The Warwick Awards for Public and Community Engagement (WAPCE), like the Warwick Awards for Teaching Excellence (WATELink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new window), and Warwick Awards for Personal Tutoring Excellence (WAPTE), celebrate the very best of Warwick’s staff and students. The WAPCE awards recognise the vital contributions Warwick staff and students make in engaging the public – on an international and national level as well as crucially within our region and local communities – in our learning and discovery, with the goals of sharing and co-producing knowledge, strengthening the role we play in the region and showcasing the role Warwick plays nationally and internationally in making the world a better place.

SMLC is delighted that 2 of our most engaged researchers' work in public and community engagement has been recognised.

James Hodkinson has won a staff award for his work on community events and arts projects designed to facilitate cross-community encounters, enhance public debate, cross-community empathy and more nuanced mutual understanding between Muslim and non-Muslim communities in towns and cities across the UK.

Abigail Coppins won a Postgraduate award for the ways in which her research into Black prisoners of war in Britain during the French Revolution has had a significant impact on the young Black women at the National Youth Theatre who were involved in the R&D of a new play, The Ancestors. Her research has fed into educational resources for NYT and English Heritage and inspired a delegation of Garifuna people to travel from central America and the US to visit Portchester castle where the prisoners were held. Her work has also introduced Black undergraduates and young people from a community of 2nd generation St Vincentians in High Wycombe to the National Archives. She has, therefore, improved knowledge, strengthened networks, engaged with people from non-traditional backgrounds.

Professor Jim Shields appeared on BBC World, France 24, TRT World, CNBC, Al Jazeera and TVP World to discuss the French National Assembly elections. He gave interviews to Chile’s El Mercurio, Mexico’s El Universal and Colombia’s Portafolio.  

Those who remember the French Department in the days of Donald Charlton will be saddened to learn of the death of Mark Treharne, who taught in the Department until 1992. Mark was an inspiring teacher who cared deeply about his students. He was also a gifted translator and pianist, giving recitals in aid of charity. His translations include works by his friend the poet Jaccottet, as well as Jacques Réda, Rimbaud, and Proust’s The Guermantes Way. He once said he would go to the stake for Proust.

His funeral will be on 29 June at 2 p.m. at Golder's Green Crematorium, and will also be relayed online.

Linda Paterson

22 June 2022

A CELEBRATION of our long-time colleagues

Miguel Beistegui

Peter Poellner

On Tuesday 17 May 11.00 – 13.00, the Monash Warwick Alliance Showcase will announce new funding opportunities for researchers, educators, professional staff, and students interested in establishing collaborations with Monash colleagues.

FAB Fest

Friday 20 May, 12pm - 5pm

Students, staff and members of the local community are invited to the official opening of the Faculty of Arts Building (FAB) taking place at midday on Friday, 20 May. The opening ceremony, where a festive glass of fizz will be provided for all guests, will be followed by FAB Fest – a festival celebrating the arts at Warwick.

FAB Fest is an afternoon of workshops, activities, performances and other events taking place right across the building and spilling out onto Senate House Lawn and the other green spaces in the vicinity.Fab Fest is rapidly approaching, and we would love to see as many staff and students there as possible.

View the schedule here: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/news/fabfest/activityschedule/

All language teaching teams across the academic sections and the Language Centre have collectively been nominated for a Community and Culture Warwick Award in Teaching Excellence.

We're delighted to have been shortlisted for professionalism and collegiality in responding to the pandemic.

Dr Zhiyan Guo has also been shortlisted for an Arts Faculty award.

The shortlists can be seen here:

https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/academic-development/wate/shortlistcategories/

Tom Whittaker has recently returned from completing a visiting fellowship at Brown University, Rhode Island, which took place in April 2021. At Brown, Tom delivered a public hybrid lecture entitled 'Photography and Postmemory in Pedro Almodóvar's Madres paralelas' and delivered a workshop to PhD students.

As part of their artistic residency in the SMLC in late April 2022, Amazonian writer Juan Carlos Galeano and Martiniquian performance artist Henri Tauliaut will offer public events on 27 and 28 April to explore how written, visual, and performative practices can address issues of memory, sustainability and justice in precarious environments. All are welcome.

A Coventry community language project involving the city’s schools, universities, local council, businesses and MPs has been named Parliament UK Community Campaign of the Year in the Your UK Parliament Awards 2022.

Applications for the Spring Term UG Sprint programme starting in March 2022 are now open to all current female UG students.

What is Sprint? Sprint is an immersive female personal development programme for students delivered via 7 online sessions.

Designed by The Springboard ConsultancyLink opens in a new window in conjunction with Oxford and Cambridge universities, in part to help address the gender pay gap imbalance, Sprint is designed to equip students with the skills required to enable them to accelerate their potential in all areas of life including academic, personal and career as well as developing a positive mind-set.

Download the latest SMLC Newsletter

We are saddened to hear of the passing of Professor Simon Gaunt, a world-leading scholar and Warwick Languages graduate.

Applying to Warwick to read languages? Which languages, which combinations? Ab initio or post high school entry? What are our campus, courses, and community like? Chat online to staff and students and have all your questions answered.

Wed 24 November, 5pm. Register here: https://meetandengage.com/universityofwarwick

The School for Modern Languages and Cultures at the University of Warwick warmly invites expressions of interest in its MPhil/PhD programmes in French Studies, German Studies, Hispanic Studies, Italian, and Translation and Transcultural Studies (including a theoretical/academic and a practice-based route).

We have free tickets available to an event which may interest you and your networks/students. The following event celebrating the soft launch of Warwick Arts Centre and as part of an ongoing call out for submissions for a co-curated exhibition in Spring 22.