5th Jan 2009 Please note this conference is now fully booked.
Introduction: A recent report from the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council) stated that 55% of the doctoral students whose disciplines it funds move into academia, and the other 45% into key positions in the public and private sectors. Careers advisers report that this latter group appears to be as satisfied by what it does in terms of career as those directly involved in purely academic pursuits, while also (perhaps paradoxically) there is an increased awareness that more might be done to prepare these students for life beyond the Academy.
This conference will aim to address some of these issues through a closer examination of four particular academic disciplines, each representing one or more of the traditional faculties within the modern university. These disciplines will be within history, social science, natural science and the performing arts. We wish to emphasise that the conference is open to all and any doctoral student, irrespective of whether or not they are working within the particular field under review. Each of four sessions will pair a working academic within one of these disciplines in conversation with an individual trained within that discipline to doctoral level but working in a profession beyond the purely academic. The aim will be to compare and contrast professional life within and beyond the academy, as seen through the eyes of that discipline. This is one aspect of the inter-disciplinary nature of the Conference. The other will be created through the conversation of the participants with one another across their respective disciplines.
Forty places at the conference are reserved for doctoral students across all disciplines. Each of these students will be given opportunity to make a short (30 minute) presentation of their work in progress to their peers.
Who should attend? The Conference is aimed at doctoral students and 40 places are reserved for them. The Conference is also for University teachers, HODs, Careers Advisers and Deans of Faculties, as well as repre-sentatives of the Research Councils.
Conference Fee: The fee ranges from £80.00 for students, to £220 (subsidised) for university staff and others associated with the sector. The fee covers all accommodation and excellent food. For a registration form please click on the link below. You may email Janis Reeves: janis@cumberlandlodge.ac.uk if you have any queries.
Travel: Cumberland Lodge is readily accessible from the M3, M4 and M25 motorways. London Heathrow is 20 minutes drive away. The nearest station is Egham (not Windsor), 40 minutes from Waterloo on the Waterloo to Reading line. Participants will be sent detailed travel directions.
Conference Programme
Wednesday 28 Jan
15.30 Arrival, tea
16.45 Welcome by Dr Alastair Niven, Principal, Cumberland Lodge
17.00 First Keynote Address: The Intellectual and the Public Sphere
Tom Docherty, Professor of English and Head of Department, University of Warwick
18.30 Reception followed by dinner at 19.00
20.30 Plenary 1: History
Justin Champion, Professor, History of Early Modern Ideas, Royal Holloway, University of London
Tim Brain, Chief Constable of Gloucestershire (PhD History University of Wales)
Thursday 29 Jan
08.15 Breakfast
09.00 Plenary 2: Sociology
Grace Davie, Professor of Sociology, University of Exeter
Kate Gavron, Chair of Carcanet Press Ltd (PhD Social Anthropology, LSE
10.30 Coffee
11.00 Student Presentations
13.00 Lunch
14.00 Free Time
15.00 Student Presentations (as for 11.00 above)
17.00 Tea
17.30 Plenary 3: Natural Science
Hilary Richards, Sub-Dean, Faculty of Life Sciences, UCL
Mark Lloyd Davies, Government Affairs Manager, sanofi-aventis (PhD Earth Sciences, University of Amsterdam)
19.00 Dinner
21.30 Cash Bar
Friday 30 Jan
08.15 Breakfast
09.00 Plenary 4: Drama
Liz Schafer, Professor of Drama, Royal Holloway, University of London
Oliver Ford Davies, Television and Stage Actor (DPhil, Oxford)
10.30 Coffee
11.00 Second Keynote Address: Reflections Upon Profession and Career
Lesley Chamberlain, Freelance Writer and Broadcaster, Russian history and philosophy.
12.15 Postscript:
Iain Cameron Head of Research Careers and Diversity Unit,
Research Council, UK
13.00 Lunch and Departure
Beyond The Campus Registration Form
