Identity, Culture and Representation Research Cluster

Description

The Identity, Culture and Representation Research Cluster is a centre of excellence in exploring and communicating the impacts of Derbyshire's heritage, from the local to the global.

The Centre brings together research staff and students in English, History, American Studies and Journalism as well as other colleagues outside the College of Arts, Humanities and Education.

The Centre’s interdisciplinary research explores representations of identity and culture through and across history and literature. The Centre has particular strengths in the themes of 18th-century heritage, literature and society, and in cultures of writing, reading and publishing.

Members’ work illuminates and challenges cultural values and social assumptions within civil society to benefit local, national and international communities and organisations and to influence public policy.

The Centre is proud of its connections to the cultural landscapes, industry and heritage of Derby and Derbyshire. Staff represent the University across a range of external platforms, including the boards of Derby Theatre, the Derwent Valley Mills World Heritage Site Research Steering Group, and Derby Museums Trust. Through these links, work across this research cluster has informed the preservation, restoration and management of public green spaces, increased engagement with museum collections, and received local, regional and national media coverage.

Between 2014 and 2016 the Cluster co-directed the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Centre for Hidden Histories of the First World War, a collaborative community research project. The Centre aimed to develop community projects focused upon alternative histories of World War One, its commemoration and memorialisation.

The Centre supported the Derby First World War Green Spaces community history project, which worked with local groups to present research results in artistically striking ways. This included textile projects, exhibitions and World War One-themed well dressings - an art form unique to Derbyshire.

Members have also engaged with local government and community history groups to share research into the cultural, historical and scientific significance of green spaces outside academia. This work included an AHRC-funded collaborative project on arboreta and a study of urban trees.

Tree collections were idealised as microcosms of nature, miniature encapsulations of the globe and as living museums. This research into arboricultural history has also had an important international dimension, comparing the development of British and Irish arboretums and tree planting with that in Europe, the USA and other countries.

Emigration has long been a part of Irish history and identity. And the project Our story: A history of the Irish in Derby recognises the varying contributions the Irish have made to the Derby city and to the wider region. Celebrating the links between Ireland and Britain, this oral history project explores and collects the experiences of the Irish diaspora.

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No, this infrastructure does not provide funding.

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University of Derby
Derby