Monday 6th September 2010

Digital development and Application; Content and Creativity

The publishing industry is currently undergoing major challenges: digitisation: is changing the material form of the industry’s key artefacts; the internet is transforming the potential ways in which publications can be distributed and the expectations of their consumers; and these two lead to profound implications for the business models of companies in the industry. Through this event we hope to bring together individuals and organisations involved in academic publishing to identify the issues and set out a way forward. We will present research we have undertaken into the perceptions of publishers, and identity models for the future which have been developed in both publication and our own work with the music business.

Date: Monday 6th September 2010
Venue: The Bond, 180-182 Fazeley Street, Birmingham, B5 5SE
Travel: a five-minute taxi ride from Birmingham New Street Station.
Parking: £5 a day to be booked in advance

Full programme and details of how to be invited to this free event are available on email request from here.

On, Archives! was hosted by the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research (WCFTR) and also contained within it a dedicated symposium on ‘Broadcasting in the 1930s’ organized by Hugh Chignall (Bournemouth) and Jamie Medhust (Aberystwth).

En route to Madison we stopped over in Chicago. Now Chicago is undoubtedly a ‘cinematic’ city, so mythologised in American and wider cultures as to be already familiar to new visitors like me. We arrived on Independence Day which meant that the Stars and Stripes was ubiquitous and firework displays abounded.

Given the tendency to wax lyrical about such places in comparison to the familiarity of home I’ll reserve further remarks for another occasion. However, and acknowledging the trompe l’oeil effect of the cityscape and delights of wandering the streets in sweltering heat, what impressed were the various ways in which the cultural heritage of the city was celebrated.

Whether it was the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright or the heritage of blues music and others, this place had plenty of cultural confidence (although less evidence of the bluster which earned the label of ‘The Windy City’). What I liked was the unself-conscious aspect of celebrating all avenues of culture, ‘high’ and ‘low’, and the entrepreneurial spirit which made this place so interesting and interested in its own history.

On to Wisconsin and ‘On, Archives!’; WCFTR was an apposite place for this event as it is home to one of the oldest and most extensive collections of print, audio/visual, and graphic materials relating to film, theater, radio and television in the United States.

The conference organizer, Professor Michele Hilmes is International Visiting Fellow in the Birmingham School of Media and a scholar whose work on media history is truly inspirational . Michele and her husband were generous enough to host a ‘Cook-Out’ for us and other visitors at their lakeside house, a highly agreeable way to acclimatize.

The conference commenced with a keynote from Tino Balio who recounted the story behind the various archives procured by WCFTR. The collections focus mainly on US entertainment-based media, particularly archives of the American film industry between 1930 and 1960 (the business records of United Artists are here), popular theater of the 1940s and 1950s, and television from the 1950s through the 1970s. Holdings include over three hundred manuscript collections from playwrights, television and motion picture writers, producers, actors, designers, directors and production companies. In addition to the paper records, materials preserved include fifteen thousand motion pictures, television shows and videotapes, two million still photographs and promotional graphics, and several thousand sound recordings. For most of us in attendance, we could spend the rest of our scholarly lives here and happily never leave the reading desks.

Later in the first day, the keynote address for the symposium was given by Dr. Kate Lacey, University of Sussex. Her paper
”Paradoxes and Paradigms: Broadcasting and its Publics in the 1930s” drew upon her knowledge of the UK and German contexts in that decade, challenging us to think in more detail about the act of listening and reception of radio in this period.

Given the size and scope of the conference there were, inevitably and regrettably, many papers that one had to miss. Nonetheless, the overall quality of scholarship was high and made each panel rewarding.

One of the most stimulating panels concerned ‘Archives and the Internet’. This featured papers from Mark Hain, Indiana University
(“Resurrecting the Vamp: Cinema’s Loss and New Media’s Finding of Theda Bara”) and Josh Jackson, University of Wisconsin-Madison
(“YouTube and the User-Generated Online Archive”). The stand-out paper here, and perhaps of the conference, came from Ken Garner of Glasgow Caledonian University. His paper continued his ongoing concern with the life and work of John Peel and was entitled:
”Ripping the Pith from the Peel: Institutional versus internet cultures of archiving popular music radio – The case of BBC Radio 1′s John Peel Show”. This reported back on the activities of fans to unearth recordings of Peel’s show from over 4 decades of broadcasting and to digitize and share the fruits of these labours. Most intriguing were the results of his online survey of Peel aficionados and their perception of the BBC’s archiving activities.

The symposium proved to be a successful innovation and further papers of note included those in the ‘BBC Talks and Education’ panel, notably Todd Avery’s 
”The Trumpets of Autocracies and the Still, Small Voices of Civilisation: Hilda Matheson, Emmanuel Levinas, and the Ethics of Broadcasting in a Time of Crisis”. While Levinas never emerged in this paper, the account of the remarkable Hilda Matheson’s ideas on radio and the 1930s moment was a useful extension of Avery’s exploration of ‘Radio Modernism’.
Elsewhere, Ben Harker (University of Salford, biographer of Ewan MacColl) spoke on “Communists on the BBC, 1935–39″. Undoubtedly a small number of individuals, communists in the BBC were responsible for some of the most interesting of productions in the 1930s which challenged the patrician and culturally conservative nature of the voice of UK radio. While other papers illuminated other stories that also challenged any view of the BBC as politically and culturally heterogeneous, its dominant character for so long was exactly that, this calling into question the nature of the ‘public’ it addressed (or constructed) in its remit. I look forward to reading the results of this research as it emerges.

Tim Wall gave two papers. The first took place under the aegis of the symposium and was entitled: “Radio Remotes and the Nightlife of the Big City”. Although I missed the presentation and what sounded like a stimulating panel, Tim’s paper concerned the way in which histories of radio and jazz tended to reproduce each other’s shortcomings. This was explored through a reflection on Tim’s passion – Duke Ellington – and accounts of his place in early ‘remote’ radio broadcasts, or transmissions from jazz and other music venues. He revealed how existing histories are deficient in mapping the practicalities of these early years, leading to various kinds of historical confusion.

This historical reflection was taken up in Tim’s second paper as part of the panel ‘Archives and Institutions’. Speaking on “Public Service broadcasting, archives, and cultural television” Tim outlined some of his thinking on the way in which the BBC have constructed histories of popular music in recent years, notably in the ‘Britannia’ series of programmes.. Given the enviable resources amalgamated in such works (and in the US in series such as Ken Burns’ ‘Jazz’ et al), they often fall short as history, tending to offer rounded narratives in the service of the demands of televisual convention when audiences and materials suggest that something more adventurous and stimulating might be attained. The challenge of this paper however was to reflect on what role the academy might play in critiquing and aiding such histories. That we might actually take a role would be a start!

This panel also included Christopher Cwynar, University of Wisconsin-Madison
speaking on “NFB.ca: The Digital Archive as National Place in the Virtual World” and Jennifer Porst, University of California-Los Angeles
”The U.S. v. Twentieth Century-Fox, et al.: How the Forced Disclosure of Documents in Legal Cases Provides an Invaluable Resource for Researchers”. Chris provided a very stimulating assessment of the Canadian Film Board’s online activity (and a nuanced reading of its sight) while Jennifer used legal records to get at the kind of interview questions one would ask of film executives if only one could go back in time.

My paper was part of the first panel of Friday, the final day, encompassed in the theme ‘Documenting the Documentary: Postwar Public Affairs Programming’ and chaired by the delightful Shawn VanCour, University of South Carolina. Matthew Ehrlich, University of Illinois, gave an interesting paper:
”Radio Utopia: Postwar Audio Documentary in the Public Interest”. This exploration of dynamic radio production on issues of public concern was fully illustrated with extracts from US radio features from the 40s and early 50s which for us drew attention to how different the sound of US radio was compared to the staid BBC.

My own paper was entitled “Inscribing the work of Philip Donnellan into documentary and other histories”. This developed my longstanding concern with the work and archive of this important, but not obscure, documentarist. My aim of exploring the nature of Archiving was rather attenuated but it is important I think to record a comment I picked up from Mark Haynes and which brought home to me something of the value of doing archive work. He suggested that for most people, the Archive is not something that they are familiar with, even though of course, many people are involved in a kind of personal, informal archiving process (of their cultural collections, personal artefacts etc). For us academics, our access to and use of archives is a privilege, even if we are sometimes under the controlling eye of archivists and institutional regulations which appear at times as if it would be preferable to NOT use the archive and touch its treasures.

Such observations, as well as the particularity of media archives raise questions about how we understand the Archive. Perhaps it is down to the variety of sessions and my own choices, but what did not emerge as fully as I had hoped were more provocative reflections on this meta-area. Nonetheless, this event was broad enough and gathered together enough scholars with an interest in such questions as to allow other discussions and collaborations that prompted reflections outside of the formal spaces of panels and papers.

On the final day we had the option of being taken on a tour of the WCFTR archives that are housed in a fine old building on the university campus. On the tour then, it was a delight to sample some of these treasures and to see original sketches from costume designer Edith Head as well as a set of letters from the screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. One of the ‘Hollywood Ten’, Trumbo was jailed for his defiance of the anti-communist Senate hearings in the 1950s and we were privileged to be shown some of his letters to his wife that were written from his prison cell. Faced with such documents, the value of the archive is tangible and one feels able to commune in some manner with the historical moment. The skill of those at this event was to make media history come alive out of such materials.

Tony Palmer’s – All You Need is Love from Interactive Cultures on Vimeo.

Prof Tim Wall and Dr Paul Long presenting to the Sights and Sounds conference, University of Salford, June 2010. All You Need is Love is a 17 part documentary covering the Story of Popular Music. The program was originally broadcast between 1976 and 1981, but since that time it has neither been commercially released or repeated.

6-8pm

Wednesday 30th June 2010

Birmingham Library Theatre

The Colony, originally made as an innovative TV documentary, explores the experience of members of the Caribbean migrant community in Birmingham and the Midlands. The film allows its subjects space to candidly evaluate their reception in the UK and their relationships with home and other migrant workers. Controversial at the time of its original broadcast the film is an enduring and powerful document of a key moment in post-war British history.

Everyone is welcome but the event is particularly aimed at those with an interest in the social history of the region, post-war migration and community, documentary film and the BBC. We want to contact educators, heritage and community groups and researchers who will find Donnellan’s archive useful and who might aid in finding ways of preserving it and promoting its use as a resource for the social and cultural history of the region.

Biography: Philip Donnellan (1924-99) worked for the BBC from 1948-84. Much of his professional life was spent in the Midlands where he worked first in radio and then in television. His work expressed his belief in the value of ordinary life and culture and the need to give working people and underrepresented social minorities a space in which to articulate their concerns in their own voices.

The project: Philip Donnellan’s un-catalogued archive is held in the Birmingham Archives and contains an extensive range of film, audio and print material pertaining to his career with the BBC and the works he made in and about the region. An award from Screen West Midlands has allowed the employment of an archive worker to assess these deposits. As a result, we are already finding rich materials such as unbroadcast films, oral histories and programme research materials.

More information: Details of Donnellan’s life and work can be found at the

‘Friends of Philip Donnellan’ website

Subscribe to the posterous site

Join the Facebook group

Help? Please pass this invitation on to your networks and to those who may find the project to be of interest. If you are interested but cannot make the event, let us know and we’ll keep you informed of developments and available resources. If you can get an audience together and find a venue, we’ll be glad to come and show some of the films to you and talk about the project.

RSVP: If you wish to attend, please forward your details to:

donnellanphilip@googlemail.com

Postal address:

Dr Paul Long
Reader in Media and Cultural History
Birmingham School of Media
BCU
B42 2SU

Who is involved? The project is funded by Screen West Midlands and managed by a partnership of Birmingham Archives and Heritage, Media Archive Central England (MACE) and Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research, Birmingham City University.

Essays must reach the Editor of Midland History by 31 October 2010. The winning essay, and others judged meritorious, will be published in Midland History.

Applications should be addressed to: The Editor, Midland History, Department of History, University of Birmingham, B15 2TT, United Kingdom

r.p.cust@bham.ac.uk

Sam Coley and Oliver Carter presenting to the Sights and Sounds conference, University of Salford, June 2010.

Radio documentary, fandom and new participatory cultures from Interactive Cultures on Vimeo.

The recent conference at the Open University, The Future of Cultural Work inspired much debate and discussion amongst delegates and touched on many pertinent issues for my PhD research into cultural entrepreneurship and education policy. With many strands including capitalism and work, precarious labour, working in television and inclusion & exclusion, it offered a variety of perspectives and provocations in relation to cultural work and cultural labour. Not only were the themes appropriate to my research, but many key academics on the subject presented and attended the conference – I must admit to being a little start-struck! McGuigan talked of the relationship between capitalism and cultural work, the subject of a forthcoming paper in the International Journal for Cultural Policy and of his book Cool Capitalism discussed in previous blog posts. Hesmondhalgh and Gregg kicked us off with two provocations on the future(s) of cultural work highlighting the pitfalls and issues associated with working in the cultural, media and creative industries. Hesmondhalgh presented the idea that on the one hand cultural studies has been very critical of recent cultural policy and of the implications for culture and those working in the sector, while on the other hand there is an over optimistic (near evangelical) promotion of creativity and the benefits of working in the sector. He suggested that instead of treating cultural workers as a ‘special’  case, that they in fact have more in common with all workers in terms of needing to explore their rights and conditions of work. He talked of  unions as a potential solution, recognising the problems with unionising freelancers and the current strength of personal networks which in many ways act as a support system but without the official power of an organised group such as a formal union.

In her provocation, Gregg highlighted the relationship between love and work, in terms of the language used to describe the ideal job and a very middle class aspiration and aestheticization of the experience of work. A simple  Blackberry advert demonstrated this perfectly; All you need is love. To further illustrate her point, Gregg referred to Steve Jobs and the language of love he expresses. This, along with our own implicit contribution to competitivess at work, and to the use of tools to make our own work and life balance increasingly blurred was contrasted with the recent suicides at the chinese factory, Foxconn which manufactures iPhones.

Of the many other interesting papers, I would like to highlight an ongoing research project by Daniel Ashton at Bath University, with media students who are making use of an incubation space rather than an ordinary class room. Ashton discussed how students described the space as more professional and how they were engaged in ‘performing’ the process of becoming a cultural worker. This process is aimed at getting students ‘industry ready’, clearly a concept which caused much concern amongst the delegates, but which for me, working within a vocational university, is a key objective whether I like it or not. The question for me is not to be critical of students, parents and others who want students to be better prepared for work (self employment or as an employee), but how to balance that while still encouraging students to be critical and independent thinkers. Despite the entrepreneurial nature of the students he researched, Ashton suggested that they demonstrated ethical concerns in wanting to set up social enterprises relating to their cultural work. A common aspiration for my students and something which did not seem to be a contradiction in my experience.

Finally, some of the other points raised:

• Do we need to rethink the notion of self-exploitation in cultural workers?
• How does networking actually work in all the different contexts & subsectors?
• What are the implications for education?
• Should we be more explicit about the idea of failure (which might not be failures) in the cultural industries as opposed to encouraging the celebrity status of a few workers?
• Do we ignore class and the importance of social capital?
• Is the celebration of autonomy and independence associated with cultural workers a paradox?
• Would it be helpful in research to take a sociological and more general view of cultural work?
• Is there a lack of interest and awareness of issues of diversity in research of the cultural sector and workforce?
• Rather than ‘Living on Thin Air’ are we Living on a Contradiction?

We will be uploading videos of all three presentations to this blog in the next few days.

In this post is Matt Grimes’ paper:  Punk’s Underbelly: De-Canonizing Histories of Punk which he has written about and posted in full on his own blog.

Punk’s Underbelly: De-Canonizing Histories of Punk from Interactive Cultures on Vimeo.

Nacho joins us until the middle of July and will be returning to Birmingham in August.

On his arrival Nacho commented: “There aren’t many research centres in Europe where the relationships between music, technology and culture are being researched in the way that the Birmingham centre is doing. I want to develop my postdoctoral research round these relationships.”

We look forward to working with Nacho during his time in Birmingham.

Introduction to Jez’s premiere from Andrew Dubber on Vimeo.

In the video above, Jez Collins of interactive cultures explains the purpose and the genesis of the film, and how it connects with the Birmingham Music Archive.