April's coin of the month, written by Matthew Smith, explores Lucian's Alexander in connection with a coin from Abonuteichos.

Paul Botley and Máté Vince's four-volume The Correspondence of Isaac Casaubon in England, 1610-14 (Geneva, Droz, 2018) was launched on 5 March 2019, in the Wolfson Research Exchange. An exhibition of early printed books by or about Casaubon was on display in the University Library during February and March 2019, to complement the launch events. Three further events took place at Trinity College Dublin on 2 April 2019. The first was a discussion about editorial method; the second the launch proper, introduced by Dr Graeme Murdock (TCD, History) and presented by Paul and Máté. The third was a roundtable event on editorial practice, with an open audience, chaired by Prof. Jane Ohlmeyer (TCD, History). See Paul and Máté deep in conversation below. For more details of the launch event go here; and for the Casaubon Project website go here.

Máté's twitter feed related to the new edition can be followed @IsaacCasaubonus.

James Piggott, undergraduate student at the Warwick University History Department, has been selected to present at the British Conference of Undergraduate Research this April. James has provided the following information regarding his forthcoming presentation:

My presentation presents two related ideas. Firstly, video-games should be considered a historically-relevant medium, through their capacity to both generate narratives and lessons of the past. Subsequently, the issue of censorship – the doctoring of the past when creating said narratives – is equally detrimental to history within video-games as in alternative formats. The historical significance of censorship within video-games, however, has been largely ignored, due to the ‘trivial’ or ‘ludified’ nature of video-games. As a result, the trivialisation and undermining of the historical practice remains within video-games.

These arguments are covered over three sections. The first unpacks several criticisms of video-games, in turn showing the medium’s historical capacity. The second uses the example of Nazism to describe and explain the presence of censorship within video-games. The final section links these two ideas, discussing the historical impact of censorship within video-games, and why the ‘ludic frame’ of video-games seemingly shadows their equally significant ‘historical frame’.

I hope that, with this paper, video-games will be taken more seriously within academia. I hope to demonstrate their potential utility for the historical practice, and, subsequently, why protecting them from censorship is important. The historical field will be greatly enhanced when developers and historians are not fearful of presenting their novel or controversial arguments. If censorship is abhorrent in alternative historical formats, so should it be in video-games.

This will entail providing a brief 10 minute presentation to a variety of different undergraduate researchers and experts; there will then be time for a short Q&A afterwards to answer any queries or loose ends.

BCUR - the British Conference of Undergraduate Research - is a yearly conference aimed at promoting and sharing undergraduate research in all disciplines. It is a fantastic opportunity to receive feedback and interest in one's work, and to meet with fellow researchers and academics. This year, the conference is being hosted at the University of South Wales, and consists of both oral and poster presentations.

Media outlets both in the UK and overseas have sought expert comment from our medieval art and architecture specialist Dr Jenny Alexander regarding the devastating fire at Notre-Dame Cathedral.

This is what she has to say:

Dr Jenny Alexander expert comment 

From Margaret Shewring

It is with great sadness that I write to let you know that J.R. (Ronnie) Mulryne, a former Chair of Theatre Studies, died on Monday 28 January. He had become increasingly unwell in the past two months and, although he remained mentally alert, his body had become very frail as the cancer had spread and the treatments became more difficult to cope with. He died at home in his sleep.

For a full obituary, on behalf of the University, please see: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/about_us/centrestaff/rmulryne

For two personal tributes please see: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/theatre_s/news/tributes_to_ronnie

Our new course the BA (Hons) Media and Creative Industries has launched this week and we are pretty pleased about it. It has taken a lot of thought and hard work and ideas and discussion and consultation and you name it, we left no stone unturned. The kernel of the idea began in 2014 and it takes a while for any good idea to pass all the tests: concept, time, energy, strategy, stress and approval. In fact, what we learned is that ideas get better as they pass each test, jump each hurdle and grow in response to each challenge. It's the process of getting the creative idea through the systems and into the world that makes us feel the most proud. So many people have been involved in this course development, from excellent external marketing agencies who collected the research from over 200 students and interviewed so many more. At least 12 of those students were kind enough to each make us a video of their personal perspectives on our course design, proposed modules and (in the end) those prospective students chose the title, not us. It was part of our ethos from the beginning that we would build a course not just based on what we wanted to teach but on what others wanted us to teach. So it was collaborative from inception.

Alongside all this student research we undertook 15 interviews with leading national and international professionals from the media and creative industries. This really helped shape the inclusion of key modules such as The Residency, Creative Producing or Media and Intellectual Property. It has been a real team effort and over the next year we will be planning our expansion of staff and facilities in preparation for welcoming new students at undergraduate level. This does mean a new emphasis for the Centre but not one that detracts from the excellent and immensely popular Masters courses we have always delivered. In fact, the key things that make our Masters so special, that our postgraduate students love, will be applied to our new undergraduate course, and maybe those undergraduates will want to stay with us for one more year! To find out more about our new course see the central university study page or our departmental course page.

Professor Jim Shields has had analysis columns on France and Brexit published in the Spanish national daily La Razón. He also appeared in the Colombian financial newspaper Portafolio, Mexican daily El Universal, Slovenian daily Večer and Sunday Express.

Friday 17 May 2019 - Oculus Building, Room OC0.04

Public Keynote Event - Everybody Welcome

Please book a place with Sue Rae at HRC@warwick.ac.uk by 30 April

1.30 - 2.30 'Passion in Practice' Workshop led by Dr Michael Meeuwis (English / Warwick)

2.30 - 3.30 Dr Naomi Pullin (History / Warwick)

‘Best Friends and Worst Enemies: Contrasting Passions in Early Modern Britain, c. 1660-1775’

[Tea]

4.00 - 5.30 Keynote by Professor Margrit Pernau (Max Planck Institute for Human Development / Center for the History of Emotions, Berlin)

‘Riots and the desire for passions. Violence, emotions and temporality, North India 1880-1947’

5.30 - 6.30 Wine reception and seminar series roundtable / conclusions

CIM is now accepting PhD applications for students who wish to be considered for a number of University scholarships, including ESRC scholarships (for social science applicants), CADRE scholarships (for arts and humanities students) and Chancellor's International Scholarships (for international students).

Eight leading universities in the Midlands are joining together to train the next generation of highly-skilled arts and humanities researchers, thanks to funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

The Midlands4Cities Arts and Humanities Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) will result in 460 new postgraduate studentship opportunities across the region over the next five years.

The consortium brings together academic expertise from - the University of Warwick, Birmingham City University, the University of Birmingham, Coventry University, De Montfort University, the University of Leicester, Nottingham Trent University, and led by the University of Nottingham. All eight of the universities in the DTP have also committed to match the AHRC funding.

It is one of 10 new Doctoral Training Partnerships (DTPs) announced by the AHRC.