Departmental news

Henry Sinclair-Banks, a PhD student in the the Theory and Foundations (FoCS) Research Group and the Centre for Discrete Mathematics and its Applications (DIMAP), has won a Best Paper Award at ICALP 2023, the 50th EATCS International Colloquium on Automata, Languages and Programming. ICALP is the main conference and annual meeting of the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science (EATCS).

Henry's paper, co-authored with researchers from Germany and Poland: Marvin Künnemann, Filip Mazowiecki, Lia Schütze, and Karol Węgrzycki, addresses the coverability problem in vector addition systems (VASS), a well-known model of concurrent systems. Coverability is an algorithmic problem for the verification of "safety properties": whether the system always avoids a set of bad states. Henry and his co-authors determine how much time is required to solve this problem in the worst case. They develop an algorithm that improves upon the state of the art that has stood for forty years. They also prove that, in several settings, it is impossible to decide coverability substantially faster, unless there is also a faster algorithm for a classic problem such as Boolean satisfiability (SAT) and finding cycles of fixed length in graphs.

In total, 5 Warwick papers will appear at this year's ICALP:

• Michael Benedikt, Dmitry Chistikov, and Alessio Mansutti, "The complexity of Presburger arithmetic with power or powers",
• Sam Coy, Artur Czumaj, Peter Davies, and Gopinath Mishra, "Optimal (degree+1)-coloring in congested clique",
• Charilaos Efthymiou and Weiming Feng, "On the mixing time of Glauber dynamics for the hard-core and related models on G(n,d/n)",
• Marvin Künnemann, Filip Mazowiecki, Lia Schütze, Henry Sinclair-Banks, and Karol Węgrzycki, "Coverability in VASS revisited: Improving Rackoff's bound to obtain conditional optimality",
• Konstantinos Zampetakis and Charilaos Efthymiou, "Broadcasting with random matrices".

This July's ICALP will be the 50th edition of the conference.

When you purchase an IP-based spy (hidden) camera for surveillance, are you aware that others may be spying on what you are watching? Recent research by Samuel Herodotou in the Department of Computer Science, Warwick, as part of his third-year undergraduate dissertation project under the supervision of Professor Feng Hao, has revealed a wide range of vulnerabilities of a generic camera module that has been used in many best-selling hidden cameras. Exploiting these vulnerabilities, an attacker may capture your hidden camera's video/audio streams from anywhere in the world, and furthermore, take complete control of the camera as a bot to attack other devices in your home network. To launch the attack, all the attacker needs to know is merely your hidden camera’s serial number. It is estimated that these vulnerabilities affect millions of hidden cameras, mostly sold in America, Europe and Asia. The (insecure) peer-to-peer network that is used by the affected cameras is also being used by 50 million IoT devices as a general communication platform. Hence, many millions of other IoT devices may also be affected. Researchers have responsibly disclosed findings to the manufacturers, and a CVE has already been assigned. Samuel will present this research work at the 17th International Conference on Network and System Security (Canterbury, UK, 14-16 August 2023). More details can be found in the paper.

On Saturday the 20th of May, we brought together at the University of Warwick an international group of scholars working on various themes relating to themes of post-war return. The desired outcome was to initiate a discussion between scholars across disciplines, geographies, and periods, thinking about the subjective dimensions of homecoming. This is significant as this field has long been dominated by normative and prescriptive social science analysis. We were particularly interested how literary theory and criticism might fertilise detailed historical analysis, and specific examples from the past might enrich and nuance broader theorisation.

Our keynote speaker Kate McLaughlin from the University of Oxford got us going with a fascinating, challenging and provocative talk on the ‘silent’ veteran, using the particular example of Zadie Smith’s White Teeth. Her remarkable interweaving of philosophical theory, in particular drawing on Gayatri Spivak’s ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’, and close literary analysis, was remarkably applicable to historical analysis. Through the speech she made the figure of the ‘silent veteran’, a problematic in all our studies, a fruitful field of analysis. The importance of ‘listening’ to the silences was particularly resonant and significant to all the presenter’s studies.

The first session ‘What home? Disrupted Homecomings’ spoke very closely to some of the key themes of the conference. All three papers stressed different dimensions of the problematic of ‘home’: what constitutes home in the post-war, across time and place, and for different individuals. Professor Taylor Soja’s discussion of a British officer, dragged backward and forward across the Empire in the ‘Small Wars’ of the late-Victorian era, complicated how ‘home’ for many could be the Front itself, but also how this would change over one’s life. On the other side of the colonial divide, Rose Miyonga gave an account of the inability of many Kenyan men and women to come home, even 60 years after the Mau Mau conflict. Due to close ancestral ties to their land, which was taken by the colonial government, people continue to feel discombobulated so long afterwards. War however can also provide a tool for making one’s idea of home much more secure, as Amy Carney elucidated. In studying a German-born Jewish soldier in the American Army, she revealed that the war itself crystallised his identity as an American, which became, undisputedly, home.

Our next panel considered how women specifically experienced, and are represented in accounts of, post-war homecoming. Alison Fell gave a remarkable account of what place combatant women came to have in post-war memory and myth-making. Due to women’s personification as the nation, tied closely to traditional ideas of motherhood, the image of homecoming was the putting down of the rifle, used to protect the home, and the taking up once again of mothering roles. In a different register, Marcin Filipowicz analysed contemporary Czech literature to illustrate how women’s homecomings disrupt easy theorisations of good and evil in post-war contexts. His powerful rendition of a scene of violent homecoming of a female holocaust survivor, with real bearing on how we consider post-war homecoming, precisely indicated the value of an interdisciplinary approach to this subject.

The third and largest panel of the day considered the broad question of the politics of homecoming, and especially how veterans made claims on the state. Robin Bates introduced to the conference a theme which would come up repeatedly, the battle for veteran’s rights, in his case, Union veterans of the American Civil War. His conception of the struggle for veteran’s rights contrasted the very different idea of the veteran in contemporary Russia. Elena Racheva shared how since the fall of the Soviet Union the state has weaponised veterans for their own ends, slowly incorporating the wars in Chechnya and Afghanistan as part of a glorious struggle in the defence of Russia. The instrumentalisation of veteran’s status was similarly demonstrated in Drew Flanagan’s discussion of French far-right activist François de la Rocque, who used his status of front-line soldier to resist allegations of collaboration. The final speaker of the panel, Susan Carruthers, spoke to a very different way post-war homecoming was framed by the state - through the British offering of ‘demob’ suits to returning servicemen. Hereby they were to be re-civilianised, although multiple groups (i.e women) were excluded.

Ably chaired by Holly Furneaux, our fourth panel brought the focus specifically on disability-centric histories of Homecoming. Nick Bailey spoke to a specific institution that mediated disabled homecomings, the British Corps of Commissionaires, with strong disciplinary overtones. This genealogy of veteran’s rights was continued by Michael Robinson, who discussed debates about provisions for veterans across Canada, Britain and Australia in the 1920s and 1930s, with a special focus on ‘invisible disabilities’. The different treatment in different countries was also reflected in Sofya Anisimova’s excellent reflection on disabled Imperial Russian officer veterans. Here too was remarkable picture of fluctuation over time, and the political uses of disability by the veterans themselves.

The final panel tied together many of the themes of the conference, discussing how veterans produce narratives that reflect on their homecoming. Chloe Storer spoke on reticence in her own oral histories with British Afghan veterans, linking back to the notions of silence considered in the keynote speech. Eamonn O’Keeffe spoke by contrast on a very talkative veteran, Shadrick Byfield, who leveraged his literacy and experiences with members of the elite to survive in Victorian Britain. The final speaker of our conference Dimo Georgiev showed how the staid, jargonistic, novels of Bulgarian International Brigadiers became standard reading in socialist Bulgaria, omitting the difficult realities of homecoming.

Altogether, the conference met the objectives we set wholeheartedly. This panoply of scholars has a real contribution to make to the study of the post-war, and to that end we seek to keep the momentum going with an edited collection. Such an opportunity is available with Routledge’s Warwick Series in the Humanities, which we hope to take advantage of in the coming months.

Conference Report

Title of Conference:

Teaching Medieval French: Sustainable Approaches for the Next Generation

Dates: 27-29 April 2023

Organisers: Emma Campbell and Liam Lewis

Background and Objectives

This three-day event for U.K.-based university teachers, researchers, and early career academics came out of two online ‘state-of-the-discipline’ workshops for Medieval French Studies organised in 2022. Responding to a need identified at those workshops, this in-person event at the University of Warwick enabled participants to develop new, sustainable, interdisciplinary approaches to teaching medieval French materials to undergraduates across a range of HE institutions.

The interconnected aims of this event were: (1) to introduce participants to strategies that they could take forward in their teaching practice, (2) to provide space and time for attendees to workshop ideas they could integrate directly into their present or future teaching, and (3) to discuss the sharing and development of pedagogical resources cross-institutionally. To that end, invited speakers with expertise in areas that intersect with studies of medieval French–particularly performance studies, visual culture, and material culture–led workshops aimed at providing participants with a set of tools for their own practice. Participants worked on existing course materials or on new ideas in ‘developing ideas’ sessions incorporated into the workshops. There was a final session dedicated to discussing practical strategies for sharing resources and sources of potential funding.

Final Programme

Thursday 27 April: Texts & Material Culture

12-1pm: Arrivals

1-2pm: How to teach with medieval architecture (Jenny Alexander)

2-3pm: Developing ideas session

3-4pm: How to use collaborative transcription and editing (Laura Morreale)

4-5pm: Developing ideas session

5-6pm: How to grow our community—a discussion led by Grapevine charity  

6-7pm: Networking, with drinks reception

7pm: Dinner on campus

Friday 28 April: Visual Culture & Interdisciplinary Work

9-10am: Arrivals

10-11am: How to teach with medieval images (Debra Strickland)

11am-12pm: Developing ideas session

12-1pm: How to approach interdisciplinary work (Liam Lewis and Harriet Jean Evans)

1-2pm: Lunch

2-3pm: How to teach with medieval mapping (Marianne O’Doherty)

3-4pm: Developing ideas session

7pm: Performance at St Mary's Guildhall of ‘Silence’ by Rachel Rose Reid, followed by an after-show talk at 9pm.

Saturday 29 April: Performance

10-11.30am: Storytelling Workshop with Rachel Rose Reid

11.30am-12pm: Break

12-1pm: How to teach with storytelling (Daisy Black and Jane Bonsall)

1-2pm: Lunch

2-3pm: How to teach with medieval song (Emma Dillon)

3-4pm: Developing ideas session

4-5pm: How to foster cross-institutional support and sharing of resources—discussion led by Emma Campbell

Outcomes

The planned outcomes of the event were all met or surpassed. These can be summarised as follows:

• New teaching resources and approaches. Participants left the workshops equipped with new materials and methodologies for teaching medieval French literature culture immediately usable in their own institutional contexts. Where possible, sessions were recorded. These are currently being edited and will be made available online, so others can use them. 

We had numerous messages of thanks from participants after the event. For instance, a senior colleague emailed to say how generative the workshops had been for her: ‘My huge thanks to you and Liam, and your amazing speakers. It was a really fab few days. I feel really regenerated.’ Another colleague highlighted the value of the event for sharing ideas: ‘A huge thank you to you both for such a welcoming, inspiring event. It was the most innovative and exciting conference I have been to for a long time. Because of covid it has been a while since I have had a chance to meet and share ideas with colleagues outside my immediate circle, so this was very much welcome.’

• Strategies for collaborative working and resource sharing. The workshops enabled colleagues to explore practical strategies for sharing resources and expertise across institutions. The final session built on this by discussing actions for developing resources and possible platforms for cross-institutional collaboration. Emma Campbell is currently planning a follow-up meeting this summer to take these actions forward.

One of our speakers emailed after the workshops to say she had already started to work with other participants: ‘Since the event I’ve already got a little team of people to work on that Mandeville manuscript I showed and am also talking to Daisy about some kind of map-based public engagement project. It’s been not just brilliant for teaching ideas but also for research collaborations. I’d love to find out about any more events run with / by this group.’

Another speaker emphasised the importance of the interdisciplinary exchanges: ‘Just a note of warmest thanks for a truly wonderful couple of days. I had the best time!!! I absolutely loved the workshops on storytelling as well as the magical performance of Silence. And it was such a lovely context for me to share ideas about teaching and also about the MUSLIVE project. I learnt so much from the conversations. Moreover, it was such an engaged and welcoming gathering -- I was so glad to be there. So many, many congratulations on convening such a marvellous event. I know, too, how much work went into this, both with the logistics and also building such a brilliant programme. Thank you.’

One mid-career colleague highlighted the importance of the networking that took place, as well as the pedagogical benefits of the workshops: ‘What a fantastic occasion the teaching workshop was! It was wonderful to see so many colleagues, and to meet new ones. I found it a truly inspirational moment, and it came at just the right time as I reflect on the relationship between teaching and research in my future work. Well done!’

• Future funding bids. We anticipate future funding bids to facilitate collaborations with community partners. Additional funding plans to support cross-institutional sharing of resources are under discussion (see above).

• Professional development. Participants of all career stages were able to learn new skills and integrate those into teaching plans.

• Community engagement. The workshops included a session co-led by Grapevine charity. There was also a public performance of a medieval text at Coventry’s Guildhall, a public after-show discussion, and a storytelling workshop accessible to the public.

HRC funding covered the cost of inviting external speakers to campus, as well as some of the cost of admin support for the event. In addition, the HRC Visiting Speakers Fund enabled us to host an overseas presenter, Laura Morreale, who would otherwise have been unable to attend. We are grateful to the HRC for generously increasing the VSF award to cover unexpected price increases in Dr Morreale’s flights.

Emma Campbell

Liam Lewis

25 May 2023

Research from Warwick Economics and the University of Munich has offered a new explanation for why tax systems have failed to address rising levels of inequality in many modern economies.

Empirical studies have shown that globalisation has raised wage inequality and the concentration of earnings at the top of the income distribution. Rather than tax levels increasing when top incomes rise, however, this is often accompanied by a fall in the optimal rate of redistributive taxation, meaning that tax systems fail to effectively share wealth across society.

Professor Carlo Perroni and colleagues argue that increased integration of markets and the prevalence of performance-based contracts help to explain why this is the case.

They observe that globalisation has led to greater integration of product markets, increasing competition and making it harder for any single firm to make a positive profit but allowing those that are successful to reap higher rewards. This feeds into labour markets and the prevalence of incentive contracts, where workers are awarded bonuses or other performance-based benefits: globalisation makes product markets potentially more profitable but also more competitive, translating into steeper incentive contracts and greater volatility of individual earnings.

The researchers’ analysis, based on US income data, reveals that while globalisation increases the income share of workers in successful firms, it reduces the effectiveness of income tax as a tool for redistributing wealth as redistributive taxation is unable to counter the higher income inequality that arises from steeper incentive contracts. At the same time, performance-based pay leads to a lower optimal tax rate, as workers are dis-incentivised from performing if tax levels are too high and more likely to opt for the security of fixed-salary contracts.

The researchers argue that a similar increase in income concentration in an economy with fixed contracts would lead to a higher optimal tax rate.

Find out more

‘Incentives, Globalisation and Redistribution’, by Carlo Perroni, Antoine Ferey and Andreas Haufler, is forthcoming in the Journal of Public Economics.

Carlo Perroni is Professor of Economics at Warwick. View his staff profile.

Four undergraduate students from the Department of Economics presented research papers at the prestigious Carroll Round conference in April 2023.

The Carroll Round is an annual international economics conference at Georgetown University for the world’s top undergraduates to present their research and exchange ideas. They are joined by prominent members of the academic and policy-making communities in a forum that facilitates informed and productive discussion on global economic issues.

The students had the opportunity to showcase original research undertaken as part of the final year of their degree course at Warwick. They presented their findings in discussion panels moderated by economics professors and practitioners.

This year’s keynote lectures were given by Dr Lisa Cook, member of the Board of Governors of the US Federal Reserve System, and Dr Signe-Mary McKernan, vice president of the Urban Institute’s Center on Labor, Human Services and Population.

Class of 2023 (pictured L-R)

• Mateusz Wiewiórski, ‘Effects of recent and prior migrants on native’s wages.’
• Jay Kavaiya, ‘Is net-zero a feasible approach? A theoretical model of sustainable growth & natural capital.’
• Daira Povez Gamboa, ‘The effect of child penalty in Peru’s labour market.’
• Andy Lau, ‘A model of online misinformation with endogenous reputation.’

Find out more about the Carroll Round conferenceLink opens in a new window

We are delighted to announce that Professor Nigel Stallard is appointed as the new Director of Warwick Clinical Trials Unit. Read the full news item here

An RSC animationLink opens in a new window explains the work of an international team of scientists, led by Warwick Chemistry, and named winners of the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Dalton Division Horizon Prize 2022.

The work of 'Team Ice' has been brought to life in a new RSC-commissioned videoLink opens in a new window celebrating their Chemistry Biology Interface Division Horizon Prize, 2022.

Dr. Maryna Utkina, BA Fellow at the University of Warwick Law School, became a part of the Ukrainian cohort and participated in a two-day British Academy-supported workshop titled “Development of academic skills in Great Britain and the international context”, which took place on the 24 and 25 May in Wigan.