Announcing the launch of a new AHRC-funded Collaborative Skills Development Programme, tailor made for those researching in any area of Contemporary Women’s Writing!!

The CWWSkills Programme comprises 6 training workshops held at different locations in the UK between 31^st August, 2013 and 12^th July 2014. Its aim is to fill the perceived skills gap between academic research and an increasingly competitive employment market, within and beyond Higher Education. Please access the programme of events and online application form at www.cwwskills.org.uk

The CWWSkills programme is free of charge and reasonable travel and accommodation expenses will be reimbursed. Please note that places are limited and the application process is selective, based on the quality of the content you input onto the form. The window for receipt of applications closes on 21 June 2013. Applicants will be informed of the outcome of their application in early July 2013.

Monday 24 June 2013 9.30-15.30

Leeds Metropolitan University, Northern Terrace Rooms 117 and 118

The Contemporary Women’s Writing Association and the School of Cultural Studies and Humanities at Leeds Metropolitan University invite you to a day conference on Contemporary Women’s Writing and Literary Prize Culture. This event is free and booking is now open (see below).

Programme

9.30 -10.00 Registration and Coffee NT117

10.00 – 10.45 Clare Hey – ‘Literary prizes, the publishing industry, digital publishing and short stories’ NT118

10.45 – 11.30 Gillian Roberts – ‘Literary prizes, national identity, postcoloniality and the case of Esi Edugyan’ NT118

11.45 – 12.30 Helen Cousins and Jenni Ramone – ‘Literary prizes and reading groups’ NT118

12.30 – 1.30 lunch NT117

1.30 – 2.15 Jane Rogers – Reading from The Testament of Jessie Lamb, Hitting Trees with Sticks and other work NT118

2.15 – 3.00 Interview with Jane Rogers – ‘Literary Prizes, Literary Careers and Literary Cultures’ NT118

3.00-3.30 Tea, book signing and close NT117

The event is open to all and free of charge. Refreshments and lunch will be provided.

For more information please contact Dr Susan Watkins at s.watkins@leedsmet.ac.uk

At the moment there are resources only for the text we are reading first – The Fifth Child – but as we go on, we will populate the other pages for the other books as well.

We hope people find it useful material and may even feel like leaving a comment!

The School of Cultural Studies and Humanities in conjunction with the Contemporary Women’s Writing Association are delighted to announce the further speakers in our series of ‘Conversations with Contemporary Women Writers’, taking place at Leeds Metropolitan University over the next three months. We will be welcoming:

Kate Johnson

Tuesday 21 May 2013, 17.30-19.00

Leeds Metropolitan University, A203

Kate Johnson is a writer of romantic and paranormal fiction. She is a self-confessed fan of Terry Pratchett, whose fantasy fiction has inspired her to write her own books. She is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association and has previously published short stories in the UK and romantic mysteries in the US. She is a previous winner of the WisRWA’s Silver Quill and Passionate Ink’s Passionate Plume award. The UnTied Kingdom was Kate’s UK debut and was short listed for the 2012 Romantic Contemporary Novel of the year award (RoNA). Run Rabbit Run is the fifth novel in her Sophie Green Mysteries and the first to be published in the UK. http://etaknosnhoj.blogspot.com

Shamshad Khan

Wednesday 29 May 2013 17.30-19.00

Leeds Metropolitan University, A312

Shamshad Khan is a performance poet whose work has appeared in a number of anthologies and been featured on BBC Radio 3 and 4. Her poetic monologue Hard Cut was performed for the conference of women live art performers (Berne, Switzerland) and Khala Ghoda Festival (Mumbai, India). The pieces Megalomaniac and Hard Cut were both directed by Mark Whitelaw, winner of the Lawrence Olivier Award 2004. Her performances have included collaborations with musicians, beatboxers and video artists. She is co-editor of two anthologies of poetry for crocus books. Her first collection, Megalomaniac, was published by Salt in 2007. http://www.saltpublishing.com/writers/profile.php?recordID=209951

Elizabeth Chadwick

Monday 17 June 2013 17.30-19.00

Leeds Metropolitan University, A301

Elizabeth Chadwick is an award-winning author of historical fiction. Her novel To Defy A King won the 2011 Romantic Novelists Association prize for the genre. In 1998, her novel The Champion was shortlisted for the Romantic Novelists Association Parker Pen Award for the best Romantic novel of the year. In 2010 The Scarlet Lion was nominated as one of the ten landmark historical novels of the decade by Historical Novel Society founder Richard Lee. ‘Her latest novel, The Summer Queen is the first in a major trilogy about Eleanor of Aquitaine.’

http://elizabethchadwick.com

ALL ARE VERY WELCOME! For further information please contact Dr Susan Watkins s.watkins@leedsmet.ac.uk

View CFP here.

Date: Tuesday 12 March 2013
Time: 17.30-19.00
Venue Broadcasting Place AG10, Leeds Metropolitan University

Professor Jaidka is a novelist and critic. She will be talking about and reading from her recent novel, Scandal Point, which is set in 1892, in colonial India. The handsome young ruler of an Indian princely state angers the British rulers. His fault? He has fallen in love and eloped with the Viceroy’s daughter. Not an ordinary romance, the elopement has far-reaching consequences. It results in a child who grows up unaware of his lineage but one day, like Oedipus, he discovers the truth and embarks on a journey seeking his roots. There are no records, no documents, no witnesses, no evidence. With the help of stray bits of information and semi-reliable clues he pieces together the almost incredible tale of his mother’s elopement and its tragic aftermath.

Manju Jaidka is a Professor at the Department of English & Cultural Studies at Panjab University, Chandigarh. A recipient of a UGC Text-book Award in 1994, she has also received several international fellowships including a Fulbright Research Grant to Harvard and Yale Universities in 1990-91, a Rockefeller Residency at the Bellagio Study Centre (1995), a fellowship at the Salzburg Center (1996), a Rockefeller Visiting Professorship at the University of Iowa (1998- 99), and the Lillian Robinson Fellowship from the Simone de Beauvoir Institute at the University of Concordia, Montreal in March 2008. Professor Jaidka is also the author of the novel, Spots of Time, and a play, The Seduction and Betrayal of Cat Whiskers, as well literary criticism on Indian and American literature. She is Chair of MELUS-India (The Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States – India chapter) and MELOW (the Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the World).

We are pleased to announce that CWWA executive committee members have secured AHRC collaborative skills development funding to run an ambitious programme of postgraduate and early-career development workshops with a focus on contemporary women’s writing between September 2013 and July 2014. The Principal Investigator is Prof. Lucie Armitt (University of Salford).

A series of 6 workshops will offer a ‘wrap around’ skills development programme tailored specifically to the needs of postgraduate and early career researchers working in the field of contemporary women’s writing. The series covers topics and skills such as ‘Publishing and Contemporary Women’s Writing’ (Southampton), ‘Making best use of Social and Digital Media for Research Purposes’ (MediaCity UK, Salford), ‘Communications within and Beyond the Classroom’ (Liverpool John Moores), ‘Careers and Employability’ (Leeds Metropolitan) and ‘Creating and Engaging New Audiences’ (Brighton). The final workshop will return to MediaCity UK, Salford with an emphasis on ‘Reflection and Practice’ linked to the skills acquired over the course of the programme. Throughout, the emphasis will be participatory and ‘hands on’.

The overall aim of the series is to maximise employability within and beyond the academy for researchers in the field of contemporary women’s writing, enhancing the skills set of this group of highly ambitious and active researchers. Content will be led by academic and non-academic colleagues in partnership with a range of academic and vocational skills providers.

Participation will be via an application process, full details of which will be communicated in Spring 2013. The workshops will be free of charge to successful applicants.

More details will be announced in due course on this website and via the CWWA mailing list.

As our members will appreciate, this is difficult time for funding across the Higher Education sector. We are pleased that we are able to continue our fruitful association with Leeds Metropolitan University and to continue to benefit our peers in the field.