· Applications are now open for the 2021-22 AHRC-funded Collaborative PhD studentship 'Sounds and Silences in the Archives of Empire'. The studentship will embed a composer at The National Archives to explore the records of Empire through the creation and public dissemination of a portfolio of new music and multimedia works, aiming to recontextualise collections. Working with Colonial Office (CO) material, the student will reinterpret and challenge the official records of the British Empire in three principal ways:
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· i) Using Machine Learning to uncover core themes and biases,
ii) Sonification of data and generation of new texts to inform original musical compositions,
iii) Engagement within communities impacted by this research, whose voices are often absent in the official record.
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· It is co-supervised by Dr Sam Salem (PRiSM Lecturer in Composition, Royal Northern College of Music) Christopher Day (Head of Modern Domestic Records, The National Archives) Professor Emily Howard (Professor of Composition and Director of PRiSM, Royal Northern College of Music) and Dr Juliette Desplat (Head of Modern Collections, The National Archives).
This fully-funded studentship offers a unique and exciting opportunity to focus on diverse histories and records while completing a flexible project which can be shaped by the student's own interests and experiences.
We want to encourage the widest range of potential students to apply for our CDP studentships and are committed to welcoming students from different backgrounds to apply. We particularly welcome applications from people from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic backgrounds as they are currently underrepresented at this level in this area.
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