLING
“Creative writing options are part of the regular degree, and the creative writing dissertations are more popular than ever. Some notable writers, including Iain Banks, Jackie Kay and Alan Bissett, have come through the Stirling undergraduate degree. This is why it’s so exciting to see the new postgraduate MLitt in Creative Writing with Kathleen Jamie and Paula Morris, which will do so much more to develop the department’s original commitment to creative work and to working creatively.”
Rory Watson Emiritus Professor
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
Stirling Centre For International Publishing And CommunicationClaire Squires
Visi;ng Speaker Programme
T h e S 9 r l i n g C e n t r e f o r Interna9onal Publishing and Communica9on has a programme of Visi9ng Speakers, invited to the Centre in order that our students can hear directly from those currently working in publishing and related industries.
We have a l i v e l y week l y programme, with speakers in Semester 1 including Marion Sinclair (Chief Execu9ve of Publishing Scotland and a Centre graduate); Jane Camillin of Pitch Publishing; Liz Small of Waverley Books; Simon Meek of Tern TV’s Digital Adapta9ons; David Mar9n of Mar9n’s the Printer. Some s t u d e n t s h a v e u s e d t h e networking opportunity of our V i s i 9 n g S p e a k e r s t o g e t in te rnsh ips a t pub l i shers ,
including via Adrian Searle at Freight Books in Glasgow.
Students write up the Visi9ng Speaker sessions on the Centre blog, and also – for the first 9me this year – have been live t w e e 9 n g t h e s e s s i o n s (@s9rpublishing) making our Centre the most ac9ve publishing studies social media presence in the UK.
The Visi9ng Speaker programme is open to all, and so if you’re planning to join us for study next year, you’d be par9cularly w e l c o m e . T h e c u r r e n t programme is available via hIp://www.pub l i sh ing . s9r . ac .uk/2011/09/15/visi9ng-‐speakers-‐for-‐forthcoming-‐semester/. Please email us on [email protected] to reserve a place.
For more in fo rma;on on Publishing programmes, visit, hIp://www.publishing.s9r.ac.uk/courses/ml iI-‐ in-‐publ ish ing-‐studies/ or e-‐mail Claire Squires, [email protected]
MLitt Modern Scottish WritingScott Hames
In the next few months the Interna'onal Journal of Sco0sh Literature will complete its move to Edinburgh University Press, where the new editorial team of Dr ScoI Hames (S9rling) and Professor Ian Duncan (Berkeley) aim to develop its reputa9on as a leading journal in the field. The journal was founded in 2006 by Dr Hames and Dr Eleanor Bell of the University of Strathclyde, as part of efforts to interna9onalise the study of ScoSsh literature and culture. S9rling research students will play a key role in the next phase of the journal's development. www.ijsl.s9r.ac.uk
For more informa;on on Modern ScoPsh Wri;ng, visit -‐ hIp://www.english.s9r.ac.uk/postgraduate/taught-‐degrees/msw.php or e-‐mail the Programme Directors, ScoI Hames at [email protected] or Suzanne Gilbert at [email protected]
DBC PIERRE VISIT
Man Booker prizewinner, DBC Pierre, visited the School on 14 November as part of the Man Booker Prize Foundation’s Universities Initiative.Stirling has become one of five leading universities in the UK to take part in the Initiative, whereby every first year student, regardless of their course of study, is given a Man Booker prizewinning book.
Funded by the Booker Prize Foundation and the University, each first year student received a copy of DBC Pierre’s novel Vernon God Little and the author agreed to come to the University to speak about his book.
Published in 2003, Vernon God Little was awarded the Man Booker Prize for Fiction and the Bollinger Wodehouse Everyman Prize for Comic Fiction. The Man Booker Prize judges described it as a "coruscating black comedy reflecting our alarm but also our fascination with America.”
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
MLitt In Gothic ImaginationDale Townshend
In August of this year, Glennis Byron, Dale Townshend and a large group of postgraduates working on various Gothic and Gothic-‐related research topics aIended the biennial conference of the Interna9onal Gothic Associa9on (IGA) in Heidelberg, Germany. The s9mula9ng array of academic papers on the all aspects of the Gothic certainly went a long way towards mee9ng our intellectual needs, but as a group, we were also frequently to be seen gluSng our physical needs and appe9tes for German food and beer on the cobbled streets of this quaint medieval city. The 2011/12 intake for the MLiI in The Gothic Imagina9on commenced in mid-‐September, and we have been on a w i l d a n d e x h i l a r a 9 n g examina9on of eighteenth and nineteenth-‐century Gothic ever since then. The op9onal modules on the Female Gothic and Nineteenth-‐century American Gothic have been abuzz with lively debate and discussion. As in previous years, many of the students on the course this year h a ve come f r om ab road , par9cularly Canada and the USA, and are all adjus9ng well to the chal lenges of the ScoSsh climate! In addi9on to our formal academic undertakings, we have also met informally as a group to discuss, in the first of our Gothic reading groups for this semester, Glen Duncan’s recent Gothic fic9on, _The Last Werewolf_. Further ac9vi9es are
planned for later in the semester, including a field-‐trip to the Edinburgh Dungeon. In late November, Dr Sue Chaplin, the well-‐known Gothic cri9c and external examiner on the MLiI in The Gothic Imagina9on, will visit S9rling to present a paper. For an insight into some of the many Gothic ac9vi9es occurring at S9rling, see our website and blog, www.gothic.s9r.ac.uk
For more informa;on on the MLi? Gothic Studies, e-‐mail Dale Townshend, [email protected]
MRes Historical ResearchMike Rapport
Congratula9ons to a l l our g r a dua9ng s t uden t s , b u t especially to Stephen Bowman and Wayne Cuthbertson, who will be awarded the MRes in H i s t o r i c a l R e s e a r c h w i t h Dis9nc9on. Stephen also wins the MRes Prize for his excellent performance.
Congratula9ons, too, to Vicki Hodgson, who has received the John Robert Hamilton Memorial Scholarship for a Master’s student studying ScoSsh History at the University of S9rling.
The all-‐day Postgraduate Training Visit to Edinburgh Repositories – aimed at introducing students to the different archives available in the capital – is going ahead on 17 November. No less than eleven students have signed up.
History and Politics PhDs
Congratula9ons to Tina Schwenk, who graduates with a PhD later this month: her thesis topic, ‘The Emperor Maximilian of Mexico: a Habsburg on Montezuma’s Throne’, is a biographical study of the ill-‐fated Maximilian, from his birth to his execu9on at the hands of Mexican liberals.
Congratula9ons to Emily St Denny, whose presenta9on of her thesis topic, on French pros9tu9on policy, won the prize at the Conference of the Associa9on for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France in September…and to Karin Persson-‐Strömbäck, whose paper presented at the Swedish Poli9cal Science Associa9on conference, ‘Unionizing Sex Workers? – The Impact of Ideas on Trade Union Policy in Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, and the Un i ted K ingdom’ was nominated by the chairs of the compara9ve poli9cs sec9on for the 'best conference paper from a young researcher' award.
For more informa;on on the MRes Historical Research or research degrees in History or Poli;cs, visit
www.historyandpoli9cs.s9r.ac.uk
or e-‐mail Mike Rapport, [email protected]
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
LLM in International Commercial LawHong-Lin Yu
Please let me introduce myself. My name is Hong-‐Lin Yu, the director of Interna9onal Commercial Law. While I am looking forward to seeing you all at S9rling in February / September 2012, I thought that you may want to know some news from S9rling.
For the next semester onwards, The Law School has decided to introduce two new modules to help out with your essay and disserta9on wri9ng. They are Legal Research Methods and Disserta9on Proposals. For Legal Research Methods, you will be learning about the different methods applied in legal research such as theore9cal, doctrinal, social-‐legal and empirical methodologies. You will be given an opportunity to prac9ce these skills which will be valuable to your future career. To help out with the prepara9on of your final disserta9on, you will be learning 9me management, how to iden9fy the topic, clarify the aims and objec9ves of the research and material management. I am sure that you will find them very helpful.
Apart from the new modules, based on our research-‐led teaching style, S9rling Law School also have staff and PhD student workshops where you can meet everybody. You may also like to know that staff in the Divis ion of Law and Philosophy have been ac9vely publishing their work worldwide. Details at www.law.s9r.ac.uk/staff/
I shall look forward to mee9ng you all. In the mean9me, you can always send me an email if you have any ques9ons.
Hong-‐Lin Yu E-‐mail: [email protected]
PhilosophyPhilip Ebert
The St Andrews and S9rling G r a d u a t e P r o g r a m m e i n Philosophy (SASP) is taught by the Philosophy Departments in the Universi9es of St Andrews and S9rling. The philosophy graduate programmes of St Andrews and S9rling are now fully merged for all postgraduate degrees. Students in the SASP programme are fully matriculated at both Universi9es and all postgraduate degrees are awarded jointly by St Andrews and S9rling.St Andrews and S9rling together form Scotland's premier
centre for philosophy and one of the top philosophy schools in the United Kingdom. Informa9ons about how to apply for the M.LiI, MPhil or PhD can be found on our w e b s i t e : h I p : / / w w w . s t -‐andrews.ac.uk/~sasp/
The programme maintains a staff of authorita9ve researchers that is l a r g e e n o u g h t o t e a c h a comprehensive and flexible range of graduate courses, and to supervise research projects. It offers graduate teaching at a level that matches the best graduate programmes elsewhere in the world, in a wide area of philosophy and the history of philosophy.
Both departments offer a very l ively and research focused atmosphere with weekly visi9ng speaker seminars , graduate student seminars, workshops and conferences. More informa9on about recent and upcoming events c a n b e f o u n d : h I p : / /www.philosophy.s9r.ac.uk/news/news.php
and hIp://www.st-‐andrews.ac.uk/philosophy/events/
Philip EbertE-‐mail: [email protected]
NEW LAW PUBLICATIONELAINE E. SUTHERLAND, KAY E. GOODALL, GAVIN F.M. LITTLE AND FRASER P. DAVIDSON (EDS), LAW MAKING AND THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT: THE EARLY YEARS (EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2011) With contributions from many academics at Stirling this new book offers the first wide-ranging critical analysis of legislative developments in those areas of law and policy devolved to the Scottish Parliament under the devolution settlement. In a single volume, Law Making and The Scottish Parliament: The Early Years provides a scholarly evaluation of a number of key legislative achievements of Scotland's devolved parliament in its first decade.
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
Media ManagementRichard Haynes
Every Autumn we invite a range of industry speakers to talk to our Media Management students as part of the module on Media Economics co-‐ordinated by Dr Phil Drake. This year we have visits from David Booth, Senior Vice President of Programming and Content at MTV whose talk ' T e l e v i s i o n P r o g r amm i n g , Scheduling and Strategy' was opened out to other students from both our undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. David is himself a S9rling graduate in Media Management and an Honorary member of the S9rling Media Research Ins9tute.
Other talks included Paula Bushell, Marke9ng & Promo9ons Manager of Scotsman Publica9ons. Her session with the students provided an overview of the na9onal newspaper industry in Scotland and how they marke t The Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday (using TV, radio, online, print, email and text marke9ng) as well as de ta i l s o f t he i r i nnova9ve 'postcode' text marke9ng in Edinburgh for the Evening News.
In the spring semester we will be v i s i 9 n g B B C S c o t l a n d ’ s headquarters at Pacific Quay in Glasgow where students will have the opportunity to walk round one of the most advanced digital broadcas9ng facili9es in the UK.
For details email me [email protected]
CMC NewsNeil Blain
Professor Neil Blain, Head of Communica9ons, Media and Culture, was a speaker and panellist at the Edinburgh Fes9val of Poli9cs 'Whose heritage, whose society?' event held in the ScoSsh Parliament on 25 August, with fellow panellists, playwright David Gre i g , RSA ch ie f execu9ve M a I h e w T a y l o r , a n d Glasgow Life's director of policy, research and development, Mark O'Neill. The event was sponsored by the Bri9sh Council, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, UNESCO, and the Ins9tute for Advanced Studies in the Humani9es.
Professor Blain was also the opening speaker, and panellist, at a conference of the European Alliance of Listeners' and Viewers' Associa9ons (EURALVA) held in Edinburgh on 7 October on the theme of 'Serving the Ci9zen: Broadcas9ng Accountability in an Online Europe', with speakers including the E.B.U.'s director of public affairs, Ignasi Guardans.
Professor Blain has also recently served as a member of the Arts and Humani9es Research Council Language and Literature panel.
GRADUATE PRIZES IN CMC
Each year the Division of Communica9ons, Media and Culture present prizes to outstanding student work. This year’s prizes are awarded to students with the best performance overall and best masters disserta9on.
The Sam Black Prize (£50) goes to the student who has performed with the greatest merit throughout the session on the MSc Strategic PR & Communica9ons Management. This years winner recipient is Marte Aasmundsen.
The Speakeasy Produc;ons Prize (£500) goes to the best masters Disserta9on and this years recipient is Andrew Baird from the MSc Strategic PR & Communica9ons Management
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
Visiting Speakers in Public Relations
Kenneth Fowler, Creative Scotland, ‘Strategic Communications at Scottish Natural Heritage and Creative Scotland’
Kenneth Fowler held an open lecture on 13 October 2011. Kenneth leads on all aspects of C r e a 9 v e S c o t l a n d ’ s communica9ons and engagement ac9vity.
He was previously Head of Communica9ons and Informa9on at ScoSsh Natural Heritage where he led on branding, campaigns, publishing, media, PR, internal communica9ons and corporate a ff a i r s a s w e l l a s S N H ’ s engagement with the media and Government. Prior to this Kenneth spent 7 years in the crea9ve industr ies as a Director of Edinburgh based adver9sing and
communica9ons agency, 1576, working with clients such as Visit Scotland, ScoSsh Government, Na9onal Museums and a host of others from the private sector. He has also worked in strategy and communica9ons with major ScoSsh companies such as Glenmorangie and Standard Life.
He has been a Board Member of Eden Court Theatre in Inverness a n d h a s l e c t u r e d o n communica9ons at universi9es and schools in Edinburgh and in the Highlands.
Andy Mitchell, Scottish Football Association, ‘PR and Football’
Andy Mitchell held an open lecture on 2 November. Andy is a media officer w i th UEFA and has extensive experience in planning and managing media opera9ons at major spor9ng events including Champions League finals and
European Championship matches. He spent ten years as head of communica9ons at the ScoSsh Football Associa9on, ac9ng as principal spokesman for one of Scotland's highest profile spor9ng bodies. In his talk, he outlined some of the par9cular challenges facing a press officer working in football, from the death of a princess to a disastrous run of defeats.
Also giving lectures this semester:
Dr Johanna Fawkes “Jung, PR and Ethics: new ways of looking at old problems”.Dr Lee Edwards, University of Leeds “Power and Public Rela9ons”.Dr Magda Pieczka, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh “Dialogue”.
Contact Jacquie L’Etang, [email protected]
STRATEGIC PUBLIC RELATIONS AND COMMUNICATION MANAGEMENTJACQUIE L’ETANG
Students studying public communication and public relations have been involved in a variety of activities, including: testing their rhetorical skills in a live debate on "This house believes that public relations is no more than propaganda"; group presentations: critical analyses of corporate social responsibility reports of a variety of organisations and comparing their rhetoric with reality; group presentations: developing and presenting health campaign proposals. Students are currently working on a range of projects including: defending the reputation of a farming organisation which has been suffering considerable negative publicity following internal conflict; exploring a variety of social movements and their persuasive communications; developing a lobbying campaign for a European organization.
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
Film Studies NewsPhilip Drake
On June 9th 2011, the School of Arts and Humani9es hosted the Fourth Annual ScoSsh Consor9um for Fi lm and Visual Studies conference on 'Film and Memory', supported by the Carnegie Trust for the Universi9es of Scotland. The conference addressed the interdisciplinary interest in issues of memory, remembering and memorialisa9on.
The conference, organised by Dr Philip Drake, was aIended by approximately 100 academics and doctoral students across the disciplines of film, television, media, communica9ons studies as well as colleagues from cognate areas in modern languages, history and psychology. Our taught postgraduate film students also had the chance to par9cipate in the conference. The conference featured presenta9ons from 24 s p e a k e r s , i n c l u d i n g 3 interna9onally renowned Keynote Speakers included Professor Richard Dyer (Kings College, London), Professor Andrew Hoskins (University of Glasgow) and Professor Robert Burgoyne (St. Andrews). In addi9on the conference/SCFVS recognised the
legacy to film studies of two colleagues who recently passed away: Dr Mark Brownrigg (S9rling) and Professor John Orr (Edinburgh) with tributes by Professor Simon Frith and Professor Mar9ne Beugnet (Edinburgh) and memorial lectures by Professor Richard Dyer and Professor Robert Burgoyne respec9vely. The keynotes/memorial lectures were all filmed and these presenta9ons will be made available via the website and on Youtube.
Keynote and panel Topics included: ‘Memory and Music: Rota and Fellini’; Remembering the BFI Summer Schools; Memorialising Conflict; ‘7/7 and ‘Connec9ve Memory’: Interac9onal Trajectories of Remembering in Post-‐Scarcity Culture’; Television and Memory; Film and Memory as Prac9ce; Remembering and ForgeSng; ‘Genera9onal Memory and Affect in LeIers From Iwo Jima’.
The conference featured a roundtable discussion of the important legacy of the BFI Summer Schools – which ran in S9rling through the 1970s and 1980s – to the disciplines of Film, television and media studies. This involved a presenta9on by Dr Christophe Dupin, lead researcher
on a project on the history of the BFI (BFI/Queen Mary) as well as lively contribu9ons from regular S9rling summer school par9cipants Professor Chris9ne Geraghty (Glasgow) and Professor Richard Dyer (Kings College, London) and Professor Grahame Smith (S9rling). Other panels were also convened on Memor i a l i s i n g Confl i c t , Television and Memory, Film and Memo r y a s P r a c 9 c e (w i t h important papers from Prac9ce-‐L e d r e s e a r c h e r s ) , a n d Remembering and ForgeSng. We were also pleased to offer places and bursaries for travel for postgraduate research students at the conference.
As well as an occasion of scholarly research the conference also p rov ided oppor tun i9es f o r ne twork ing and knowledge exchange during refreshment breaks and lunch, as well as at a post conference dinner for invited speakers.
For more informa;on on the MLi? F i lm S tud ies , v i s i t : hIp : / /www.fmjpg.s9r.ac.uk/film-‐studies/ o r e -‐ma i l t h e P r o g r amme D i r e c t o r s : P h i l i p D r a k e -‐ [email protected], Elizabeth Ezra -‐ [email protected]
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
2011 Graduates10,000 Miles for Graduation
Another student travelled almost 10,000 miles for her gradua9on. Vietnamese student Trinh Tuyet Ngoc Nguyen from Ho Chi Minh City made her first trip to Scotland to par9cipate in the ceremony and graduate with a Masters in Media a n d C o m m u n i c a 9 o n s Management.
Trinh, who works as a Corporate Communica9on Manager for L’Oreal Vietnam, completed the course by aIending Ho Chi Minh City University’s Humani9es and Social Science campus, with professors from S9rling University flying to Vietnam for the lectures.
The 41-‐year-‐old said: “This is my firs t 9me v i s i9ng beau9fu l Scotland and it is an exci9ng trip. To come here is a dream come true. Scotland was a des9na9on I o}en thought of when I was a young English student. I was impressed with the richness of culture, music and literature and was aIracted to the mysterious castles, Loch Ness monster, and to the stories from writers like Arthur Conan Doyle and Robert Louis Stevenson.”
A lack of professional corporate communica9ons t ra in ing in Vietnam prompted Trinh to search o n l i n e f o r i n t e r n a 9 o n a l q u a l i fi c a 9 o n s , w h e r e s h e discovered the S9rling course.
She sa id : “Other over seas universi9es delivering training c o u r s e s i n V i e t n am o}en compromise in standards to aIract more students. S9rling is quite determined to sustain its quality of teaching and high standards in assessing students.
“The fact the course was taught en9rely in English by professors from S9rling was also a credit for the programme as it gave us a feeling of similarity -‐ as if we were studying in S9rling.”
Trinh says that her intensive training with the University has been valuable in giving her a deep ins i ght in to the corporate c ommun i c a9on r o l e i n an organisa9on. She added: “The c ou r s e h a s h e l p ed me t o iden9fying the most effec9ve way to perform my job.”
For details of our programmes in Vietnam contact Dr MaIhew Hibberd. [email protected]
HONORARY DOCTORATE
PROF DONALD WORSTERreceived the honorary degree of Doctor of the University in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the field of Global Environmental History.
A graduate of the University of Kansas and Yale, he became primarily interested in the emerging field of environmental history - the changing perception of nature, the rise of conser-vation and environmentalism - but especially the ways that the natural world has impinged on human society and provided the context for human life over time.
His latest book A Passion for Nature: The Life of John Muir, won the Homecoming Award for 2009 given by the Saltire Society.
Professor Worster gave a free public lecture titled ‘Facing Limits: from Abundance to Scarcity in America and the World’, at the University of Stirling on 24 November.
For details of our MRes in Environmental History contact Dr Catherine Mills [email protected]
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
SCHOOL OF ARTS & HUMANITIES www.stir.ac.uk/schools/arts-and-humanities
A&H New Masters Programmes for 2012-2013
MSc/LLM in Environmental Policy and Governance
For further informa;on contact: Professor Gavin [email protected] hIp://www.law.s9r.ac.uk/staff/g-‐liIle.php
Gradua9ng with an MSc/LLM in Environmental Policy and Governance will significantly improve your knowledge and understanding of the subject and will enhance your aIrac9veness to employers in the environmental sector. Graduates will be able to pursue careers in the rapidly developing areas of environmental policy, regula9on, economics and management.
LLM in Corporate Social Responsibility
For further informa;on contact:Dr Nicole Busby [email protected] hIp://www.law.s9r.ac.uk/staff/n.busby.php
Corporate Social responsibility has become one of the most topical issues within the business world with the majority of corporate organisa9ons worldwide adop9ng social responsibility policies. Consequently there is a great demand for employees who have a specialised legal knowledge in corporate governance and social responsibility. Graduates will significantly enhance their employability within this growing field.
MLitt in Digital Media, Publishing and Law
For further informa;on contact:Professor Claire [email protected]://www.english.s9r.ac.uk/staff/claire-‐squires/index.php
Dr Graham [email protected] hIp://www.fmj.s9r.ac.uk/staff/graham-‐meikle/graham-‐meikle.php
MLiI in Media, Publishing and Law will provide graduates with knowledge, understanding and skills at taught masters level, appropriate to careers in the crea9ve industries; to provide graduates with a broad and clear insight into contemporary communicaton and its legal, regulatory and industrial contexts thus providing graduates with high level skills in communica9on, research and cri9cal thinking valued by the crea9ve industries; and to provide the academic founda9on for progression to PhD level study.
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1
Graduate StudiesSchool of Arts and Humanities
University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA
Tel: 01786 467592hIp://www.s9r.ac.uk/schools/arts-‐and-‐humani9esE-‐mail: [email protected]
ONE YEAR ON… JAMAL BAHMAD REFLECTS ON HIS FIRST YEAR AS A PHD STUDENT IN ARTS AND HUMANITIES
Having been awarded one of the Horizon studentships in the Arts and Humani9es, I arrived in S9rling in October 2010 and immediately began
work on my doctoral disserta9on about the city of Casablanca and the emergent forms of postcolonial subjec9vity in
Moroccan cinema since the 1990s. During the first year of the project, I carried out archival research in UK
libraries and spent a month in Morocco talking to filmmakers and acquiring copies of their feature films. My supervisor's advice to write down the
disserta9on piecemeal as I go along has worked very well for me. I am about to finish the second chapter of the
disserta9on and look forward to commencing work on the remaining three next January. I have given two
research-‐based presenta9ons at the University of S9rling and in late November travelled to London where I presented a paper at an interna9onal
conference. Because PhD life is also about acquiring new skills which would enhance the candidate's employability a}erwards, I have been involved in
extra-‐curricular ac9vi9es. For example, I introduced Moroccan cinema to ScoSsh audiences in two interna9onal film
fes9vals. Besides, I am on the editorial board of inSPIRE, the University of S9rling's first interdisciplinary journal of
postgraduate research (hIps://www.inspirejournal.s9r.ac.uk/). I am currently helping with the organisa9on of the annual Spanish studies conference
in S9rling next year to acquire skills which will enable me to organise film-‐related events and academic
conferences in the future.Jamal Bahmad, 2nd Year Research Student.
POSTGRADUATE WORKSHOP
Final year undergraduates, postgraduates, and staff members are invited to aIend "Funding the Future: Ensuring P o s t g r a du a t e R e s e a r c h Development". Organised by postgraduates, the workshop will include a diverse mixture of postgraduate research papers and presenta9ons from exper t s on the ScoSsh funding climate. It will be held i n rooms C1/C2 o f the Pathfoot building, on the 27th of January from 1pm to 4.30pm.
This will be the School’s first a n n u a l P o s t g r a d u a t e Workshop; a day organised by p o s t g r a d u a t e s , f o r postgraduates with the aim to encourage discussion beyond disciplinary boundaries.
DECEMBER 2011 GRADUATE STUDIES NEWSLETTER ISSUE 1