News

20 June · 16:00 – 18:00
R1.13, Ramphal Building

This seminar will involve a series of 20-30 minute talks from a diverse range of speakers who have done research into different aspects of various sports. This will be followed by an open discussion about sport and contemporary society.

Speakers:

Channel Swimming – Dr Karen Throsby, University of Warwick

Football – Prof Wyn Grant, University of Warwick

Horse Racing – Deborah Butler, University of Warwick

Football – Dr Sam Farooq, University of Gloucestershire

In a report just released by the University of Warwick and the Zoological Society of London, Dr Eric Jensen finds that a trip to the zoo can boost children’s science and conservation education more than classroom teaching alone. This research is the largest and most robust investigation of the impacts of visiting zoos for children and young people ever conducted globally.

The press release on this study can be found here: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/newsandevents/pressreleases/new_research_shows_a_visit_to_a_zoo_boosts_science_and_environment_knowledge1

What does the future hold for social science? Will priorities change based on funding availability? Professor Christina Hughes, Chair of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Dr Ben Richardson, an early career researcher in the department of Politics and International Studies, give their views on what they think may happen in the future.

To read the full interview please visit: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/knowledge/themes/07/future/

With the support of IAS, we are delighted to announce the forthcoming visit to Warwick of Karen Barad, Myra Hird and Elizabeth Wilson. Each of these scholars have considerable reputations in the field of interdisciplinary science studies. In their distinctive ways, Professors Barad, Hird and Wilson are providing new theoretical approaches which have their roots in feminism and which challenge conventional wisdoms of ontology and epistemology in the study of the social and natural through which they draw upon, inter alia, quantum physics, bacteria and artificial intelligence. Their visit will be of particular relevance to colleagues in psychology, sociology, politics, education, history, health and medicine, philosophy and gender studies. We believe this will prove to be a landmark intellectual event. Programme of events: Barad, Hird and Wilson Programme

For further information please contact: J.T.Silva-Flores@warwick.ac.uk

The University of Warwick will be welcoming Professor Mary Margaret Fonow as an IAS Visiting Fellow, 16-20 May 2011. In association with the Departments of Sociology and Law, the Centre for the Study of Women and Gender and the Centre for Comparative Labour Studies, Professor Fonow will be giving a series of workshops and a keynote lecture. ALL WELCOME

Further details can be found at: Professor Mary Margaret Fonow, IAS Visiting Fellow

Dr Eric Jensen delivered a plenary presentation at the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria Education conference in Valencia, Spain on public engagement in zoos, drawing upon research at ZSL London Zoo and Durrell Wildlife Park in Jersey. He argued for a visitor-led approach to conservation education and engagement within zoos and aquaria at the conference held at the Oceanografic aquarium from 10-12 March 2011. http://www.eaza.net/activities/Pages/EZEConference2011.aspx

Following the conference, Dr Jensen co-organised and contributed to the first ever EAZA Visitor Studies Seminar aimed at introducing zoo educators to key principles in social research with the aim of enhancing public engagement with wildlife conservation in zoos. This post-conference on 13 March 2011 was organised by the EAZA Visitor Studies Working Group, of which Dr Jensen is a member. http://www.eaza.net/activities/Documents/EZE2011docs/Visitor_study_programme_final%20version.pdf

Gurminder K Bhambra (Warwick) and Julian Go (Boston) have won joint funding from the Strategic Funding Initiative for Joint Research and Education to develop existing links between faculty members at Warwick and Boston Universities around the general theme of ‘Postcolonial Cosmopolitanisms’. Through this collaboration we seek to: (1) consolidate research interests around this theme; (2) develop longer-term pedagogical and intellectual exchange through the crafting of a common interdisciplinary module that could be taught at both BU and Warwick; (3) discuss possible future faculty exchanges and student exchanges.

The intellectual background to the project is an address of the question: How do we, with our manifest differences, live together in the world? What are the ways in which cross-cultural difference have been imagined and managed across history and in different parts of the world? What forms of social organization, political structures, and cultural systems have facilitated or hindered coexistence? The theory and research programmes known as “postcolonialism” and “cosmopolitanism” have each emerged across the social sciences and humanities to offer different responses to these questions. While existing work in this area has separated the two paradigms, we will bring the two perspectives together into a critical dialogue to better address the larger questions they pose. Further, while the two paradigms have emerged in different disciplines, our project will offer a truly interdisciplinary approach, enabling new discussions between the collaborators’ respective fields, ranging from Sociology to English Literature to Classics and History. We will thereby cover not only multiple disciplinary perspectives but also different times and places, examining a range of theoretical perspectives and empirical work on cross-cultural interaction and management.

The first visit will be by Boston colleagues to Warwick in May 2011 and this will be followed by a return visit to Boston by Warwick colleagues in November 2011.

 http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/pg/current/phdstudents/current/syrgan/publications/podcasts/?podcastItem=simon_williams_on_sleep.mp3

Dr Eric Jensen publishes comment in journal Nature on science communication evaluation