Workshop
PhD Workshop: Scholarship and Politics
- LIAS PhD Workshop Committee
- Date
- Friday 31 May 2024
- Time
- Address
-
Lipsius
Cleveringaplaats 1
2311 BD Leiden
Scholarship and Politics
Scholarship and politics are entangled in significant and intricate ways that affect academic work in many aspects. The aim of our workshop is to pose questions that will help you reflect on the relationship between your academic work and politics in the broadest sense. During plenary sessions, four distinguished speakers – Professor Remco Breuker, Dr. Casper Wits, Dr. Noa Schonmann, and Dr. Annachiara Raia – will share their experiences on these topics. In between, we will work with break-out groups moderated by our invited panelists to zoom in on four distinct themes:
- Politics of access and personal security: With growing (geo)political tensions, research safety and academic security are increasingly under threat. What are some of the risks in researching politically sensitive topics? Do you self-censor? How do you manage visa issues or restrictions on access to data, research participants, or source materials?
- Politics of activism: A growing number of scholars use their scholarship to take activist roles in their public activities and teaching. But can scholarship and activism be reconciled? How do your personal beliefs shape your research? How do we discuss politics in academia, and what happens when such discussions take over on campus?
- Politics of funding and public interest: The flow of funding is, to an extent, determined by demand shaped by political forces. Is our work ethically compromised by catering to these forces, and if so, under what circumstances? Should and can scholars disregard these forces and do research for its own sake, as a purely intellectual pursuit? How should scholars engage with public opinion? What are the pros and cons of media appearances and publishing outside the ivory tower?
- Politics of the archive: Definitions of ‘the archive’ have changed over the past decades. What type of archives have emerged and in what (new) ways do politics impact them? Who builds and manages archives of various kinds? Who can access them? Can archival collections be designed to distort our view of events? If so, how can we work with such challenges?
To facilitate insightful conversations, we ask participants to do a small number of readings as an introduction to the theme of their choice and to prepare a (very short) statement to kickstart the discussions. Information on this will be provided closer at a later date. After the workshop, there will be plenty of drinks and finger food for all participants and speakers to network and reflect on the day.
To register, please click on the button below. The deadline for registering is 10 May 2024.
Organizers
The 2024 LIAS PhD Workshop is organized by Gözde Kircioglu, Hualin Cao, Juul Eijk, Leanne Lai, Mingran Cao, Pouwel van Schooten, Vincent Brussee, and Timothy de Zeeuw.