July is fast approaching: Gregynog update

Dear all
July is getting closer and we are into the final phase of preparations for the Ideas Lab. We have a wonderful group of participants--and a few places are still available if you wish to join us. Use the booking tab on the right or if you have any queries email our Graduate Assistant, Yvonne Rinkart, on gregynogideaslab@gmail.com.

We have a new guest professor to announce: Aslı Çalkıvik, from Istanbul Technical University has agreed to take part this year. Her work focuses on questions in international relations and political theory. She will be offering a seminar On Violence, Security, and Outliving ‘Life’, which examines questions to do with the relation between security and violence, and how political fear circulates in and produces the political field. The seminar asks whether we should or can dismantle security and what kinds of political imaginaries are available to think politics beyond a politics of security.   Aslı replaces Sam Opondo, who has family responsibilities that unfortunately prevent him participating this year.

We are also fortunate to be able to announce two exciting plenary sessions on Alternative Learning Spaces; we explore, with the help of visiting artists, creative spaces for learning that move beyond the seminar room or lecture theatre. More details of these will be available later.

Altogether a wonderful programme: the revised details have been posted on the right. We are very much looking forward to seeing you in July! 
Best wishes
Jenny

Exciting group of participants: Do join us!

Dear all
We still have some places available for Gregynog Ideas Lab V which takes place from 11-16 July 2016. Bookings can be made online by following the links on this site (gregynog.blogspot.co.uk) and requests for further information can be directed to Yvonne Rinkart at gregynogideaslab@gmail.com. Full details of our Guest Professors are to be found here too, plus a provisional schedule and seminar details.

We have an exciting group of participants signed up so far, from the US, Canada, the UK, Sweden, Switzerland and much further afield. Their interests range over postcolonialism; critical security studies; gender, feminist and queer theory; psychoanalytic theory; Middle Eastern Politics; political violence, war and politics; collective memory and trauma studies; visual and 'creative' methodologies; narrative methods; poststructuralism; and historiography. Participants are engaged with a wide range of great topics including looking at women as embodied subjects, the history of military psychiatry, the relation between mortality and politics, the everyday politics of women in right-wing movements, temporalities and modalities of recovery, the effect of state discourses of security on marginalised groups, post-terrorist memory and reconstruction, and how history shapes political possibilities.

We are looking forward to many fascinating discussions in seminars and workshops, and some great conversations in the intervals between scheduled activities. The five-day Ideas Lab is a gathering of like-minded people from different countries and institutions. It provides a friendly and relaxed setting and has led to long-standing friendships and fruitful collaborations. I hope you may be able to join us!
Jenny

Two New Guest Professors / Seminar Details Posted

We are delighted to announce further details of Gregynog V, as the deadline for early bird bookings at the reduced rate approaches:

• We have two new Guest Professors joining us this year: Andrew Davison from Vassar College, who works on the hermeneutics of borders, secularism and modernity, and Michael Dillon, whose wide-ranging work on continental philosophy in relation to war, security and politics is well known. 
• Our other Guest Professors include Jenny Edkins, Tom Lundborg, Himadeep Muppidi, Sam Okoth Opondo, Erzsebet Strausz, Rob Walker, Annick Wibben and Andreja Zevnik: see their brief biographical details.

• Draft details of the Guest Professor seminars are now posted on the site; topics covered include postcolonial politics and writing, the neoliberal subject, Deleuze and politics, amateur diplomacy, Derrida and Gadamer, images and aesthetics, psychoanalysis and resistance, researching war, and the art of representation.
• A draft timetable is also posted, showing the schedule for the week, including one-to-one research surgeries with Guest Professors, roundtables, presentations from participants, social events, and (optional!) yoga sessions.

The deadline for the early bird rate is 31 January 2016, so book now to secure your place at this reduced rate! Places are limited to 30 participants to ensure a relaxed, productive and friendly atmosphere. We welcome graduate researchers and early career faculty from all parts of the world, whether you have been before or are new to the Ideas Lab.

Online bookings can be made directly from gregynog.blogspot.com, and more information about how to book is there too. If you have any queries contact our Graduate Administrator, Yvonne Rinkart, on gregynogideaslab@gmail.com.

We look forward to welcoming you to Gregynog in the Summer!!
Jenny