Faculty to lead major interdisciplinary research project on Creative Multilingualism

Researchers from six universities with joint expertise in over 40 languages will collaborate with 16 external partners to investigate the connection between languages and creativity in an ambitious research programme funded by the AHRC. The £4 million Oxford-led programme on Creative Multilingualism forms part of the Open World Research Initiative (OWRI), together with programmes led by Cambridge, King’s College London and Manchester. Over four years, they will seek to place languages at the heart of academic and public life.

EHRC Challenge: The Visibility of Modern Languages

Bids are invited for EHRC small grants (£2,500) that enhance the visibility of research in Modern Languages. This challenge stems from the idea that there is much going on in Modern Languages which would profit from showcasing.

The challenge should be to encourage everybody working in Modern Languages (faculty, librarians, students) to:


think about the visibility of their research in ways which profit their ongoing work
share best practice in documenting outreach, using social media
link up within the university as much as with external partners

The Faculty's Portuguese Year Abroad students have been given a blog space by BBC Brasil, and the first post has been published, with a lively response from Brazilian readers.

Tutors: Dr María del Pilar Blanco, Dr Ben Bollig, Dr María Donapetry, and Dr Claire Williams

Our nomination for a Teaching Excellence Award has been approved by the Humanities Division. This award is made in recognition of the high quality of our teaching and the important contribution which we make to the teaching of Latin American Studies in general and Latin American Film Studies in particular.

Film is an integral part of a number of undergraduate modern languages courses at Oxford and has also been one of the most important emerging areas in Latin American studies in recent years. We have worked together to develop a shared paper on Latin American cinema. The option proposed an innovative format that took into account the mixed level of expertise in film amongst potential students and the different areas of expertise of the teaching team.

The course thus gives students the opportunity to discover and explore major movements in the history of cinema in Latin America, from the radical experiments and manifestos of the 1950s and 60s to the slick blockbusters and internationally successful co-productions of the twenty-first century, including...

European Grant for the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages

Professor Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly, FBA, learned on 3 May 2013 that her application for a collaborative research grant to HERA (Humanities in the European Research Area) was one of 18 successful projects. The 3-year grant of almost 1 million Euros will enable her to work with colleagues in Germany, Poland and Sweden on ‘Marrying Cultures: Queens Consort and European Identities 1500-1800’. The focus of the project is the foreign consort as agent of cultural transfer. Among the case studies to be investigated are the Polish princess Katarzyna Jagiellonka, Duchess of Finland and Queen of Sweden (1526-83); Hedwig Eleonora, Duchess of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp and Queen of Sweden (1636-1715); the Portuguese princess Catarina of Braganza, Queen of Great Britain (1638-1705); and Maria Amalia, Princess of Saxony, Queen of the Two Sicilies and Queen of Spain (1724-1760).

The Oxford Research Centre for the Humanities – Taylor Institution
November 1-2, 2013Conveners: Martin McLaughlin and Javier Muñoz-Basols
The first of three annual EHRC workshops on translation will be held on 1-2 November 2013 in TORCH (The Oxford Research Centre for the Humanities), Woodstock Rd, and in the Taylor Institution, St Giles.

Conveners: Martin McLaughlin and Javier Muñoz-Basols, with the assistance of Dr Elisabetta Tarantino

Tom Earle (Professor of Portuguese in the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages) has obtained several paperback copies of his book Black Africans in Renaissance Europe (Ed T. F. Earle, University of Oxford and K. J. P. Lowe, Queen Mary, University of London) which he would like to donate to University Libraries in Africa. The aim is to distribute these books by means of personal contacts rather than by risking them to the vagaries of the postal system. If any colleagues have links with, or are planning trips to, any African countries over the next few months, please contact Professor Earle (Thomas.earle@mod-langs.ox.ac.uk) to obtain a copy of the book to take with you. Copies have already been distributed to the University of Ghana in Accra, and to Chancellor College in Zomba, Malawi.

Further details of the book can be found on:

http://www.cambridge.org/gb/knowledge/isbn/item5735921/?site_locale=en_GB