This blog is currently interrupted. However, the network continues to work through the mailing list that brings together researchers working in and about London. If you are a researcher who would like to be a member, feel free to contact us.

FiLo is a researcher run and inspired network, that aims to bring together researchers who have chosen London as their field site. Born from the realisation that London has become a popular research site in the area of migration studies, we thought it would be time to bring together the different projects undertaken in the city, to provide both for social support and academic networking opportunities. The ambition is to develop a forum were we can share our experiences of doing research in London and promote the variety of different projects we are basing in the city. While the roots of FiLo can be found at Sussex University the FiLo is not University nor discipline bound and welcomes all researchers who feel that their research interest are related to London as a research site.

 

Child Poverty in London

Child Poverty in London

The End Child Poverty campaign has produced a report that shows many parts of London to be among the poorest int he country. Its list of the 20 UK local authorities containing the highest percentages of children in poverty contains eleven of the capital’s 32 boroughs, with Tower Hamlets topping the list on 52%. Islington, Westminster, Hammersmith and Fulham and Barking and Dagenham are up there too. The massive gap between the capital’s richest and poorest is illuminated by the Eng Child Poverty Campaign report.

It is also well illustrated on the excellent website ‘London’s Poverty Profile’.

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2011 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for FiLo’s blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 4,800 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 4 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Two Very Original Call for Contributions

Tired of presenting papers or exhibiting posters at conferences? Looking for new ways to present your work? Have a look at these two calls for contributions, both original and of interest to those researching in or about London.

Performing the city: mobility, space and subjectivity.

7th December 2011, setting out from Look Mum No Hands in Old Street, 10.30am

Call for Contributions/Participants: Deadline 4th November 2011

Cities are shaped by, and give shape to, the movement of people, technologies, things and ideas. They are composed of dynamic entanglements of humans and non-humans, (re)produced and contested on a daily basis. To make sense of mobile urban life demands an understanding of a myriad of actors who perform aspects of everyday life. Building upon the work of University of East London’s Sustainable Mobilities Research Group, this workshop seeks to examine and enliven some of these entanglements through a mobile symposium.

The event will take place in London on Wednesday 7th December, setting out from Look Mum No Hands in Old Street at 10.30am and returning there for lunch. The tentative format of the day is to have two excursions (one am, one pm) into different parts of London; of course the journeys will be just as important – if not more so – than the destinations.

The day will be very informal, and whilst it will be Œfacilitated¹ by us (Rachel Aldred, Katrina Jungnickel and Justin Spinney) we are looking for participants to talk/walk through themes central to their work, whether at a particular location or whilst on the move (for those less familiar with London we are happy to suggest locations). Speakers will be asked to talk for no more than 15 minutes and are encouraged to include objects/materials/places and of course movement.

We are keeping themes purposely broad at this stage but are particularly keen on talks/tours which engage with the following themes: the politics of (im)mobility; mobility and temporality; the sensory, affective and (im)material; (in)visible mobilities (particularly in relation to the Œwarping¹ of the city); rhythm; citizenship and urban governance; the construction and displacement of subjectivities through mobility; place, infrastructure and the scripting of movement. Submissions are welcome from areas including (but not limited to) geography, sociology, architecture, history and anthropology. We are particularly keen to attract postgraduate and early career researchers but all are of course welcome! There will be no power point facilities, but there will be plenty of time for discussion and networking.

The event is free to attend, morning coffee/tea/pastries and lunch are provided, travel expenses around London will be reimbursed for all attending, and we can cover speaker travel costs up to £50.

If you would like to contribute a talk/tour please submit a positioning statement (max 500 words) about your research/ proposed talk/ tour/ destination/ mode of movement by Friday 4th November to k.e.jungnickel@uel.ac.uk or j.spinney@uel.ac.uk. We will then put the final programme together and notify speakers by Friday 11th November. If you would like to come along without contributing a talk please contact Katrina or Justin, but please note that as places are limited to 25 in total they will be allocated on a first come first served basis. This workshop is supported by the ESRC Cycling Cultures Project.

Blast from the Past

RAI’s Education Outreach Programme

Call for Contributions: Deadline 16th November 2011

In anticipation of the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics, the RAI’s Education Outreach Programme is running an oral histories project called Blast from the Past. The aim of the project is to connect people around the world through material objects related to sports, games and play. We are asking people to dig through their attics, family trunks and wardrobes to find objects (sport kits, souvenirs, photos, medals or magazines) that capture special memories related to sport, games and play. Send us a video of you speaking about your object or write a story and send us a photo!

Who can participate?  Anyone interested in anthropology, history and sport

How do I submit my story? Send us a photo of your object with a description of max 100 words. Alternatively, send us a short video clip, max 1:30 sec.

Further details HERE.

London Walks

New on the Guardian website and very beautifully created are a series of Badaude’s Illustrated London Walks.

The Guardian and Tate are also flogging a book of the series.

Badaude has a great blog with some wonderful observations and drawings of London, Paris and issues in between.

 

 

June Film Festivals

  

June starts with the promise of a wonderful month for documentary film in London. The city is hosting two related film festivals:  The Open City London Documentary Festival (16^th -19^th June) and the 12^th RAI International Festival of Ethnographic Film 2011 (23^rd-26^th June).

The programme of either festival is loaded with an amazing variety of films and other events (check out RAI’s workshops!) that are bound to be of interest to many. FiLo members, and others with an interest in London as a site of research, should watch out for Open City films under the strand City Scope: opening the city,  lifting the paving stones.

Below is more information on each Film Festival.Enjoy the films!

Open City London Documentary Festival

Where: Malet Place, Bloomsberry, London. Map and Directions.

When: 16th to the 19th June 2011

Tickets: £5 each

Full Programme is available online.

A film description as a teaser: Home Sweet Post-It, screened on the 16^th June, 8pm.

A house in East London is home for almost 20 young people. They’re from Brazil, Spain and Colombia and most can’t communicate in English – even amongst themselves. This short, funny documentary shows the challenges of sharing space, toilet paper, cooking smells and other life-changing intimate moments and how post-it notes could offer one solution to the problems….or maybe not.

12th RAI International Festival of Ethnographic Film 2011

Where: UCL, Roberts building, in the heart of Bloomsbury, Central London.

When: Thursday 23rd June to Sunday 26th June 2011

Registration: Online registration. Festival Pass £75; RAI Fellows & Members £70; Students/Concessions £50; Day Passes at various rates; Festival Dinner on Saturday £20; Archive Workshop £15;

Full Programme is available online.

A film description as a teaser: Faux Vintage, screened on the 25th June, 09:00 – 11:15

Faux Vintage is a social history of the electric guitar as recounted by London repairers, restorers, traders, collectors.

Wot no labels!

Research regarding fluid sexual representation on TV

Craig Haslop from the University of Sussex is conducting research in the Media and film and music department investigating the potential of open-ended sexual representation on British television – that is representation of sexuality without labelling.

As part of this he is looking for volunteers in London to give just 1 and 1/2 hours of their time to attend a screening of the BBC TV series Torchwood and a follow up discussion of 45 minutes.  All research will be treated in complete confidence and results used will be anonymous.

The focus groups will take place in Central London on the Tuesday the 7th and Wednesday 8th June 2011 at the Drill Hall starting at 6.45pm at the Drill Hall , 16 Chenies Street, London WC1E 7EX near Tottenham Court Road tube.

If you think you can help please contact c.d.haslop@sussex.ac.uk with the date you can make and whether you’re employed and if so what your occupation is.

(Feel free to pass this information on to friends and colleagues who you think might be interested)

Yet Another Conference of Interest

CfP: Ethnography, Diversity and Urban Space. 2011. September 22-23

COMPAS, University of Oxford, Oxford

Call for Papers:  Deadline 6 June 2011

The intensification of global flows in the current period has led scholars to describe cities like London as ‘super-diverse’: a ‘diversification of diversity’, with a population characterized by multiple ethnicities, countries of origin, immigration statuses, and age profiles (Vertovec 2007).

The aims of this conference to be held at COMPAS <http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk>  (University of Oxford) on 22-23 September 2011 are: to address the missing dimension of migration and mobility in the literature on urban space, and the missing dimension of spatiality in the literature on diversity; and to develop new modes of inquiry appropriate to the contemporary challenge of super-diversity.

We invite proposals for papers which investigate aspects related to the conference themes and we welcome in particular proposals that focus on the following areas:

• Understanding belonging and diversity in complex urban spaces
• Changing practices of fieldwork and new and old modes of ethnographic investigation

Abstracts from early career researchers are especially welcome.  For full details, see: http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/events/forthcoming/#c802

Cheap Eat Central London?

… sounds like an oxymoron doesn’t it … a bit like ‘military intelligence’, ‘real estate’ , or there’s a tasty sounding guide to 10 of the best cheap eats in central London on the Guardian website.

Time Out have their own guide here.

On the Guardian website, Dave Hill’s Excellent London blog now has a London Blogoshpere roundup. Filonetwork’s sychophancy hasn’t convinced him to add us, probably because of the lack of posting and local politics dirt digging which he likes.

You can sign up for his ‘Metropolitan Lines’ newsletter here.

Filming Ethnographically – 12th RAI Festival of Ethnographic Film

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Do you have a spare film from your ethnographic fieldwork and thought about submitting it somewhere here is your chance:

The 12th RAI International Festival of Ethnographic Film
Will be hosted by UCL in London, 24-26 June 2011: www.raifilmfest.org.uk
Submission deadline: 15 January 2011

Submissions are invited from any field of ethnographic film. Only films released (first screened in public) after 1st January 2008 are eligible for competitive screening.

Please submit the form and stills by e-mail (film@therai.org.uk) and send the preview DVD and proof of entry fee by post. Deadline for Submission is 15 January 2011 (post mark date; Please ensure that preview tapes arrive by 26 January) – Thanks!

Check the website for application documents.

Contact for any inquiries: Susanne Hammacher (film@therai.org.uk)