Research degree funding opportunities

Context

Current health and environmental crises heighten our awareness of the positioning of the human body within the global scale of disease transmission and climate emergency.

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for health and wellbeing, social inclusion and environment, and World Health Organization and UNESCO initiatives emphasise interrelationships between planetary and human health. Past cultures were also sensitised to the nuanced relationship between the individual human (microcosm) and the universe (macrocosm), engaged in activities of observation, measurement, mapping and scrutiny.

Exploration of these knowledges offers opportunities to reappraise parallel contemporary perceptions and experiences. Centred on Wellcome Collection's rich holdings relating to astrology, health and the body, the proposed will be a landmark project that will be Wellcome's first CDA in the creative arts.

The project focuses on Wellcome's medieval European manuscripts and printed books, unique materials that reveal ideas about how the movements of the planets and the phases of the sun and moon directly impacted on health.

Medieval astrological diagrams like Zodiac Man (e.g. MS.8932) show how zodiacal signs were associated with specific areas of the anatomy, affecting treatments like bloodletting. Unusual astrological conditions were seen to bring about illness, such as attribution by the German scholar Grünpeck (EPB/INC/2.b.2) of the arrival of the pox in 1496 to the ill effects of a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.

Astrology was also central to efforts to predict and prevent illness and environmental catastrophe. Folding calendars (MS.8932, MS.40) and astrological tables (MS.8004, EPB/B/283) provided key information about upcoming celestial conditions and their expected impact on the body, the weather and harvest yields.

(Image: MS.8932 astrological tables and Zodiac Man)

Research questions

• How can expanded art practice communicate the value of historical collections for understanding contemporary relationships to the body, offering audiences new understandings of their own health and wellbeing?
• How might the mobilisation of European ideas about the observational relationship between macrocosm and microcosm provoke interventions into contemporary discourses on alternative health, wellbeing, and the relationship between self and planet?
• How can such practice place historical European ideas of bodily health in dialogue with global communities, gendered discourses on the body, and changing definitions of illness and disability?

Methods

Situated in expanded art practice (encompassing, for example, writing, performance, visual art), multimodal approaches offer expressive provocation into discourses of contemporary health.

Expanded practice is shaped by contextualisation through contemporary preoccupations with the relationship between health and planet, for example creative writing (Sarah Perry, Enlightenment; Richard Powers, Bewilderment; Daisy LaFarge, Lovebug), dance/performance (Alexandrina Hemsley; Florence Peake; Lenio Kaklea), and visual art (Candida Powell-Williams; Samah Shihadi; Jenny Saville).

The candidate will determine the theoretical framing of the project but potential approaches include historical and art historical methodologies, medical and environmental humanities, autoethnographic practice, new materialism, disability studies, crip theory, and decolonial and feminist practices.

Outputs

The final submission will take the form of multimodal expanded art practice that communicates to public audiences through performance, publication or display. Outputs will also reach internal staff and researcher audiences at Wellcome.

Subject to AHRC eligibility criteria, the studentship covers tuition fees (home rate only) and a grant (stipend) towards living expenses.

AHRC studentship rates for 2025-26 are yet to be announced – the doctoral stipend for 2024-25 was £21,237 (three and a half years full-time or part-time equivalent for seven years); levels are likely to rise slightly for 2025-26.

Collaborative Doctoral Students also receive an additional stipend of £600.

Students can apply for an additional six months stipend to engage in extended development activities such as work placements. See AHRC funding and training for full details.

Additional funding from Wellcome Collection consists of up to £1500 research expenses per annum and funds to organise workshops or knowledge exchange events.

As a TECHNE student, the selected applicant will have full access to the TECHNE Doctoral Training Partnership development activities and networking opportunities, joining a cohort of almost 60 students per year from across ten universities in the UK.

A postgraduate degree in a relevant field is highly desirable.

Candidates will need to evidence experience in working across different creative forms, although it may be that formal qualifications or existing professional practice prioritise one particular mode of expression.

Experience of working with cultural or community organisations will be valuable but is not a requirement.

Some of the collection holdings include Middle English, French or Latin, however a large amount of the material is visual and translations of some sources are also available.

Kingston has a training development fund that will support candidates who would like additional training in archive sources, and Wellcome Collection offers in-house collections support.

While prior experience of archives or language skills are therefore not a requirement, willingness to undertake additional training where necessary will be advantageous.

Given the focus on health and wellbeing and the potential for autoethnographic work, the project will welcome applications from candidates with lived experience of vulnerability, chronic illness and/or disability.

Applicants must satisfy AHRC eligibility requirements and terms and conditions.

Students who are fee assessed as ‘international' are eligible for the stipend to support living costs and tuition fees at the UK rate. UKRI funding will not cover international fees set by universities, nor will it cover visa fees and associated costs.

The proposed studentship (subject to selection by the TECHNE Panel) will fund a full-time PhD studentship for three and a half years or part time study for up to seven years (50% FTE and above).

Please send your expression of interest for this project by email to: KSAresearch-applications@kingston.ac.uk

Please title your email ‘Wellcome Collection CDA Application'

Applications should comprise the following:

• 1-2 page statement outlining your interest, the specific qualities and skills you would bring to the project, and how you would approach the research questions as outlined in the project vision.
• A copy of your first degree and any postgraduate qualifications.
• A current CV (no more than 2 pages).

Applications must be received by Kingston University no later than Wednesday 15 January 2025, midday (GMT).

Interviews for short-listed candidates will take place online on Wednesday 22 January 2025.

The selected candidate will then be supported by the supervisors to complete a TECHNE application for final submission to TECHNE by Thursday 20th February 2025.

Results of this second stage competition will be known by May 2025.