ISRF Newsletter – December 2024
It’s the final newsletter of 2024; and what a newsletter it is! Read on for a Director’s Note, details of our Flexible Grants for Small Groups competition, and more.
Contents
Director’s Note
Research after Trump
Christopher Newfield
The ISRF runs several lines of internal research, mostly in pilot mode, looking for research questions on which we might run larger-scale projects in the future. Four of these were set back – let’s say, “clarified” – by Trump’s recent re-election.
Trump is the guy who resets the odometer back to zero. You get him out of office, put a few plans in motion to address glaringly obvious problems – like the climate crisis – go a ways down the road and put a few kilometres on the odometer.
And then Trump returns. He pushes the button and everything returns to zero. While he’s in office, the odometer runs in reverse…
11th Flexible Grants for Small Groups (FG11)
Deadline: 5pm GMT (6pm CET), Friday 10th January 2025
Scholars from within Europe are eligible to apply as Principal Investigator(s) to lead a small group of 2-10 scholars (which may include graduate students). Applicants should hold a PhD and will normally have a permanent appointment at an institution of higher education and research.
The awards are intended as providing flexible support for a period of (up to) one year for the activities of the research group.
Book Launch: Like Lockdown Never Happened, by Joy White
Thursday 23 January 2025, 6:00pm-7:30pm (GMT). In person.
UD Music, London, E15 2QS.
Under COVID-19, music listening increased as people used it to help counter the psychological fallout of lockdown—the isolation, restriction and boredom. In her new book, Like Lockdown Never Happened, Dr Joy White shows how Black music and culture reshaped our lives in the first 18 months of the pandemic.
‘Migrants have been beaten, hounded by dogs and burned with cigarettes’ – on the frontline of the Poland-Belarus border crisis
Families attempting to start a new life in Europe have become stuck in the woods between two countries, regularly receiving horrific treatment at the hands of the authorities.
What Newfoundland – and Messy Family Histories – Can Tell Us About the Harms of Colonialism
ISRF Fellow Julia Laite’s family have been on Newfoundland since the 17th century. Her latest project explores ancestry, empire, exploitation – and Shanawdithit, the Beothuk woman who witnessed the death of her world under colonialism.
How Portugal spied on Muslims in colonial Mozambique
At the ISRF’s November Congress, Fellow Sandra Araújo revealed the remarkable hidden history behind her forthcoming book.
Video: Book Launch for Adam Hanieh, Crude Capitalism (2024)
On the 13th of November, the ISRF hosted a book launch to celebrate the publication of an important new book, Crude Capitalism. We were joined by Adrienne Buller and Angus McNelly.
New Publication: Like Lockdown Never Happened: Music and Culture During Covid (Repeater Books)
Dr Joy White (ISRF Independent Scholar Fellow 2015-16 and Academic Advisor) explores how Black music and culture framed how we passed the time in the first 18 months of the Covid-19 pandemic.
11th Flexible Grants for Small Groups Competition (FG11)
Live now: deadline 5pm GMT, Friday 10th January 2025
Funding support for small groups (2-10 scholars) to complete a piece of research or undertake face-to-face joint group work.
2nd First Book Grant (FBG2)
Closed on 1st November 2024
Newly qualified post-docs (within three years of PhD award) are eligible to apply for support to convert their PhD thesis into a book.
7th Mid-Career Fellowship (MCF7)
Closed on 28th March 2024
Scholars more than ten years post-PhD were eligible to apply for support to complete a one-year piece of original research. Award announcements are expected in the summer.