Writing for the broader public: why we write + how to do it

On Tuesday 16th May, the ‘Surgeons’ were lucky enough to be joined by Emily Brown from the editorial team of The Conversation, Fraser Macdonald from the University of Edinburgh, and our very own Oli Mould and Sasha Engelmann. The session focussed on the question of how to write for the broader public, and lead to lively conversations on why we might want to get published outside of conventional ‘academic’ outlets and how it can be done.

Fraser kicking off the session: “we often leave unexamined the emotional investments of writing”

I begin with a bullet point list of tips – because if you’re reading this

Etched in Bone: Screening of a work in progress by Martin Thomas and Béatrice Bijon, with a response by Luciana Martins

Photography: Huw Rowlands

This special session of Landscape Surgery on 9th May, supported by the Centre for the GeoHumanities, was an extraordinary opportunity to witness and respond to a ‘work-in-progress’ film by Martin Thomas and Béatrice Bijon, from Australian National University. The session was chaired by Felix Driver, Luciana Martins from Birkbeck, University of London responded, and the assembly generated keen discussion, which in its turn rippled out into the London streets and buildings and beyond.

My response will be less descriptive and summative than I am in the habit of offering, both because of the scope and complexity of our shared experience as well as the dynamics of its generation; its ‘coming into being’. I will instead attempt a reflection focused on three themes that struck me most forcefully, and acknowledge my omissions as well as my debt to all of you who created the experience with your responses. The first will be the historic events that the film bears witness to. I will move on to the recent repatriation events that the film witnessed. My aim will then be to consider the witnessing itself; the relationships between the film, audiences and events.

With that said, I would like to start with the customary warning to readers that I will be referring to deceased Indigenous Australians and others.

Culture as an expression of ‘National’ Identity in Cornwall

Paulo Freire sees the relationship between a periphery and the state which sees itself as its ruler as being that between the Oppressor and the Oppressed. For Freire, cultural invasion (ie the ‘ruling state’ imposing its own culture on the periphery) is one of the main tools in achieving dominance. “Invaders penetrate the cultural context of another group, in disrespect of the latter’s potentialities; they impose their own view of the world upon those they invade and inhibit the creativity of the invaded by curbing their expression” (1983: p133).

In recent times, indigenous Cornish culture has became a major rallying point for those living in the territory, something which formed an integral part in the Cornish being granted National Minority Status under the Council for Europe’s Framework Convention. This legislation seeks to protect indigenous languages, culture and encourage the national government to recognise this sense of difference and take it into account when considering policy and funding.

But, for all the positivity that was there with the recognition of National Minority Status, Cornwall’s identity on a cultural and linguistic level has not previously received the recognition that it 

Speculation and Meaning in the 1980s Swedish Arts World: The Making, Display and Dispersal of the Financier Fredrik Roos’ Art Collection: Jenny Sjöholm

Landscape Surgery’s summer term programme started on 2nd May with a round of news about the varied and fascinating things that Surgeons have been up to over the past few weeks. These involved suitcases, corridors, conferences, placements, submissions, and a fellowship. The one I will give a specific mention to is Ben Murphy’s show at the Architectural Association’s School of Architecture until 27^th May, to give you all a chance to see it in the next couple of weeks or so. It sounded like Ben gained some rich experience about dealing with press interviews along the way.

For the main part of afternoon, Jenny Sjöholm, Marie-Sklodowska Curie Fellow with the Department, introduced us to an art collection created by Frederick Roos. This collection was remarkable in many ways as we shall see; but Jenny’s particularly fascinating work has been to trace the collection over its life. This is not an object biography but a collection biography if you will.

Notes on a Conference: RHUL Geographers at the RGS-IBG Postgraduate Midterm Conference 2017

As a first-time conference go-er, I was admittedly pretty nervous when I jumped on the train to Cardiff. Holding my prompt cards in one hand and my phone in the other, I found myself running through Paddington station at 9am with my (two!) backpacks, voice-recording my slightly-out-of-breath self reciting my presentation in preparation for the conference. This was not the picture of serenity I had hoped I would embody, but it did (and still does) make for quite an amusing listening experience.

In hindsight, I wish I’d have been able to relax a little more. Because the first thing to say about the RGS PG Midterm conference, is that it is very friendly; and very supportive. People had said this to me before,