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Congratulations to the Class of 2013

December 23, 2013, 1:40 am
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In November our English Literature undergraduates became Bachelors of Arts. The Awards ceremonies took place at the Centaur, overlooking Cheltenham. It is a privilege to attend and always an occasion for pride, and some emotion. We all hear a great deal about what education can do for us, but not enough about how people's talents and achievements help to create a better society. So let us pause and say so.

The University's Flikr album captures some moments from the day. Professor Robert Macfarlane, who gave last year's  annual Laurie Lee Memorial Lecture , received an Honorary Doctorate. The School of Humanities was among several schools represented. Our congratulations go to everyone.

After the ceremonies at the centaur, lots of new graduates returned to Francis Close Hall for the School of Humanities's farewell tea. That was fun.

 


We wish the Season's greetings and a very happy New Year to all graduates, and to current and prospective students. See you in 2014.
 
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Happy New Year to all students past, present and future

January 16, 2014, 3:53 am
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Welcome back. We look forward to another year of reading, writing, thinking and immersion in the cultural life of the university and the town.
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Humanities Public Lecture series welcomes Tim Ingold, social anthropologist, walker, writer

January 29, 2014, 3:00 am
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The next speaker in our series of Humanities Public Lecture is Tim Ingold, who will be speaking on 'Lines and Weather' on 31 January, Francis Close Hall TC001 (Main lecture theatre) at 7:30pm.

 
Professor Ingold is Chair in Social Anthropology at the University of Aberdeen. His work combines anthropology, ecology, writing, space, art, human movement, and philosophy. He is the author of many books, including Making: Anthropology, Archaelogy, Art and Architecture (Routledge, 2013), Being Alive: Essays on Movement, Knowledge and Description (Routledge, 2011), The Perception of the Environment (Routledge, reissued 2000), and Lines: A Brief History (Routledge, 2007).
 
Student, staff and the public are warmly invited to this very special event. Tickets are £5 to the public. University of Gloucestershire staff and students are admitted free of charge, but must obtain tickets through the Online Shop.
 
 

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A letter from a recent English Literature graduate

February 11, 2014, 1:52 pm
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Graduates are lifelong members of the University. We love to hear from our former students and find out what they're doing now. Here's a letter from Mike Jordan BA (Hons) English Literature, class of 2013.


Mike's fantasy front room.
 
 
Hi, my name is Mike Jordan, and I’ve just recently graduated from the University of Gloucestershire after three years of my English Literature BA (which I really enjoyed).

Towards the end of my final year, I had received an email asking if I was interested in doing any voluntary work for the Wychwood festival; working with Waterstones as part of the children’s literature event. The summer holidays in between studies are long, and I thought this would be a great experience to put my degree to good use. And I’m glad I did- as not only did I have a great time meeting the authors and learning a bit about children’s literature,  I was very fortunate in later getting a job with Waterstones; which I’m thoroughly enjoying and hope to take further as a career as a bookseller.

For anyone thinking of volunteering for anything or wondering what opportunities are out there that can help tie in with their own degrees after their studies, I would say to ask their lecturers and see if they know any contacts in the fields you are interested in. My lecturers were a constant support to me; and I know that without the contacts that my lecturers have had with these booksellers for example, this opportunity would not have been possible.

What I would say is keep looking out for these opportunities for voluntary work and do apply to them. Amongst having some fun experiences of your own, you never know what path they might lead to for your career.




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Welcome to our Humanities Applicant Day, Wednesday 19 February

February 14, 2014, 11:40 am
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The School of Humanities Applicant Day takes place on Wednesday 19 February from 12:30pm at the Francis Close Hall campus, five minutes from Cheltenham town centre. Join us to learn more about the University of Gloucestershire, its facilities, and what it's like to live and work in Cheltenham. Help is on hand from Accommodation, the Money Advice team, the Student Achievement team and other student services, and our excellent Student Ambassadors, all of whom are currently studying with us.




You'll take part in a subject workshop designed to give a sense of what it's like to study at degree level with us. English Literature and English Literature applicants will be thinking about that creative genius of English writing, William Blake.


Applicant Days offer the ideal way to find out about our courses, to get the feel of the place, to meet students and lecturers. Click here for more information and details of how to book your place; you can also email enquiries@glos.ac.uk or telephone 0844 846 4 846.  We look forward very much to seeing you on Wednesday.
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Sponsored Read-a-Thon for World Book day, 4th March

March 1, 2014, 4:32 am
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English Literature students are marking World Book Day next Tuesday with a sponsored reading of Laurie Lee's Cider With Rosie. All proceeds go to the Booktrust.

The event celebrates the power of reading to change lives, and draws on the School of Humanities' many connections with Gloucestershire writers. Each year we sponsor the Laurie Lee Memorial Lecture at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature, and the University Archives have extensive holdings of Gloucestershire Poets, Writers and Artists' work.
CiderWithRosie.jpg
 
Organiser Melody Grace writes:

Today in the UK, three in ten children are living in households that do not contain a single book. This year Booktrust have launched the Children's Reading Fund to support children with additional needs, disadvantaged children and children in care. They want to help children throughout the UK enjoy books, reading and the lifelong benefits they can bring, and your participation could make a real difference.

On the 4th March, the English Literature course hosts a sponsored Readathon of Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee. It will begin in TC001 at 3:15-and end in TC002A by 9:15 at the absolute latest. Refreshments will be provided!

Please support this student-led event and help to spread the gift of reading that we take so much for granted.
Cider with Rosie Read-a-Thon
 
Tuesday 4 March 2014
 
Francis Close Hall TC001 (Main lecture theatre)
 
3:15 till evening
 
Refreshments provided
 
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Students read Cider With Rosie to raise money for Booktrust

March 14, 2014, 1:09 pm
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To celebrate World Book Day and to raise money for Booktrust, our enterprising level 4 students of English Literature and English Literature and Creative Writing arranged a sponsored reading of Laurie Lee's Cider with Rosie. It also marked the centenary of this Gloucestershire writer's birth, and offered a good excuse to drink cider and eat cakes.

 
 

Siani Medlock made and decorated these splendid cupcakes.

Twelve readers started at about 3:30, egged on by a supporting crowd. By 9:30, in another location, we were flagging. But we completed the book.


 
The bitter end, c. 9:00 pm.

The organisers were interviewed on camera and some photos taken for the Student Union newspaper Space. We'll collect the incriminating evidence for our Flickr photo gallery, to be uploaded here soon; please check back.

Many thanks to the organising team: Charlotte Damiral, Niall Gallen, Melody Grace, Siani Medlock, Laura Nicklin and Katherine Timbury. The readers were (in no particular order) Beth Norris, Siani Medlock, Luc Wafford, Katie McDonnell, Niall Gallen, Cherie Jones, Melody Grace, Natalie Mason, Laura Nicklin, Katherine Timbury, Hilary Weeks, Debby Thacker.


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A new publication and a new direction in cross-disciplinary research

March 19, 2014, 2:52 am
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Description: Bloomsbury Influences: Papers from the Bloomsbury Adaptations Conference, Bath Spa University, 5-6 May 2011
 
 
Bloomsbury Influences: Papers from the Bloomsbury Adaptations Conference, Bath Spa University, 5-6 May 2011
 
Professor Shelley Saguaro and Lucy Tyler have contributed to this new collection of essays, edited by E. H Wright. In this collaborative essay, entitled ‘”Nature Once More Had Taken Her Part”: Recuperating Anon, the Common Voice and the Uncovered Theatre’, ‘the pageant performed by the villagers in Woolf’s Between the Acts is linked to “ecoperformance”, a theoretical approach which explores the pressures places on al fresco theatre by the natural world. As well as how and why it has become an important part of British culture. Woolf, according to Saguaro and Tyler, “offers a compelling example of outdoor theatre and its practitioners’ methodologies, which can be compared (and are useful) to a contemporary practice of the art form”.’ (E.H Wright, Introduction).

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Author, comedian and broadcaster Rob Newman speaks at the University of Gloucestershire next week

March 22, 2014, 3:52 am
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Robert Newman is an author, broadcaster, comedian, and political activist, who will be making a rare public speaking appearance at The University of Gloucestershire on March 26th 2014.
 
He read English at Selwyn College, Cambridge, before finding fame as a comedian on the BBC’s The Mary Whitehouse Experience. He was then half of Newman and Baddiel, described by The Guardian as "the most successful comedy duo of all time."
 
After a pioneering, record-breaking tour that famously sold out Wembley Arena, Newman turned his back on main-stream stadium comedy, pursuing a solo career as a novelist and political comedian. His first novel, Dependence Day, won the £10,000 Betty Trask Award, and his second novel, Manners, was published by Penguin. His return to comedy saw him produce a series of erudite politicised solo shows that have toured in Britain and America, and have seen him compared to Lenny Bruce and described as "the funniest comedian I’ve ever seen" in The Sunday Times, and "breathtakingly, heartbreakingly, goosepimplingly brilliant" in The Scotsman. In 2005, he finally returned to television comedy when his show A History of Oil screened on More4, and in 2007 the BBC screened a six-part series, A History of the World Backwards.
 
Newman continues to make his name as one of the most exciting and unusual of contemporary British novelists. His third novel, A Fountain at the Centre of the World, was chosen as a book of the year by Dave Eggers and described in The New York Times as "the talismanic Catch-22 of the antiglobalization protest movement."The Guardian argued it was a "wonderful, big-hearted, textured, funny, moral and deeply unfashionable book", while The Independent asked if it could "herald a resuscitation of the English "literary political novel", almost dead in the water since the best work of Malcolm Lowry and Graham Greene".
 
Newman will join us to discuss politics, fiction, history, and his new novel, The Trade Secret – an outrageous, continent-crossing epic that subtly blends fact and fiction, and is described by The Guardian as "a rollicking Elizabethan yarn that has much to say about the origins and nature of modern capitalism."
 
The event is free to staff and students of the University, but places can be reserved through the Online Shop here.
 
 
 

'Fiction, Politics and the Past'

A talk by Rob Newman

Humanities Public Lecture Series

University of Gloucestershire

 

Wednesday 26 March 2014

Francis Close Hall TC001 at 7:30pm

 

All are welcome

 
 

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Postscript: Laurie Lee Read-a-Thon for World Book Day

March 26, 2014, 2:54 am
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English Literature and Creative Writing students raised nearly £138 for Booktrust . Job done. On behalf of the School of Humanities, thanks to everyone involved, some of whom appear below.

 
Photo: Debby Thacker.
 

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Centre for Writing, Place and History hosts a research seminar on Richard Jefferies

March 28, 2014, 2:37 am
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Richard Jefferies (1848-87) was the author of several novels and children's books, and remains a much-loved nature writer. He is perhaps best known for Wild Life in a Southern County (1879), a natural history of his native Wiltshire and in particular the countryside around Swindon. It has been said that Jefferies's 'sphere was the the fields and hedgerows around us [...] his task was to show that the unfamiliar lay near at hand' (G. Sampson).

The Centre for Writing, Place and History welcomes Rebecca Welshman (U of Exeter) for a research seminar on Richard Jefferies and his work. It promises to be a fascinating paper and discussion for anyone interested in literature, history, natural history and the environment, and everyone is welcome. Details below.

 
 

The Centre for Writing, Place and History
presents
 
 
“The Old House at Coate”: Literary Voyages at the Birthplace of Richard Jefferies (1848-1887)
 
Rebecca Welshman (University of Exeter)
 
Wednesday 2 April at 5:15pm
University of Gloucestershire
Francis Close Hall HC202
 
Everyone is welcome
 
Image: http://www.flickr.com/groups/richardjefferies/

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Welcome to our final Applicant Day of the year, Friday 4 April 2014

April 3, 2014, 1:22 pm
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The School of Humanities Applicant Day takes place on Friday 4 April from 12:30pm at the Francis Close Hall campus, five minutes from Cheltenham town centre. Join us to learn more about the University of Gloucestershire, its facilities, and what it's like to live and work in Cheltenham. Help is on hand from Accommodation,the Money Advice team, the Student Achievement team and other student services, and our excellent Student Ambassadors, all of whom are currently studying with us.






You'll take part in a subject workshop designed to give a sense of what it's like to study at degree level with us. English Literature and English Literature applicants will be thinking about that creative genius of English writing, William Blake.






Applicant Days offer the ideal way to find out about our courses, to get the feel of the place, to meet students and lecturers. Click here for more information and details of how to book your place; you can also email enquiries@glos.ac.uk or telephone 0844 846 4 846. We look forward very much to seeing you on Friday.

 

 


 

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Test post April

April 15, 2014, 6:45 am
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Testing the browser; please check back with us soon.
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An extra Open Day/Applicant Day on Sunday 27 April

April 23, 2014, 11:28 am
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Our Open Day this Sunday will include an Applicant Day element for those students who may have missed the last one but who would like the chance to find out more about us. Applicant Days are special events for students to whom we've offered a place. Whatever stage of the university selection process you're at, please join us.

The School of Humanities Applicant Day takes place on Sunday 4 April from 12:30pm at the Francis Close Hall campus, the Gothic bit of the university, five minutes from Cheltenham town centre. Advice and help are on hand from Accommodation,the Money Advice team,the Student Achievement team and other student services, and our excellent Student Ambassadors, all of whom are currently studying with us.

We offer courses in English Literature, English Literature and Creative Writing, English Literature and History, and English Literature and Language. Come and meet members of the staff team, tell us about yourselves and your study interests, and find out what it's like to study with us. Those of you considering dual subject degrees (they're all BA Single Honours awards) may have particular questions to ask about the experience of learning across the disciplines, so we're running a Q & A session especially for you.

We hope to see you this Sunday.
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Jazz and Storytelling at FCH this week

April 29, 2014, 4:29 am
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Two special events bring together the spheres of poetry, music, and storytelling this week at Francis Close Hall.

Alex Steele and the Improwise Quartet 'will take a deep look at how we can apply ‘jazz thinking’ to enhance our abilities to make change happen in the world, through our powers of language, communication, innovation, leadership and creativity.  The session will focus on lessons, skills, perspectives and values which we can learn from the world of jazz and improvisation, and will feature live demonstrations and interactions with a jazz quartet.' the session runs on Thursday 1 May, 11:00 - 1:00 in TC001.


On Friday 2 May, storytellers and story-writers Anthony Nanson and Kirsty Hartsiotis, from Fire Springs, will host a session called Storytelling and Enchantment: the Imagined and the Real. They will explore ways that imaginative stories can re-enchant our lives and the world we live in with qualities of empathy, connectedness, and significance. The workshop includes storytelling, theory, and interactive exercisesand is suitable for anyone interested in writing, language, performance, or the environment.  Details: 1:30 - 4:30 in HC204.

Events are open to all Humanities students, but you must book a place: http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/arran-stibbe-6287598237



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Research seminar on Edward Thomas, poet of Gloucestershire and WW1

May 2, 2014, 9:15 am
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The Centre for Writing, Place and History
 
presents
 
 
 
 
'"The sun filled earth and heaven with a great light": Edward Thomas's poetic evocation of the weather world'
 
Anna Stebbing (University of Worcester)
 
Wednesday 7 May 2014
Francis Close Hall HC204, 5:15
 
Everyone is welcome
 
Image: Bluebells in Dymock Woods.
Reproduced for educational purposes only
 
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Dr Debby Thacker wins University Teaching Fellowship

May 7, 2014, 1:11 am
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Congratulations to all colleagues whose achievements were celebrated at the Staff Excellence Awards 2014, but our special congratulations to Dr Debby Thacker on receiving a University Teaching Fellowship. More photos in our Flickr gallery here and at the University Flickr page.



The School of Humanities dominated this year's Staff Excellence Awards: from left, Dr William Large (Religion, Philosophy and Ethics), Dr Debby Thacker, Dr Dave Webster, Dr Roy Jackson (both RPE).
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Hail and farewell

May 7, 2014, 1:42 pm
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Anna Stebbing (University of Worcester) was the guest speaker at the final seminar hosted by the Centre for Writing, Place and History today. She demonstrated how the poet Edward Thomas's 'poetic evocation of the weather world' can be read within the framework of ecocriticism, including Heideggerian analysis of nature. As usual, the conversation was richly diverse, although the event was rather poignant, as organiser and chair Professor John Hughes remarked. For more than five years the CWPH has brought guest speakers to the University of Gloucestershire and offered scholarly dialogue to staff and students, as well as opportunities for colleagues to contribute. Never is this intellectual activity more welcome than when we are all buried under heavy marking and admin loads, or revising for exams.

The Centre has presented research seminars on topics ranging from Thomas Hardy, Richard Jefferies, F.W. Harvey, Ivor Gurney, and nineteenth-century illustration, to Baudrillard and 9/11 literature, and British Communist culture. Speakers have included (among many) Rebecca Welshman, Brian Maidment, Roger Ebbatson, Simon Dentith, and Roger Deeks. The Centre also organised a symposium, 'The (Dis) United Kingdom' on English and Scottish cultural identity and history.

The CWPH's scholarly work, like that of its fellow Humanities research group the Centre for the Bible and Spirituality, will be subsumed into the 'Being Human' project, established recently as a University Research Priority. With its discussion of weather, human consciousness and globalization, Anna's paper bridges the two research areas and looks to future projects.

Our thanks go to John for running the Centre and organising its activities. We will miss those Wednesday afternoons.



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Professor Shelley Saguaro delivers her Inaugural Lecture on Wednesday 14 May

May 11, 2014, 12:00 pm
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Professor Shelley Saguaro's Inaugural Lecture, Much Madness, Such Sanity: Growing in the Garden of Humanities, will discuss the relationship between our discipline and what it means to be human. Her title draws on her longterm interests in the natural world, creativity, women writers from the seventeenth century to the present, and gardens. More information can be found here .
 

The lecture takes place on Wednesday 14 May at Park TC014 at 6:00 campus. Refreshments will be served in Elwes Reception area from 5:00, and there will be a drinks reception after the lecture at 7:00. Places are free of charge to staff and students, but you must book your place by emailing inaugurallectures@glos.ac.uk

 

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Stop Press: Sixth-form student essay competition to be announced

May 13, 2014, 11:19 am
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Details of the English Literature essay competition for A and AS level students will go live very soon. Watch this space.
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