Joining the Centre for Memory, Narrative and Histories through a Visiting Research Fellowship

The Centre for Memory, Narrative and Histories invites applications, from individual researchers and historical practitioners who are not members of staff at the University of Brighton but would like to undertake collaborative research with us, to become one of our Visiting Research Fellows for a period of up to one year. Former DPhil research students who have recently been awarded their doctorate from the University and seek a continuing affiliation as postdoctoral researchers are also eligible and welcome to apply, as are retired former employees of the University.

Applications must propose specific activities or projects and identify the contribution it is envisaged they will make to CMNH’s existing research areas and activities. Sponsorship by one of our permanently employed staff members is required, and potential applicants are advised to identify a suitable sponsor from our Researcher Membership and secure their support for the application in advance. All applications must be approved by the Dean of the School of Humanities and Social Science. The University charges successful applicants a fee of £200. This secures a University of Brighton IT account, email address and access to the University’s libraries and other facilities.

Applicants must submit, via their sponsor, a completed application form, a completed IT Account Registration Form and a CV.

A call for VRFs will be made in June 2023 – more details will follow nearer the time.

Our current VRFs are:

Dr Hélène Abiraad

heleneabiraad@hotmail.com

My research is an exploration of urban activists’ narratives and experiences of space and place, the past, and urban activism in contemporary Beirut. It explores the physical, temporal and emotional relationships of Beiruti activists to a contested past and to a contested city. I am a long-standing member of CMNH, was awarded my PhD from the University of Brighton in December 2020, and am now Visiting Research Fellow and member of the Brighton Memory Studies Collective working on our monograph, Unsettling Memories of Violence: Complex Temporalities in ‘Post-conflict’ Societies.

Dr Ian Cantoni 

ian.cantoni@gmail.com

I am a historian who draws on interdisciplinary methodologies from the fields of history, memory studies, and anthropology to consider the contemporary resonances of 20th Century conflict in French culture. My doctoral thesis is a site-specific study of the Mémorial du Camp de Rivesaltes, a major site of memory in the French historical landscape. My PhD was awarded by University of Brighton in 2019. I am a CMNH Visiting Research Fellow contributing to the ‘Negotiating Complex Temporalities in “Post-Conflict” Spaces’ research area as a member of the ‘Brighton Memory Studies Collective’.

Dr Ken Clarry

k.clarry2@brighton.ac.uk

Ken Clarry is a practising artist and researcher whose work focuses on aesthetics, theory and the politics of power. His PhD, awarded by the University of Brighton in 2020, was a practice-based investigation of how representations of power and violence evolve in wars and conflicts as spectral phenomena, and how artists and theorists strive to make sense of them. As a Visiting Research Fellow in CMNH his current project ­– “Conflict Pollution” – explores the environmental and ecological effects of armed conflict.

Dr Struan Gray

struancgray@gmail.com

I am a Lecturer in Film at Falmouth University. I am a longstanding PGR member of CMNH and organised its Complex Temporalities Reading Group for several years. My PhD was awarded by the University of Brighton in in 2019 for my thesis, ‘A Haunted Transition: Dealing with Ghosts in Post-dictatorship Chilean Film’. My research continues to focus on Latin American film, film-makers and memory politics. I am a CMNH Visiting Research Fellow and member of the Brighton Memory Studies Collective working on our book, Unsettling Memories of Violence in ‘Post-conflict’ Societies.

Dr Paddy Maguire

P.J.Maguire@brighton.ac.uk

Paddy Maguire is a social and political historian who taught at Brighton University from 1978–2018, becoming Head of Humanities in 1996, and co-founding CMNH in 2008. He was active in the History Workshop movement, Labour History and the Workers Educational Association. He has published on a variety of topics including working class writing, literature and politics, the co-operative movement, social class and Labour politics, and design and the British economy. As a CMNH Visiting Research Fellow, he is researching the changing structure, culture, location and representation of the English working class 1960-2010.

Dr Lucy Kate Newby

lucyorkate@gmail.com

My research concerns the theory and practice of oral history in relation to cultural memory discourses, with a particular focus on youth experience of the Northern Ireland Troubles. As a former doctoral researcher at the University of Brighton, I have been a highly active member of CMNH since 2015. My PhD was awarded in 2020 and I am now a CMNH Visiting Research Fellow and a member of the Brighton Memory Studies Collective, working towards publication of our co-authored monograph Unsettling Memories of Violence: Complex Temporalities in ‘Post-conflict’ Societies.

Dr Cathy Palmer

C.Palmer3@brighton.ac.uk

I am a Visiting Research Fellow, a member of CMNH’s Steering Group, and lead the Heritage in the 21st Century research area. As a social anthropologist I am experienced in ethnographic methods such as observation, interviewing, and photo‐elicitation. My research interests lie in the broad area of culture, space and place, focusing on tourism, heritage sites, memorialisation and embodiment. I am particularly interested in commemorative landscapes of war; in ‘dark tourism’ where memorialisation of conflict and death may become framed as ‘heritage’; and in visitor experience of conflict heritage.

Dr Melina Sadikovic

melina.sadikovic071@gmail.com

A long-standing PGR member of CMNH, I was awarded my PhD from the University of Brighton in 2018 for my thesis: ‘Narrating the War Experience. The Politics of Memory and Commemoration within the Framed Peace Process in Bosnia and Herzegovina’. I am now a CMNH Visiting Research Fellow. My work merges Cultural Studies, Memory Studies, post-conflict studies, and contemporary European History to focus on post-war and post-communist transition in South-eastern and Eastern Europe. I am a member of the Brighton Memory Studies Collective working on our co-authored book.

Dr Kasia Tomasiewicz

kasiaalextee@gmail.com

I am an independent postdoctoral researcher, having been awarded my PhD from the University of Brighton and the Imperial War Museums in 2021 for my thesis entitled: “Memory in the Museum: Representing the Second World War in the Imperial War Museum, London 1960–2020.” I am a longstanding active member of CMNH and now, as Visiting Research Fellow, plan to continue its collaborative relation with IWM through research on the new WW2 Galleries. I am also a member of the Brighton Memory Studies Collective working towards publication of our co-authored monograph.