University English AGM 2019
Provisional Programme
The Berrick Saul Building, University of York
Friday 12th April
13.30-14.00 Registration (tea and coffee available)
14:00-15:15 Panel Session 1 (organisers: Alex Thomson, Jennifer Richards)
Scaling up: larger grants in English Studies
This panel will examine data on AHRC applications in English in order to explore the problem of scale as it applies to research funding bids in English Studies. With close involvement from the AHRC we hope to analyse the problem and encourage colleagues in English to ‘think big’.
Professor Jennifer Richards (AHRC Advisory Board, Director of Newcastle University Humanities Research Institute)
Jessica Clark (Strategy and Development Manager, Languages,Literature and Area Studies, AHRC)
TBC
15:15-16:15 Plenary Session
“Studying English Literature in post-Brexit Britain”
Debbie McVitty (editor WonkHE)
16:15-16:40 tea/coffee
16:40-17:55 Panel Session 2 (organisers: Ben Davies, Nigel Wood)
English among the Languages
Given a continued decline in Humanities enrolments and a cultural climate of ‘anti-intellectualism’, this panel will ask what can English learn from colleagues in other disciplines such as Classics and Modern Languages. How might we work together to promote English and related disciplines by thinking more broadly about the study of languages, texts and literatures? In the wake of Brexit especially, how might we collaborate within and beyond the UK, so as to develop and promote the study of languages and literatures as effectively as possible?
Olga Gomez-Cash (University Council of Modern Languages, and Head of Department, School of Languages and Cultures, Lancaster University)
Helen Lovatt (Chair, Council of University Classical Departments, University of Nottingham)
Matthew Townend (School of English and Related Literature, University of York)
18:00 Wine Reception / Book Prize
19:30 Dinner
Saturday 13th April
09:30-10:25 Plenary Session
REF2021: Briefing and Q&A
Ann Heilmann (Deputy Chair, sub-panel 27, REF2021, Cardiff University)
10:25-10:50 tea/coffee
10:50-11:30 Business Meeting
University English AGM Business Meeting
11:30-12:55 Session 4
Does English need a Professor of Public Understanding? (organisers: Susan Bruce, Ros Ballaster)
In the context of recent decline in English A-level enrolments, concerns about recruitment at HE, and the increasing characterisation of English as a frivolous discipline in the media and in political discourse, this panel will examine the benefits that a dedicated focus on ‘public understanding’ has brought to disciplines outside our own. It asks whether English is as well-understood outside the academy as we once thought that it was, and explores how we might enhance its perception in the public eye.
Geoff Cubitt, (Director of the Institute for the Public Understanding of the Past, University of York)
Angie Hobbs, (Professor of Public Understanding of Philosophy, University of Sheffield)
Harriet Barnes, (Head of HE and Skills, British Academy)
13:00 Buffet Lunch
14:00 CLOSE
14:00-15:30 University English Executive meeting
