Technecast

Happy New Year! We are kicking off 2026 with something different. In November, Techne held its annual Student-Led Conference in London, during which the Technecast team organised a discussion around the idea of untranslatability.  We first hear from Felix, who came up with the idea for the session and provided our participants with a plethora of examples from different languages and disciplines. Then, we dive into the results of the discussion led by Adrianna.  We are grateful to all participants for giving us some fascinating insight into the cultural uses of language. One participant even managed to smoothly tie the discussion to our conference theme (Gateways, Barriers and the Space Between - can you spot it?).  You can find examples of words mentioned in the episode on our instagram page, @technepodcast Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the Arts and Humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Adrianna Chmielewska, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

In the latest - and last - instalment in our Heritage and Memory series, Adrianna Chmielewska talks to Thomas Nixon-Roworth from Sheffield University on his research into clergy and lay relations in mid-17th century England.  In the first half of the episode, Thomas will be talking about the premise of his research and its main themes. Adrianna then talks to Thomas about the fascinating and complex series of relationships at St Stephen, Coleman Street parish in London.  Thank you Thomas for your time and interest in Technecast! Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the Arts and Humanities. It is produced by Adrianna Chmielewska, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected].

This week, we take a brief detour from our usual themes to explore a question at the crossroads of social ethics and technology: Can humans and robots be friends? We are joined by Ruby Hornsby, doctoral researcher at the University of Leeds, to explore this question. We discuss what friendship really means, why she argues it cannot exist with machines, and why it’s worth asking what friendship and human connection means in the digital age.  This episode was hosted and produced by Eva Dieteren. ------------------------------ Ruby Hornsby is a final year philosophy PhD student at the University of Leeds funded by The White Rose College of Arts and Humanities. She researches whether humans can be friends with robots and, more broadly, she is interested in Applied Ethics, Ethics of AI and The Philosophy of Love, Sex and Relationships. Ruby is the post-graduate research assistant for Ethical Dating Online Project (link below),  a network of researchers focused on exploring the ethics of online dating. She is also the founder of Wiser Debate Club, a free monthly philosophical debate club for people aged 60+ which has recently been awarded funding to expand to various UK sites.  ------------------------------ Resources: Books Alone Together (2011) by Sherry Turkle Machines Like Me (2019) by Ian McEwan  Klara and the Sun (2021) by Kazuo Ishiguro Films/TV Her (2013), dir. Spike Jonze  Black Mirror: "Be Right Back" (season 2, episode 1) and "Common People" (season 7, episode 1) Sex actually with Alice Levigne (Alex and Mimi): Eternal You (on grief bots) Other Alaina's Blog Ethical Dating Online | Insta: @ethicaldatingonline Centre for Love, Sex and Relationships | Insta: @Leeds_CLSR ------------------------------ Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Adrianna Chmielewska, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected], on Instagram @technepodcast, or on X @technecast.

In the first installment of our 'Nature' theme, Isabel catches up with friend of the podcast, PhD researcher and filmmaker Viveca Mellegård. She fills us in on how her PhD journey has been progressing, and shares an immersive soundscape of her practice with us. ------------ Image: Viveca Mellegård Technecast music: Jennifer Doveton Soundscape: Viveca Mellegård Link to Episode 1 'Secrets of the Prize Papers' from the podcast On The Record at the National Archives: https://tnaontherecord.libsyn.com/secrets-of-the-prize-papers-trade-loot-and-letters ------------ This episode was hosted and produced by Isabel Sykes ------------ Viveca is a researcher and filmmaker and started her career making science and arts programmes at the BBC. She integrates film and photography as research methods with a particular interest in making the embodied aspects of craftsmanship visible. Viveca is doing a collaborative PhD with Royal Holloway, University of London and the Economic Botany Department at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Her research links Kew’s colonial era collections of Indigofera tinctoria from India to contemporary indigo production and dyeing in West Bengal. Her work aims to communicate the value of the knowledge and skills embedded in the craft of dyeing with natural indigo and to show how embodied practices can cultivate human-plant relationships.  ------------ Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Adrianna Chmielewska, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected], on Instagram @technepodcast, or on X @technecast.

Continuing our Heritage and Memory series, Adrianna Chmielewska talks to Helen Williams on her research into representations of motherhood.  Helen Williams is a first-year doctoral researcher in creative writing at Brunel University of London. An experienced motherhood journalist, Williams is writing a novel based around her research on the ways relationships between generations of university-educated mothers and daughters are represented in contemporary British fiction. One of the texts she is focusing on is Bernardine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other. In this podcast, Williams presents a piece of creative criticism: a monologue in the voice of the National Theatre, a key setting in Evaristo's novel, comparing the structure of the novel to the architecture of the theatre. As well as reading a sample of her writing, Helen talks about her inspirations for the project and trends in matricentric literature today.  All reading and viewing recommendations can be found on our Instagram @technepodcast.  Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Adrianna Chmielewska, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

In our first episode on the theme of Heritage and Memory, PhD researcher Tom Hull from the University of Brighton talks to us about his research project.  Tom's project uses a combination of archival research, literary criticism and creative writing to deepening our understanding of Dr James Barry. Dr James Barry was many things. He was a pioneering surgeon, performing the first successful caesarean section within the British Empire where the mother and daughter both survived. He was an army doctor in various occupied territories, and was complicit in the racialised violence of the British Empire. And he also happened to be a trans man. In this episode, Tom explores how we can both recognise a person from the past as a queer pioneer, and acknowledge that history has privileged them and silenced others - for example, Barry's Jamaican manservant and companion of 35 years, John, about whom so little is known. Using techniques and theories such as Saidiya Hartman's 'critical fabulation', Tom's project seeks to address these gaps in the archive both creatively and critically.    Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected], or on Instagram @technepodcast. 

In honour of International Women's Day, this episode brings together PhD researchers from a range of backgrounds to explore the role of gender in musical traditions and genres (from opera to classical to popular music). Join us as we celebrate the voices of women in music research, dive into everything from Kendrick Lamar’s iconic Super Bowl performance to Dolly Parton’s timeless legacy, and share a few of our personal listening gems along the way! You can find these gems in the accompanying Spotify playlist. About the participants: Adrianna Chmielewska is a first-year PhD student at Kingston University. Her research focuses on adaptation of literature into opera as a reflection of Italian cultural identities. Looking at the development of opera from the 17th to the 21st century, she investigates how turning stories into opera communicates with Italian culture and society. Adrianna sees opera beyond the elitist stereotype, as a persistent, vibrant and culturally rich means of storytelling. Emma Haughton is a third year student with techne at Kingston University. Her PhD focuses on the intersections of Musicology with English Literature, culture studies, and philosophy exploring women who wrote symphonies during the twentieth century. Her main focus of her thesis is exploring the symphonies of African American composer Florence Price through a postcolonial/transnational lens. Eva Dieteren is a second year Techne-funded PhD student at Kingston University London. Her research sits at the crossroads of feminist theory and popular music studies, with a focus on exploring concept albums through feminist, new materialist, and decolonial perspectives. Felix Clutson is a fourth year Teche PhD student at the University of Surrey. His research explores the production and translation of football museum texts, focusing specifically on the tension between the local representation and global reach of clubs. Isabel Sykes is in her third year of her Techne-funded Sociology PhD at Brunel, University of London. Her project investigates media representations of unpaid domestic labour alongside working-class women’s lived experiences of such work. This episode was produced and presented by Eva Dieteren Technecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTP The music is composed and generously given by Jennifer Doveton If you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via instagram @technecast

In our final episode of 2024, the team comes together for a roundtable discussion on the theme of ‘care’. Topics include: how can we practice self-care as researchers, particularly in the current turbulent HE landscape? What does care as methodology look like? And does care for ourselves or each other even matter while we are failing to care for our planet? ------------ Image: GoodFon Music: Jennifer Doveton ------------ This episode was hosted and produced by Isabel Sykes ------------ Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected], on Instagram @technepodcast, or on X (formerly Twitter) @technecast.

This episode follows a workshop on ‘The Practice of Interviewing: Perspectives from Across the Arts and Humanities’ hosted by the Technecast team on 20 September 2024. First, you will hear from four Technecast members (Isabel, Felix, Olivia, and Pragya) as they share their own interviewing experiences. This is followed by four practice interviews by Gareth Hughes, Tom Railton, Julia Schauerman, and Emma Haughton.  ——————— This episode was produced and presented by Eva Dieteren Technecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTP The music is composed and generously given by Jennifer Doveton If you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via X @technecast

In this episode Edwin Gilson and Florence Fitzgerald-Allsopp, both researchers exploring works of art involving nonhumans at the University of Surrey, join Felix for a conversation about our relationship with the flora and fauna around us. We discuss different approaches to art based on nonhumans, the social lenses humans look through at nonhumans, and how their relationships have changed over the course of their research.  ------------------- This episode was produced and presented by Felix Clutson Technecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTP The music is composed and generously given by Jennifer Doveton If you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via X @technecast

In our latest instalment of our series on 'Senses', we hear from Rosalind Holgate-Smith. Rosalind is an AHRC-funded doctoral researcher whose work looks at touch, particularly in the field of dance and contact improvisation. In this episode, Rosalind talks to Morag about her conceptualisation of 'Deep Touch', and how this conceptualisation informs and enriches her teaching and dance practice. We hope you enjoy!  You can find more of Rosalind's work here: https://rosalindholgate-smith.com/work Photo for episode cover credited to Bernardo Chances. Technecast is a podcast showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Chiara Muzzi, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected]

Jennifer Doveton - whose lovely music you hear every time you listen to the technecast - is a postgraduate researcher in her third year at Brunel University. Her research is on middle-class subjectivity and moral value in British screen fantasy. At the moment she's looking at the Harry Potter film series and the His Dark Materials television series for markers of class in characterisation and narratives of upward mobility that reproduce neoliberal ideologies of individual aspiration. In this podcast Doveton takes a look at the role of the labour in these portal fictions and how the characters undertaking labour are presented, including their narrative function, relationship to the protagonist, and how they perceive themselves. You can follow Jennifer on twitter here: @JDHDoveton and find her video essays on youtube under JDH Doveton: www.youtube.com/channel/UCqZMVlLA0y9FHBe4unzTbHwThe previous technecast episode we produced with Jennifer can be found on Spotify here - https://open.spotify.com/episode/1aPzFQbz4IBTkBcEWxJ3Rq?si=41b0c0c99ec845a2 - or by scrolling back through your technecast podcast feed to September 2022. ---This episode was produced and presented by Felix ClutsonTechnecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTPThe music is composed and generously given by Jennifer DovetonIf you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via X @technecast

In this latest episode of our Work and Labour series we hear from Julia Pond, a transdisciplinary dance artist, teacher and researcher working with political economy. She works with choreography, improvised movement and text, humour, and, sometimes, bread dough, often siting work in public space. Currently, this takes shape in her performance project and fictional company BRED. Julia is a co-initiator of the podcast DanceOutsideDance, and is supported by TECHNE funding for her practice-based PhD research. Her work has most recently been published in Documenta Journal. ------------Image: Gani Naylor Music: Jennifer Doveton------------References:Fridman, Leora. (2022) Static Place. Santa Barbara: Punctum Books.Hersey, Tricia. (2022) Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto. New York: Little, Brown Spark.Kallis, G. and Vansintjian, A.(Ed). (2017) In Defense of Degrowth: Opinions and Minifestos. Online: Open Commons.Kunst, Bojana. (2015) Artist at Work, Proximity of Art and Capitalism. London: Zero Books.Paramana, K., Gonzalez, A. (Eds.) (2021) Performance, Dance and Political Economy. London: Bloomsbury Academic.Pitts, F. H., Jean, E., & Clarke, Y. (2020). Sonifying the quantified self: Rhythmanalysis and performance research in and against the reduction of life-time to labour-time. Capital & Class, 44(2), 219-239.Rojo, Paz. (2018). To Dance in the Age of No Future. Berlin: CIRCADIAN.Soper, K. (2020) Post-Growth Living: For an Alternative Hedonism. London: Verso. Virno, Paolo (2002). Virtuosity and Revolution, The Political Theory of Exodus. Autonomedia, http://dev.autonomedia.org/node/1392.------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humnities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Chiara Muzzi, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected], on Instagram @technepodcast, or on X (formerly Twitter) @technecast.

David McEwen, a co-founder and director of Unit 38, joins Felix to continue their conversation about architecture and community. Unit 38 is an architecture practice working on community projects in east London, in particular Wards Corner in Tottenham. In this part we hear about Unit 38’s involvement with Clapton Community Football Club, as well as public commons work, situated knowledge, and community wealth in Preston.You can find out more about Clapton Community Football Club here: https://www.claptoncfc.co.uk or https://twitter.com/claptoncfcAnd info on Unit 38 is available here: https://www.unit38.org or https://www.instagram.com/stories/unit38_---This episode was produced and presented by Felix ClutsonTechnecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTPThe music is composed and generously given by Jennifer DovetonIf you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via X @technecast

David McEwen, a co-founder and director of Unit 38, joins Felix for a conversation about architecture and community. Unit 38 is an architecture practice working on community projects in east London, in particular Wards Corner in Tottenham. The discussion explores questions of community resources, privilege and design focused on people not materials.There is a small amount of explicit language.---This episode was produced and presented by Felix ClutsonTechnecast is a research and practice podcast supported by Techne DTPThe music is composed and generously given by Jennifer DovetonIf you’d like to get involved or turn your work into a podcast, please get in touch with us - [email protected] or via X @technecast

In this latest instalment of our 'Senses' series we hear from Emma Mitchell. Emma is an AHRC-funded Creative Writing doctoral researcher at Brunel University London whose work uses archival research and experimental literary forms and practices to reclaim the voices of marginalised women from History. Her project focusses on Georgian sex workers and works with contemporary documents, objects and ephemera to generate narratives that place women’s voices front and centre. An ex-school teacher and brand strategist, she has performed worldwide as a comedian, circus and burlesque artist, and is best known for her critically-acclaimed one-woman show, The Naked Stand Up. She’s been featured in The Times, Daily Mail, Scotsman, The Daily Record and even The Sun. She is the producer of Naked Girls Reading, London, and has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Late Night Woman's Hour discussing nudity and her work. Her recent writing has been published by Haunted Girlfriend, Broken Sleep, Steel Incisors and Streetcake Magazine among others.------------Image: Emma Mitchell------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Chiara Muzzi, Eva Dieteren and Pragya Sharma. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

It's the final Technecast of the year! We've had some lovely new members join the Technecast team this year, so we thought we'd take this opportunity to do some introductions. In this casual epsiode, each member of the team answers some questions about themselves and their research. We also discuss our favourite epsiodes from the past year, so it's a bit of Technecast Wrapped, too. We hope you enjoy!Correction: In this epsiode we mistakenly describe Vietnamese-American author Ocean Vuong as Korean. We apologise for this mistake. If you are interested in sharing your research with us in the new year, you can get in contact via email ([email protected]) or on Instagram (@technepodcast).Have a wonderful winter break and we'll see you in the new year!Take care x

In the first episode of our 'Work, Labour and Protest' series, Isabel introduces us to her project which explores media representations and lived experiences of working-class women’s unpaid domestic labour in the UK.Isabel is an interdisciplinary scholar whose research focuses on the intersections of class, gender, and labour under neoliberal capitalism. She is currently in the second year of her PhD at Brunel University London. If you would like to get involved with the study and you meet the recruitment criteria stated in the episode, please email [email protected] and quote credits here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zN5yJKL1kuWE8D9MQ5YgqOg7oPrbnVAB/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107808994539784012619&rtpof=true&sd=true--------------Image credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/100392997@N08/14507586254--------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

In our last episode on the theme 'narratives of nation', our very own Felix Clutson shares his research into football in the age of globalisation. Felix discusses the ways in which football transcends borders (for better or worse), the modern phenomenon of sportswashing, and the plight of his beloved Reading FC. After his presentation he joins Edwin for a conversation based around the question: is football eating itself?Want to turn your research into a podcast? We'd love to hear from you at [email protected].

Beth Williamson is a PhD student at Royal Holloway, University of London working collaboratively with the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG). Her research explores how the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) tackled the problem of ‘orthography’ when recording and mapping place names in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, revealing how geography and linguistics, and politics and diplomacy, shaped the way the world was brought to ‘order’. In this episode of our 'Narratives of Nation' series, Beth explores the circumstances leading up to the appointment of the Orthography Committee at the RGS and the actions the committee took to achieve a uniform system of orthography.--------------Image credit: The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers)---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

Gareth Hughes is in the second year of his PhD in Comparative Literature and Culture at Royal Holloway. His thesis explores spatial transformations in contemporary French and multilingual poetry.In this episode of the ‘Narratives of Nation’ series, Gareth talks about the multilingual poems of Michèle Métail, the power of poetry to loosen the bind between nationality and language, and how entering into poetic spaces can help us to reimagine the world.--------------References:Gratton, Peter and Morin, Marie-Eve (eds.), Jean-Luc Nancy and Plural Thinking : Expositions of World, Ontology, Politics, and Sense (Albany: SUNY Press, 2012).Li, Xiaofan Amy, ‘A Post-Orientalist Turn: Pascal Quignard, Michèle Métail, and China’, The Western Reinvention of Chinese Literature, 1910–2010 (Leiden: Brill, 2022).Les Linguistes atterré(e)s, Le Français va très bien, merci (Paris : Gallimard, 2023).Métail, Michèle, Le Cours du Danube en 2888 kilomètres/vers… l’infini (Dijon : Les presses du réel, 2018). Les Horizons du sol : panorama (Marseille : CipM / Spectres familiers, 1999). Le Vol des oies sauvages (Saint-Benoit-du-Sault : Tarabuste, 2011). Nancy, Jean-Luc, The Creation of the World or Globalization, trans. François Raffoul and David Pettigrew (Albany: SUNY Press, 2007).Parish, Nina & Wagstaff, Emma, ‘Michèle Métail : traduire la contrainte’, Michèle Métail : la poésie en trois dimensions, ed. Anne-Christine Royère (Dijon : Les Presses du réel, 2019). --------------Image: “The Map of the Armillary Sphere” by Su Hui, from Michèle Métail’s Le vol des oies sauvages : poèmes chinois à lecture retournée (Tarabuste Éditions, 2011). Credit: Hopscotch Translation, accessed via https://hopscotchtranslation.com/2021/10/18/janet-lee-marcella-durand/ [24 August 2023]---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

In the latest instalment of our ‘Narratives of Nation’ series, Rosie Knowles, a PhD researcher at Royal Holloway, tells Isabel about her research into the health geography concept of therapeutic landscapes. In this episode, Rosie shares how her family connections with the steelworks town of Port Talbot inspired her to locate her research here, where she explores therapeutic interactions and connections between this coastal, industrial landscape and its inhabitants.A multitextured landscape in itself, Rosie’s project features creative practices from storytelling to print-making, as well as ethnographic research methods such as walking interviews with members of a local men’s mental health charity. Through this work, she examines how ‘moments of stillness and calm’ can be sought and found in the ‘grey’ industrial settings that sit outside the conventional ‘green’ and ‘blue’ spaces we commonly associate with health and wellness.--------------Image: Rosie Knowles---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Isabel Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We’d be happy to hear from you at [email protected]

In the first episode of our new theme, 'Narratives of Nation', Lili Toitot, PhD researcher at Brunel, tells Edwin about her work on the mixed national identity of the French region of Alsace. An Alsatian herself, Lili examines the documentation of the region's history through the lens of gender and war memorials. The question that emerges from this episode is: what can we learn from Alsace about nationhood and national identity?Image credit: Lili Toitot. War memorial, Strasbourg, Alsace.---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

We interrupt our scheduled programming to bring you this special episode in light of recent events. Techne's summer congress this year was cancelled due to the on-going industrial action taking place at the University of Brighton. In this episode, the Technecast team explore why industrial action is taking place at Brighton, and the position of the arts and humanities more broadly in UK higher education. A huge thank you to Luke Beesley, a Brighton PGR who gave us a really informative interview for this episode.https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/brightonucusolidarityIf you would like to share your research with the Technecast community, or have any comments about today's episode, please get in contact at [email protected], or follow us on twitter at @technecast or on Instagram @technepodcast

Finishing up our theme of life writing, Olivia chats to Al Meggs about his work on reclaiming cabaret.Al trained in dance and went on to a long career through the 1980s and 1990s as performer in cabaret, theatre, T.V. and film, before taking on various guises ‘behind the scenes’. Roles that ranged from stage crew to stage manager to production manager and dresser to wardrobe assistant to costume supervisor.Now, a second year creative writing doctoral student at the University of Brighton. Al's creative practice thesis, 'Reclaiming cabaret. A queer haunted autoethnography of real, researched and imagined stories of cabaret past and present' is in two parts. The creative element 'Blond Angel' is an autoethnographic novel recalling the life of a young male dancer in a small touring cabaret dance company in Italy in the 1980s, acknowledging an undocumented period in dance history. It also stories people and places from the origins of the modern cabaret in fin-de-siècle Paris, bringing the past and present together in a magically real space, where real, researched and imagined lives meet, haunt and interact within Al's lived experience. The critical element focuses on evolving unconventional approaches to autoethnographic and academic writing that resists the traditional patriarchal discourse of academic narratives. The podcast gives a glimpse into Al's life in Italy and the commercial dance world of the 1980s, and how he found himself, later in life, transforming from dancer to writer. It also touches on how Al uses storytelling to create critical, reflective academic work as a method tochallenge the heteronormative patriarchal discourse of traditional academic narratives.You can learn more about Al's research here: https://research.brighton.ac.uk/en/persons/al-meggs. ---------------Image credit: Mike Hornsby for the 'present day' photo & Al Meggs for the 'past' photo, from 1985.---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

Returning to our theme of life writing, Olivia chats to Gemma Turner about her research on early modern carers. Gemma discusses how the early modern gentlewoman Elizabeth Isham reconceptualised her difficult spiritual relationship with caring after writing her autobiographical Booke of Remembrance.Gemma works for the University of Southampton within Student Disability and Inclusion. She recently completed her MRes project entitled 'The Carer's View: A New Perspective on Chronic Illness and Disability within the Early Modern Family' at the University of York. The project examined the experiences of two women, Elizabeth Isham and Mary Rich. Her research has mainly focused upon the surprisingly uncomfortable way caring responsibilities interacted with both women's Christian faiths. ---------------Image credit: Leaf 1r of Elizabeth Isham’s Booke of Remembrance, digitised through PrincetonUniversity Library: http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/gx41mm48v ---------------Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Edwin Gilson, Felix Clutson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

Continuing our theme of senses, researcher and sound artist Samuel Hertz shares his work on the sound(s) of climate and environmental change. More specifically, Samuel examines the ways in which acoustic sound-capturing methods alter human perspectives on space and time. After his presentation, Samuel joins Edwin for a discussion about all things sound, exhibiting his work in the International Space Station and the Pacific Ocean, and his recent performance art piece in Dortmund, Germany, which features a doom metal rendition.You can learn more about Samuel's research and practice here: https://www.samhertzsound.com/***************************Episode transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZdSvyDRU3v58riC9obWsbrflyojZr3qI/view?usp=sharing ***************************Technecast is a podcast series showcasing research from across the arts and humanities. It is produced by Felix Clutson, Izzi Sykes, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons and Edwin Gilson. Fancy turning your research into a podcast episode? We'd be happy to hear from you at [email protected].

In our latest installment of our 'Senses' series, Isabel chats to Viveca Mellegård about her fascinating research into the practice of indigo dyeing in West Bengal.Viveca is a researcher and filmmaker and started her career making science and arts programmes at the BBC. She integrates film and photography as research methods with a particular interest in making the embodied aspects of craftsmanship visible.She’s doing a collaborative PhD with Royal Holloway and the Economic Botany Department at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Her research links Kew’s colonial era collections of Indigofera tinctoria from India to contemporary indigo production and dyeing in West Bengal. Her work aims to communicate the value of the knowledge and skills embedded in the craft of dyeing with natural indigo and to show how embodied practices can cultivate human-plant relationships.---Viveca is interesting in collecting feedback on the affective power of listening to the indigo dyeing process. If you would like to share anything about your experience of listening to Viveca's talk, perhaps something you felt in response, or a particular moment that chimed with you, please email us at [email protected]: Viveca Mellegård---Episode transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/144GbprFj00aOLIaF2JdFgnvmCC6p0iKZ/view?usp=sharing ---Technecast is supported by techne DTPTechnecast team: Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Isabel Sykes

In this episode, Morag chats to Rachel Holmes about her research to kick off our theme on senses. Rachel Holmes is a practicing artist and writer currently completing her doctorate project The Language of Birds at Kingston School of Art, supervised by Professor Scott Wilson. Influenced by the work of Georges Bataille, Silvia Federici, Eduardo Kohn and Dale Pendell, The Language of Birds is interested in developing a theory of luck or chance, through which the intelligence of the Other (as nature) expresses itself; historically through ritual practice. In this podcast she sets the context for her research by describing the worldview of "living myth" which was demonized during the medieval witch hunt, laying the foundations for transatlantic slavery, modern capitalism and our contemporary state of disenchantment.www.racheladelineholmes.comIG: @jaguar_birdCover art: "Hazel Grove", textile work by Rachel Holmes referring to a vision-fast undertaken in Donegal, Ireland. --- Episode transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Jn5T_EdDVZWeBmNc-32GdBcU2TBmI0od/view?usp=sharing ---If you would be interested to share your research with us, please do get in touch at [email protected]

Welcome to our first episode in our new series on Life Writing. In this epsiode, Morag chats to Karen about her fascinating research.Karen’s doctoral research explores the lives of former Irish nuns, one of whom is her mother. Her work is located at the interface between a number of disciplines (history, sociology, narrative psychology and Irish Studies) and draws on narrative and life history methodologies to consider these life stories in context. These former nuns entered a religious congregation in 1950s Ireland and Karen’s study considers how they came to re-imagine an alternative self and how they navigated the transgressive process of leaving convent life decades later to re-enter the secular world they had renounced as teenagers. Her research is concerned with representations of the past and how ethical memory can challenge the imposing ideologies of the present. Karen is a principal lecturer in Education at the University of Brighton, UK. Her other research interests include the role of reflective practice in professional becoming and how biographical and arts-based methodologies can lead to transformative learning in Higher Education.---Episode transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/14pKXF9Z4RtabjtAX_nHsvBepLXEfdbfF/view?usp=share_link--- If you would like to share your research on this podcast, get in touch at [email protected]

During her artist-residency at the Archive of the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, Anushka Tay composed a series of music inspired by 19th century plant collection in China. She created four multi-layered, textured pieces which range from an instrumental piano solo evoking Orientalism, to a spoken-word poem collaged with field recordings that she took around Kew Gardens during the summer.In this episode of Technecast, Anushka discusses the way that she navigated her instinctive visceral responses to a colonial-era historical archive, as an artist with East Asian heritage. She became sharply aware of the voices of people who had contributed the knowledge preserved in the archive, but who were rarely named or credited in the sources. By moving from text to sound, her responses to the archival materials convey the emotional experience of reading the documents. Through the act of listening, experience the joy and wonder of collecting gorgeous plants, in foreign and unfamiliar lands.You can listen to the full versions of Anushka's pieces on her Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/anushkatay/sets/curious-miscellaneousBrowse the companion website for Anushka's exhibition at the Archive: https://curiousmisc.anushkatay.co.uk/Find out more about the Miscellaneous Reports Collection at the Archive at RBG Kew: https://www.kew.org/science/our-science/projects/miscellaneous-reportsInformation on visiting the Archive at RBG Kew: https://www.kew.org/science/engage/accessing-our-science/accessing-library-art-archives---www.anushkatay.co.ukAnushka Tay is an artist and researcher working across text, textiles and music. Whatever the medium, her work explores a preoccupation with the experiences, textures and shapes of the moving body. She is a Techne PhD Candidate at London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London, where she researches Chinese diaspora dress histories through a close study of clothing and jewellery. When she isn’t making things, Anushka enjoys growing flowers in her small garden. She is not a botanist. ---Episode transcript: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i6L5uCafgjl01-cjFuTzLBljnYiRVcsp/view?usp=share_link ---The Technecast is supported by techne DTPEpisode presented/produced by Felix ClutsonTechnecast team: Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson, Morag Thomas, Olivia Aarons, Isabel SykesMusic composed and generously provided by Jennifer Doveton

Continuing our theme of archives, Rudy Loewe (researcher and artist at University of the Arts London) shares their research on the Black Power movement in the English-speaking Caribbean, and the ways in which the British government suppressed it. Rudy also discusses their experience digging into recently declassified Foreign and Commonwealth Office records at the National Archives, and translating these records into art. Rudy is displaying their art at several upcoming exhibitions:Unattributable Briefs: Act Onehttps://www.staffordshirest.com/rudyloewe New Contemporarieshttps://www.newcontemporaries.org.uk/Precarioushttps://www.artexchange.org.uk/exhibition/precarious/#:~:text=This%20exhibition%20creates%20a%20platform,how%20to%20pay%20the%20rent.Unattributable Briefs: Act Twohttps://www.orleanshousegallery.org/news/2022/07/announcing-emerging-artists-programme-22-23-rudy-loewe/Liverpool Biennial https://biennial.com/2023Photo: Rudy Loewe, Trinidad #1-2 (2022). Photography: Ben Deakin.

In this special podcast for the Techne January Congress 2023 - which is based around the craft of writing - the Technecast team share some advice and experiences on writing for a podcast. In addition to input from Felix, Morag, Julien, Olivia and Edwin, we also hear from former contributor Mary Dawson, who gives her tips on scripting and recording an episode of Technecast. Towards the end of the episode the team also discuss music, and specifically the types of music that enhance academic writing. Listened to this, and interested in making your own Technecast episode? Get in touch, we'd love to hear from you: [email protected] hope you all enjoy the Congress.

This is the second episode in our series on Archives. Artist-researcher Eimhin Daly discuss the entangled sites of their research to consider what constitutes an archival relation. Seeing place itself as an archive, they are concerned with practices of relation, specifically with unlearning relations to place and pasts that are produced by imperialism and nationalism in Ireland. ----Bio: Eimhin Daly is an artist-researcher working with performance and writing. They are currently undertaking a PhD in the School of Arts at the University of Roehampton.Their research project emerged from an engagement with site-specific feminist artworks. In following artists Alanna O’Kelly and Anne Tallentire to Connemara on the west coast of Ireland—the artists’ sites of inspiration three decades ago—Eimhin pays attention to intergenerational affinity and difference in considering (hi)stories of displacement in the region. Listening beyond dominant, amplified narratives, they complicate the notion of Irish loss and longing, and make explicit national perpetration and participation in ongoing settler-colonialism.---Technecast:This episode is presented by Julien Clin.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and produced and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson, Morag Thomas and Olivia Aarons.Contact: [email protected] / @technecastMusic composed, performed and generously provided by Jennifer Doveton

The contributor for this episode is Holly Antrum.This episode was recorded during the exhibition ‘Laura Mulvey and Peter Wollen: Intersections in Theory, Film and Art’, at Camera Austria in Graz (11 June - 14 August 2022). Final-year techne researcher Holly Antrum staged her paper-based artist multiple from within the show, Markéta’s Notes, as a podcast for technecast. Holly Antrum’s project involves filmmaking as an expanded practice. Markéta Hašková is a matrilineal counterpart developed by Holly Antrum to explore the navigation of archives through foregrounding interpersonal collection searches with subjectivity and tactility. She has used the medium of audio recordings that she makes and collects in her research, to underscore this episode, and shares and reflects upon Markéta’s Notes as a recently published aspect of her research. All recording in this episode has been produced in the locality of the project by the researcher at study desks including in the BFI archive viewing desk set within the BFI Southbank Reuben Library.The podcast introduces how she has engaged with conceptualizing a project centring on layers of real and fictional presences in the archive: originating through attending the archive at the BFI, and developing narration for feminist ‘fictioning’ and stepping back into the personal voice of the feminist artist-researcher. Markéta’s Notes was commissioned by the exhibition curators Nicolas Helm-Grovas and Oliver Fuke and by Camera Austria. To receive an update about when the free pamphlets A Taste of Honey and Oedipus Rex from Markéta’s Notes - and when the full edition is available to buy in the UK - sign up to Holly’s artist mailing list. https://tinyletter.com/holly___antrumImages of Markéta’s Notes and their presentation within the exhibition as well as a written version close to this podcast text can be viewed on Goldsmiths’ Animating Archives blog https://sites.gold.ac.uk/animatingarchives/holly-antrum-marketas-notes/---Bio:Holly Antrum (she/her), is an artist, filmmaker and researcher born in London and based in London and South West England. She works with lens-based media including 16mm film, as well as sound, print and writing, and her works approach public and closed live settings. A consistent theme is an attempt to capture tactile histories, while shifting how a document – written, sonic, or visual – might speak through its context and thereby reveal how certain spaces and landscapes are inhabited with meaning and influence.Her work has been shown widely in the UK and internationally, in galleries, DIY spaces, cinemas, online and in print, and is held within public and private collections. Her artist films are distributed by LUX Artists’ Moving Image and she is currently completing a techne AHRC-funded practice-based PhD with Special Collections at the British Film Institute, in partnership with Kingston School of Art. www.hollyantrum.com---Technecast:This episode is presented by Felix Clutson.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and produced and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson, Morag Thomas, and Olivia AaronsContact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienMusic composed, performed and generously provided by Jennifer Doveton

This special episode of Technecast was made for the Techne-funded 'Cultivate' conference, hosted at Kew Gardens, London, on November 10. The episode, 'There Are More Spaces Still to Come', is a 'Cultivate' special feature produced by Techne student Judah Attille, one of the conference organisers. In conversation with Judah, multidisciplinary artist Shenece Oretha speaks about sonic interventions and knowledge production in her installation, In Counter Harmony, staged in the Tin Tabernacle Kilburn and created for Brent Biennial 2022, In the House of my Love.Cultivate aims to reflect on the many areas we strive to cultivate – as Techne researchers, as practitioners, as communicators, as individuals, and as part of wider communities. Cultivate is a student-led event seeking to provide opportunities to put these forms of cultivation into action. The breadth of topics includes land use and misuse; plants and interactions with nature; cultivating skills, networks, and research; and creating space for the practical and caring aspects of cultivation. The conference is structured around panel discussions on the themes of cultivating knowledge, networks, and wellness. This event aims to provide a momentary space to not only reflect on the ‘effort’ and ‘work’ aspects of cultivation, but also on those aspects that nourish and help.Shenece Oretha (she/her, they/them) is a London based multidisciplinary artist sounding out the voice and sound’s mobilising potential. Through installation, performance, print, sculpture, sound, workshops, and text she amplifies and celebrates listening and sound as an embodied and collective practice. Recent works include: In Counter Harmony, Brent Biennial, 2022Ah So It Go, Ah No So It Go, Go So! Curated by Languid Hands for Cubitt Gallery, 2022Notes on Play, a response to the British Library Sound Archive, 2021Hyper Functional, Ultra Healthy | Shenece Oretha: Listening Wholes, Somerset House Studios, 2021Judah Attille (she/her, they/them) is an independent filmmaker and Techne PhD candidate based at UAL Chelsea. Her interest in the sonic register of research output has benefited from a series of Techne audio editing and podcast workshops that consider sonic technology and sonic aesthetics, hosted by Techne alumna and Technecast founder Jo Hutton. In her collaborative practice experience with other Techne students, Technecast has offered Attille a unique platform for building and sharing knowledge bases between institutions within and beyond the Techne research community.In Counter Harmony excerpts courtesy of artist Shenece Oretha and Metroland Cultures Brent Biennial 2022.Special Thanks to Shenece Oretha for her contributions to post-production on There are more spaces still to comePhoto Credit: Detail from In Counter Harmony, Tin Tabernacle, September 2022, by Judah AttilleA transcript of 'There Are More Spaces Still to Come' can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nkty5iuZTCn4XHA24rW25WeMJ8LNZYke/view?usp=share_linkA transcript of Shenece Oretha's 'In Counter Harmony' can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uU2X05AwbF8VdzF4EEyjyHWMV7-ARQhr/view?usp=share_link

In our final instalment of our theme looking at genre, Sarah Richardson joins us on the Technecast to talk about inclusive satire. By examining reactive characterisations of the archetypal fantasy ‘monster’ in satirical fiction, this project aims to make the argument that these textual strategies demonstrate a broader trend of empathetic storytelling in satire, presenting a genre more optimistic of both the human and inhuman. More specifically, the main focus of this research is on characterisation strategies which generate an ‘inclusive humour’ as opposed to presenting objects of ridicule and mockery. To keep reader engagement at the centre of discussion, the term ‘monster’ is defined in terms of its impact: the project refers to Jeffrey Cohen’s definition of the creature that is ‘the abjected fragment that enables the formation of all kinds of identities,’ a revealing entity both in how it relates to itself and to society. Since this research is practice-based, ‘Laughing with the Bogeyman’ uses Terry Pratchett’s work and my own original writing as baselines to frame the discussion theoretically, hopefully leading to further exploration into the reader response element towards textual strategies of inclusive humour. *Sarah Richardson is a PhD researcher in the English and Creative Writing Departments at Royal Holloway, University of London. She has been interested in satire, humorous narratives, and anything that elevates parody to high art ever since Terry Pratchett’s Discworld taught her that serious is not the opposite of funny. Her studies have permitted her to write a satirical novel all about this stuff (lucky thing) and hopefully by the end she’ll also walk away with a degree.Twitter: SarE_Richardson*Info about Cultivate: https://cultivatetechne.wordpress.com/about/*This episode is presented by Polly Hember. The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin, Felix Clutson and Edwin Gilson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienMore info & Call for Papers: https://technecast.wixsite.com/listen Royalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.comImage generously supplied by Helen Richardson.

In the second episode of our focus on climate fiction and speculative fiction (part of our 'genre' theme), University of Surrey researchers Frances Hallam and Edwin Gilson participate in a roundtable discussion led by Technecast's Felix Clutson.Frances Hallam (they/them) is an AHRC-funded PhD researcher at the University of Surrey. Their doctoral thesis, entitled ‘Aquafuturism’, explores ocean and sea creature imaginaries in 21st century speculative fiction that figure decolonial and eco-queer storytelling in the Atlantic.Edwin Gilson is a third-year PhD student at the University of Surrey, and his research relates to the Anthropocene through the lens of contemporary Californian climate fiction, with a particular focus on the tension between the local and the planetary.Technecast:This episode is presented by Felix Clutson.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin, Felix Clutson and Edwin Gilson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.comImage generously supplied by Alex Berger.

A two-parter this week. In the first part, Edwin Gilson introduces the literary label of climate fiction and investigates its usefulness, as well as the blurring of realism and science fiction, through the prism of a number of literary works set in California. Following on, Frances Hallam asks "What is cli-fi without sci-fi?". Their presentation gives us a glimpse at the interconnected histories and contemporary contentions across the scope of climate fiction and science fiction, and asks if we can meaningfully separate the two."Edwin Gilson is a third-year PhD student at the University of Surrey, and his research relates to the Anthropocene through the lens of contemporary Californian climate fiction, with particular focus on the tension between the local and the planetary.Frances Hallam (they/them) is an AHRC-funded PhD researcher at the University of Surrey. Their doctoral thesis, entitled ‘Aquafuturism’, explores ocean and sea creature imaginaries in 21st century speculative fiction that figure decolonial and eco-queer storytelling in the Atlantic.-Technecast:This episode is presented by Felix Clutson.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

Jennifer Doveton is a postgraduate researcher in her second year at Brunel University. Her research is on middle-class subjectivity and moral value in British screen fantasy. At the moment she's looking at the Harry Potter film series and the His Dark Materials television series for markers of class in characterisation and narratives of upward mobility that reproduce neoliberal ideologies of individual aspiration. In this podcast Doveton takes a look at the role of the home in these portal fictions and how these spaces and places contribute to the interiority, class, individualism and ultimately the moral standing of their main characters. You can follow Jennifer on twitter here: @JDHDoveton and find her video essays on youtube under JDH Doveton: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqZMVlLA0y9FHBe4unzTbHwTechnecast:This episode is presented by Felix Clutson.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

This is the second episode celebrating Beyond Human Symposium, which was organised by Rachel Holmes, Rachel Hopkin, Liz K. Miller, Jon Mason and Simon Aeppli. Beyond Human was a techne-funded symposium held at Royal Holloway, University of London on the 26th and 27th May 2022, with keynote speakers the writer and researcher, Gyrus, and the filmmaker and lecturer, Roz Mortimer.This episode features a conversation between Liz and Jon about the themes that the symposium engaged in, around landscape, the paranormal, and connecting with non-human or beyond human forms.More information about Beyond Human:www.facebook.com/BeyondHuman.Symposiumlizkmiller.wixsite.com/beyond-human*Liz K. Miller (b. 1983, Hexham) is an artist and researcher whose audio-visual practice spans diagramming, field recording, print and pigment making. She graduated from Edinburgh College of Art (BA), Camberwell College of Art (MA), and was a print fellow at the Royal Academy Schools (2013 to 2016). In 2018 she was awarded an AHRC Techné scholarship to undertake a practice-based PhD at the Royal College of Art. Her research considers how listening to the sounds made by trees can reconnect humans to the forest, and how the combination of audio and visual can be used to enhance that connection.Instagram: @liz_k_millerwww.lizkmiller.comwww.rca.ac.uk/students/liz-k-miller/Jon Mason is a professional storyteller with a longstanding focus on the folklore and history of place, and the role of myth in humanity’s understanding of life. He has a BA Hons in History with Archaeology from the University of Wales, Bangor, and an MA in Contemporary History from the University of Sussex. He is currently undertaking a Techne-funded PhD at the University of Brighton entitled “Re-storying the city: applying urban perspectives to eco-storytelling.”Twitter: @jonmaseFacebook: "Jon Mason Stories and Music"jonthestoryteller.com/research.brighton.ac.uk/en/persons/jon-mason*Image credit: Rachel HolmesThe Technecast: technecast.wixsite.com/listen/cfp / contact: [email protected] / twitter: technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson & Polly Hember.Episode introduced and edited by Polly Hember / twitter: pollyhemberRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

This month we’re excited to celebrate the Beyond Human symposium, organised by Rachel Holmes, Rachel Hopkin, Liz K. Miller, Jon Mason and Simon Aeppli. Beyond Human was a techne-funded symposium held at Royal Holloway, University of London on the 26th and 27th May 2022.Leading us through the process of creating, organising and facilitating this symposium, Rachel Holmes and Rachel Hopkin reflect on how this project came together and offer their practical tips for organising events within academia. More information about Beyond Human: https://www.facebook.com/BeyondHuman.Symposiumhttps://lizkmiller.wixsite.com/beyond-human*Rachel Holmes is a Chinese/Irish artist, writer, and doctoral candidate, with research interests in “anthropology beyond the human”, ecstatic experience and anti-capitalist theory. She is influenced by forms of rejected knowledge including the occult as a feminist practice, dream theory, and animism. Her interests are informed by her academic background in philosophy, and practices with visual arts, performance and creative writing. Website here: https://linktr.ee/raholmesRachel Hopkin is a full-time TECHNĒ funded PhD in Screenwriting in the Media Arts Department at Royal Holloway. Her project explores screened representations of love between humans and robots within the context of the socio-ethical impact of Human Robot Interaction. Twitter: @rakishi*Image credit: Rachel HolmesThe Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen/cfp / contact: [email protected] / twitter: @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson & Polly Hember.Episode introduced and edited by Polly Hember / twitter: @pollyhemberRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

Welcome back to the technecast! Today’s episode features a conversation between Beth Palmer, Robert Shaughnessy and Alicia Barnes reflecting on a series of seminars and workshops called ‘Imaginative Confrontations with Shakespeare: Truth, Reconciliation, Justice’. The series tackles questions such as how do we forgive the unforgivable, and who gets to say whether we should or not? They take one of Shakespeare’s “problem plays”, ‘Measure for Measure’ to think through these issues and how they intersect with our contemporary moment, exploring the literary and cultural canon in order to address the injustices that it has excused or obscured. In addition to Beth, Rob and Alicia’s fascinating conversation, you’ll hear scenes read from ‘Measure for Measure’ and a scene written in a workshop led by Chinoyerem Odimba. *Beth Palmer is Senior Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Surrey  and Director of Postgraduate Studies for the School of Literature and Languages. She has published widely on Victorian literature and culture and on the ways in which contemporary culture mediates the nineteenth century.Robert Shaughnessy is Professor of Theatre at the University of Surrey and Director of Research of Guildford School of Acting. He has published on Shakespeare and early modern drama on stage and screen, and his current work focuses on the intersections between Shakespeare, applied and socially engaged performance, and cultural diversity.Alicia Barnes is a PhD Candidate in English Literature, funded by the Doctoral College Studentship Award. Her current research focuses on nineteenth-century British Railway Literature and its intersections with Empire and national identity. During her MA in Nineteenth Century Studies at the University of Sheffield, Alicia was awarded the Horace Walpole prize for her research on the Gothic. She has presented at multiple conferences, including the International Student Byron Conference in Messolonghi, Greece, covering a range of topics that span the long nineteenth century. Alicia is also an organising member of SAHRG. Twitter: @aliciarbarnesMore info about Chinoyerem Odimba’s work: http://theagency.co.uk/the-clients/chino-odimba/ / Twitter: @Chino100percentMany thanks to the voice actors who took part in the recording for this episode: Mariana: Svea Brain Jangen / Insta: @sveabrainjangen / Twitter: @sveabrainjangen Isabella: Emily Prosser-Davies / Twitter: @emprosserdaviesJuliet: Rebecca Helen / Twitter: @rebeccahelenj / Insta: @rebeccahelenjDuke: Dr Darren Tunstall / Head of Theatre Studies at University of Surrey Barnardine: Aaron Hodgetts / Insta: @aaronhodgettsacting / Spotlight: https://www.spotlight.com/2254-6724-4453*The Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen/cfp / contact: [email protected] / twitter: @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Julien Clin, Felix Clutson, Edwin Gilson & Polly Hember.Episode coordinated by Polly Hember / twitter: @pollyhemberRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

This second of two episodes produced by Outside/rs 2022, themed around Vision, Perception and Outside/rs looks gets stuck in the watery fenlands of the East Midlands, travels through time and speculates on queer futures.Can art, and particular use of media, be a speculative mode of engaging with utopian models of queer reproduction and community? In supernatural literature and folklore there are clear themes of coded queer relationships, identity and the manifestation of spectral beings. In Lincolnshire Fenland folklore, the Tiddy Mun, for example reclaim(ed) the land and waterways for displaced people, and can be interpreted as queer. James Chantry shares their creative practice, which involves video, sound, performance, drawing, animation and sculpture, each a mode of queer reproduction. Through this work they challenge gender expectations and inner colonialism, as well as propose theories of queer reproductive and social futurity.*Contributors: James Chantry (he/they) is an artist and PhD researcher at De Montfort University, Leicester, in Fine Art by practice. Their research explores the links between the supernatural and queer identity, in specific liminal geographic locations, such as the fens, marsh and edgelands. www.jameschantry.co.uk *Outside/rs 2022: https://outsiders2022.wordpress.com/[email protected]@outsiders2022*The Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen - [email protected] - @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP.Episode presented and edited by Joe Jukes. @jsdjukes Cover Image: Still, taken from Darklins, James Chantry, 2021.Royalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

In the first of two guest episodes, curated by the Outside/rs 2022 conference, we’re exploring the unseen, emotional and sometimes smelly aspects of museum collection work. In recent years, an increasing number of institutions in the heritage sector have begun to recognise their significant role in including queer history and in battling the LGBTQ+ community’s invisibility. Historically, queer perspectives have been excluded from museum collecting and object interpretation. Acquired objects that are not explicitly connected to LGBTQ+ life have generally been read as ‘straight’, disregarding any queer significance they might hold. A single object, however, has the potential to tell a range of different stories. Every time an object is interpreted, an active choice is made about which one to tell. At the Science Museum, historic cataloguing practices have led to difficulties in finding queer stories – but this does not mean that they are not there. Unearthing them is a necessity for the museum’s mission to inspire futures and to engage audiences in STEM.*Contributors: Laura Büllesbach (she/her) and Dr. Rebecca Mellor (she/her) are Assistant Curators for the Science Museum Group’s One Collection project. Follow their work on Twitter @laurabullesbach and @rjimellor.Science Museum Group Collections Online: https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/*Outside/rs 2022: https://outsiders2022.wordpress.com/[email protected]@outsiders2022*The Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen - [email protected] - @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP.Episode presented and edited by Joe Jukes. @jsdjukes Cover Image: Object no. 1997-181/5 "Bag of blue 2 x 4 Lego bricks", The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum.Royalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

Today we hear from Christina Heflin for the final episode on surrealism.Eileen Agar’s wearable sculpture, The Ceremonial Hat for Eating Bouillabaisse , has a peculiar story that has never been acknowledged by scholars. In each of its images – from either archives, catalogs, publications or film footage – the hat appears to be a different object. Did Agar make an entire series of these hats like the myriad series of objects she created over the years? It would appear so, but since neither the artists nor prior scholarship address this issue, it is hard to determine the truth. This paper aims to establish The Hat ’s narrative and to explain that the hat was a singular, evolving work of art rather than a series. This is not only for the sake of knowing the scope of Agar’s oeuvre , but also to understand the way this important British Surrealist artist worked. The images of The Hat have a range of dates spanning from the late 1930s to 1995, when it arrived in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s permanent collection following Agar’s death. The hat’s life, very much like that of the artist’s, changed and developed over time. I argue that even though this colorful inverted cork basket adorned with both natural and manmade décor features different elements in each photograph, it remains the same work of art. It thereby retains what is essential, what Benjamin calls its aura . Its identity and authority remain indelible despite these changes.Contributor bio:Christina Heflin recently completed her PhD at Royal Holloway University of London where she worked on Surrealism, materialism and marine life. Her thesis is titled Submerged Surrealism: Science in the Service of Subversion . She is currently a lecturer at Parsons Paris and is the author of the book chapter on “Surrealism in England” for the forthcoming Routledge Companion to Surrealism as well as the article “Jean Painlevé’s Surrealism, Marine Life & Non-Ocular Modes of Sensing” for the Cross-Cultural Studies Review (2020) and “Eileen Agar’s Science” for The Modernist Review (2019). You can find her on Twitter - @christy_heflin.Technecast: This episode is presented by Felix Clutson.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

We start a new theme this episode with Shakespeare, presented by Dr Kate O'Leary. Surrealism and Shakespeare are rarely connected in contemporary discourse, despite André Breton’ s admiring references to the Bard and interest in his plays shown by Leonora Carrington and others. This is a pity, as they are more closely linked than is often suspected. Whether he likes it or not, Shakespeare is the god-father of Romanticism and Gothic, both of which were acknowledged by the Surrealists as ancestral to their own movement. Both Shakespeare and Surrealism lend themselves readily (and in the case of Surrealism, knowingly) to rich and fruitful dialogue with Freudian psychoanalytic theory. Moreover, across the world, people labouring under oppression or colonial rule, whether in Eastern Europe under Communism, or in the Third World under imperial governance, have drawn on Shakespeare and Surrealism as the most effective weapons in cultural resistance and liberation from the alienation and thought control oppressive regimes impose. Shakespeare and Surrealism both interrogate power, explore the depths of the human psyche, celebrate love and Eros, and pursue the wondrous and the uncanny, and both deploy Alchemy as a dynamic of transformation to attain the Marvellous. In this podcast I propose to discuss how Shakespeare, in his later plays, the so-called ‘Romances’ (of which The Tempest is the best known), uses Alchemy both as a symbolic language in the plays themselves, and to turn the theatre itself into an alembic to cast an Alchemical spell on the audience, creating for them a vision of the marvellous they can carry with them out of the theatre into the connecting vessel of the world out - side. As the Dadaist Hugo Ball put it, “ Only the theatre is capable of creating the new society ”. Dr Kate O’ Leary has a PhD in Shakespeare and John Donne and currently works at the University of Liverpool. She is a founder member of Surrealerpool Collage of Alchymical, Flâneurial and ‘ Pataphysical Studies (website: www.surrealerpool.online), and is a regular contributor to the Collage’s journal ‘Patastophe!David Rice is a lecturer and writer with a background in psychology. Like Kate, he currently works at the University of Liverpool, is a founder member of Surrealerpool and writes for 'Patastrophe!-----The Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen/cfp - [email protected] - @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Episode presented by Felix ClutsonRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

We're delighted to be starting our March theme of Surrealism off with a talk by Daniela Georgieva on the writer and artist Leonora Carrington.A sophisticated game of table tennis in which Hummingbirds take the role of the ball, preparing a meal with vegetables that throw themselves into a cauldron filled with boiling water, a dinner table rich with wine, fruit, and caterpillars transforming into butterflies, a half-human, half-beast girl flying towards the moon with feathers shining like snow in the sun. These are a few of the fantastical scenes seen in the art and writing of Leonora Carrington. Outlandish and as charming as they are bizarre, Carrington’s characters are presented as myth and satire. The figures on her canvases come to life through comedy and tragedy, their entrance provokes eyebrow-raises and their departure leaves a bitter-sweet taste. Carrington’s art is deeply personal, often intertwining with her own life and experience and no such symbol displays this as Carrington’s animals. From a white stallion to a feral hyena, to animal-human hybrids, to understanding Carrington’s life and art one needs to look no further than the animals dancing across her canvases. Exploring the way they transform throughout the years and the different ways in which they are represented, while still carrying deep personal meaning, Carrington’s animals present the true soul behind the artist, sometimes even more so than her self-portraits. Daniela Georgieva is a PhD student at Royal Holloway University of London with a focus on Surrealism. She has obtained a Master’s Degree in Art History and a Bachelor’s in film. Her studies focus on the art and writing of Leonora Carrington, folklore, the fantastical, and the Occult. She is a painter herself and often applies her knowledge of painting and the arts to her research.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulienRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.comImage: 'Self Portrait' by Leonora Carrington

“Where is home for you?” The question can be laden with hidden meanings and, often, with assumptions about identity. In this episode, writer and doctoral researcher Julien Clin reflects on place as a source of community. Dismantling both identity and the nation as imagined, probing the concepts’ discourse-theoretical limitations, giving up identity in favour of embraced alterity, Julien seeks to move from backward-looking nostalgia to Being in place. From a topological point of view fed by sense-affect, he attempts to reimagine the concept of roots as a rhizomatic engagement that, ultimately, makes and constantly remakes the Home.Julien Clin is working on a creative nonfiction book as a topo-poiesis of Heimat in the gentrifying, global city (specifically London). The accompanying critical research, which he undertakes with Techne-AHRC funding at Kingston University, focuses on ‘writing the home’. His first degree was a Magister Artium in American and Romance Philology from the University of Tübingen (Germany), with a dissertation on “The Art of Montage in John Dos Passos’s Manhattan Transfer.” This explored the implicit political message conveyed by the technique and how it contributes to the representation of the city.After several years in broadcast journalism, during which Julien worked as a producer and foreign correspondent, he obtained a Master’s in Creative Writing from the University of Oxford (Somerville College). He continues to be interested in long-form radio and travel writing, as well as urbanism more widely. He tweets very infrequently @ClinJulien.The Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Contact: [email protected] / @technecast / @pollyhember / @ClinJulien Royalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com

This month on the Technecast, we're exploring identities, and in this episode we're joined by Abbie Cairns. Abbie introduces her research, 'Interrogating Artist Teacher Identity (Trans)Formation in Adult Community Learning (ACL)'. An educational sector often delivered by local authority, for learners aged 19+ (Department for Education, 2019). Central to the work is the belief that ACL has different qualities to other educational sectors and that these qualities impact the identity of the artist-teacher. These qualities include the low status and pay (Briggs, 2007; Augar, 2019) in comparison to Higher Education, lack of access to subject specific continued professional development (Allison, 2013) and communities of practice (Sheridan, 2018) in comparison to secondary education and precarious working hours (A Plan for an Adult Skills and Lifelong Learning Revolution, HC 278, 2021). Abbie explores her mixed methodology rooted in a grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss, 1967), including life story interviewing (McAdams, 2012), autoethnography (Adams et al, 2014) and vignettes about composite character artist-teachers. These methodologies have been chosen due to their links to storytelling and is concerned with theoretical plausibility of the story (Morse et al, 2021) and how they can help us understand the phenomenon. She shares with you the story of Jessica a composite character based on four artist-teachers in ACL and extracts of autoethnographic writing on her own identity (trans)formation.-----Contributor:Abbie Cairns is an artist-teacher working in Adult Community Learning (ACL). She is currently completing her PhD at Norwich University of the Arts. Her research explores the identity (trans)formation of artist-teachers in ACL. Abbie identifies herself as an artist-teacher and is engaged in both art and teaching practices.Abbie is interested in how artist-teachers in ACL came to develop their identity and is engaged in narrative research with participants. Motivated by her own lived experience, she wants to connect with others with the same identity.Abbie is a text-based artist who makes, and exhibits work regularly. She sits on the board for Colchester Art Society and facilitates the Creative Practitioner Support Programme for SPACE, supporting emerging artists.If you want to find out more about Abbie's work, you can follow her here:Twitter: @abbiecairnsartInstagram: @abbiecairnsportfolio----The Technecast:technecast.wixsite.com/listen - [email protected] - @technecastThe Technecast is funded by the Techne AHRC-DTP, and edited by Polly Hember, Julien Clin & Felix Clutson.Episode presented by Felix ClutsonOriginal art by Abbie CairnsRoyalty free music generously shared by Steve Oxen. FesliyanStudios.com