CHASE Research Networks Directory

Find CHASE networks that are related to your research interests and needs. With a wide range of topics and activities, CHASE Research Networks are organised under three categories: methodological approaches or practices, sites of activism, and researcher well-being.

If you have any questions or you want to start a network, reach out to CHASE’s researcher networks officer at networks@chase.ac.uk. If you’d like to join a network, you can contact the network directly or fill out this form here.

Interdisciplinary Research Methods Networks

 
 

Digital Studies Collective (DiSCo)

The Digital Studies Collective (DiSCo) detects a fading distinction between the offline and online worlds. We are not dystopian about humanity’s technological destiny, nor do we envisage a utopic future. Rather, we believe it is of critical importance to develop and deploy innovative research processes to grapple with our new hybrid reality. 

We welcome students from all stages of their PhD and across any field or period, so long as they are keen to incorporate digital methodologies, frameworks and tools into their research.

If you are interested in joining the Digital Studies Collective please email editors@discojournal.com with your name, institution, thesis title and a few words on what you hope to get out of the Cohort.

Website: www.discojournal.com
Twitter: @CHASE_DiSCo
Instagram: @discojournal

 

The Creative Writers Network

The Creative Writers Network is open to all PRGs interested in creative writing whether it is your primary research focus or not. We aim to have one online meeting per month and hope to have some in-person meetings in the future. The topics of our last three meetings were Top 5 Websites for Creative Writers, Autoethnography Research Writing, and a Medical Creative Writing Workshop co-hosted with the Broadly Conceived Network.

This network is led by Emily Berry, PhD student in Creative Writing at Birkbeck University.
Find our latest updates on X [Twitter]: @ CHASE_writers

Please email chase.creative.network@gmail.com if you’re interested in joining as a member or co-leading any sessions.

 

Aural Pluralities Network

AuralPluralities is a research network led by academics and creative practitioners dedicated to addressing, and extending upon, the ‘auraldiverse turn’ in the Arts and Humanities research: theory and praxis (as referenced by: Drever (2015); Farmer (2020), Hugill (2019), Renel (2018), Thompson (2020)), problematising the onto-epistemological hierarchies associated with sound and audition.

By critiquing accepted norms in audio technology, sound culture and Western epistemologies and questioning the extent of human perception, relations in and through the vibratory world (and whether hearing and listening is ever an individual act), the network aims to foster an expanded conception of aurality, developing within its associates direct experience of the many modes of knowing that sound affords. In working through such research questions, we aim to collectively create (expanded) sonic research methodologies and counter structures to audio and cultural standardisation.

AuralPluralities is a gathering space dedicated to support and facilitate academics, researchers and students - across the CHASE network, as well as associated scholars and practitioners (e.g. invited speakers/presenters and workshop leaders.) and independent scholars - throughout their research careers, via a multitudinous series of activities. These include in-person networking events, specialist workshops/training sessions, online presentations and discussions, and field trips. In future years, we hope to establish concerts, collaborative projects, exhibition opportunities, publications, plenaries and colloquia.

Information and ,mailing list: auralpluralities@protonmail.com

The AuralPluralities Network is a collaboration between:
John Drever (Goldsmith, University of London).
Alice Eldridge (University of Sussex).
Helen Frosi (Independent/SoundFjord).
Aki Pasoulas (University of Kent).

 

CHASE Medieval and Early Modern Network

The CHASE Medieval and Early Modern Research Network offers a space for interdisciplinary collaboration and development amongst the cohort and beyond for those working with materials from this period. Providing a relaxed community for postgraduate researchers to share their work-in-progress and develop their knowledge and presentation skills in a supportive environment, the network welcomes those with historical, art historical, literary, political, and economic focuses to share their ideas and perspectives. 

The network hosts informal online monthly meetings on the last Monday of the month to share work-in-progress research presentations, guest lectures and discussion groups. With 2024 being the year of our inaugural in-person MEMRN Conference, the network is always seeking new members to help bring to fruition our ambitious plans for the future organising specialist skills training, exhibition visits and networking events.

Please send an email to CHASEmemrn@gmail.com or contact us via social media to be added to the mailing list.

X [Twitter]: @MEMRNChase

Instagram: @memrnchase

Threads: @memrnchase

BlueSky: @memrn.bsky.social

Website: https://memrnchase.wordpress.com

 

Broadly Conceived

Broadly Conceived is an interdisciplinary network of PhD and early career researchers who are interested in reproduction-related topics including (in)fertility, pregnancy, birth and more. We meet regularly online and organise one-off in-person events such as writing retreats and conferences.

The team consists of Jemma Walton, Kate Errington and Genevieve Smart (all Birkbeck), and Rachel Arkell (Kent).

To read more about us and our scheduled events please see our website. You can stay up to date with our activities by signing up to our mailing list or following us on X @BConceived. 

Our email is broadlyconceived@gmail.com

 

ECHOES (Exploring Collective Histories and Ongoing ExperienceS)

The ECHOES Network explores multidisciplinary representations of pasts operating in varying ‘presents’. Co-founders Francis and Louise (University of Essex) established the network to bring together researchers interested in how legacies of the past manifest in archives, cultural memory, and social practice.

Spanning the humanities, arts, and social sciences, we aim to support research and dialogue across these fields with monthly reading groups, and also provide opportunities to present works-in-progress in a friendly environment.

We aim to have various in-person meetings, including writing retreats, exhibition visits, and conferences, and to also establish a digital presence to improve accessibility for non-CHASE members who wish to join our discussion groups.

Email: echoesnetwork@outlook.com

 

CHASE Mental Health and Social Justice Network

Last year the NHS declared ‘a national emergency’ in mental healthcare in England. With mental distress on the rise, and services chronically underfunded, the question of social justice for those in need of support is more urgent than ever. Faced with a polarised landscape: neglect and lack of access to treatment on the one hand, and punitive responses on the other; researchers and practitioners need to find ways of coming together to critically assess the best and worst of institutional practices - past and present - in a way that can contribute to meaningful change.

The CHASE Mental Health and Social Justice Network aims to provide opportunities for PGR researchers, service-users, organisers and practitioners to share research, lived experience and professional practice. We engage with themes of mental health, mental health institutions, their practices and provision, and questions of social justice using a range of forums including online reading groups, film screenings, workshops and creative/skills exchanges.

Email: mhsjnetwork@gmail.com

 

Future Matters Network

Future Matters is an interdisciplinary network that brings together scholars from architecture, arts, film, mathematics, media, and science to explore research practices emerging through the forecasting and media representation of unfolding catastrophes—whether climate, pandemic, or war. Focusing on computational simulations, scenario planning, and predictive modelling, we examine how these tools shape our understanding of the present and the future. Drawing from sociological, historical, and media scholarship, we explore the transformative impact of prediction and crisis on environments and the potential of these methodologies as sites of resistance. By fostering collaboration across disciplines, we aim to cultivate alternative imaginations of the future beyond the confines of large-scale data processing and predictive modelling.

Email: lzimm001@gold.ac.uk jnuen001@gold.ac.uk

 

Race and Disability Reading Group

Emerging in the first decades of the 21st Century has been new academic exploration of the specificity of experience for intersectional groups, communities that combine two or more societally marginalised identities. Research has been shown how identities, such as race or gender, dynamically interrelate to form a unique recipient of a fluid societal prejudice very much their own. Most recently, the intersectional relationship of race and disability has drawn academic and media attention. In the USA, no less for the correlative ‘pipeline’ revealed between undiagnosed or misunderstood learning disabilities in African American school children and eventual incarceration in US prisons (detailed on Sage journals website here). At ground roots level, there has also been focus from groups such as ‘Sisters of Frida’ on the experiences of non-White disabled women, a community that endure a special societal invisibility and powerlessness informed by their three coalescing identities.

The proposed Race and Disability Reading Group aims to bring together academic and non-academic minds interested in unpacking through experience and scholarly discussion the specificity of this intersectionality, particularly in relation to representation in film, television and other screen media. Meeting once a month for two hours, group organiser and postgraduate researcher, Jana Manuelpillai (himself studying the intersection of blindness and race in US TV) will choose a chapter or PDF essay/article related to race and disability to begin the reading group discussion. Moving forward, attendees will also be invited to submit ideas for reading.

This Race and Disability Reading Group is open to all students, postgraduates and non-academics across Birkbeck and beyond interested in this topic and desiring group study support in this field. The Reading Group will ensure that all attendees are comfortable and supported in the session. As such any individual needs (related to disability or otherwise) are welcomed and will be catered for with kindness. The Reading Group will be a safe and private space for all viewpoints to be heard.

If interested in joining the Race and Disability Reading Group, please email jana@thenoblesage.com. Sessions will take place at 6-8pm in Room G08 at Birkbeck Central, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HY on the first Wednesday of each month, every month. If you would like to attend remotely, do let us know and we will do our very best to accommodate.

 

Network for Critical Interdisciplinary Practice-Based Research

The aim of our network is to develop and support a community around practice-based research and foster inter (intra-)disciplinary practice-based research (PBR) relations. Our motivation for meeting is to bring practice-based researchers together  to discuss, reflect, engage, explore, experiment, and develop our own practices as well as our practices in relation. These gatherings take different forms, from discussions around reading, practical explorative sessions, as well as in the form of the “crit”, or a practice critique feedback session. We are experimental and seek to create a distinct and proactive space for disciplines that engage with practice.
This year we will meet once a term as a community for a large crit event, we are hosting a PBR conference event at the end of the year and we will also have monthly convenings. Each offering presents an opportunity for different networking focus, modalities and rhythms.
If you would like to be a part of the PBR conference organising committee, or be informed about our meetings, please reach out to critinterdisciplinarypractice@gmail.com.

 

Intersectional Healing Network

Our network is dedicated to individuals who experience intersectional barriers—whether through race, caste, gender, sexuality, class, disability, or other overlapping systems of oppression. Together, we aim to create a "common" of spiritual practice rooted in the richness and diversity of our worldviews and belief systems. This initiative, led by Clémentine Bedos and Abhaya Rajani, builds on the Kali Kula community, which focuses on spiritual praxis for collective healing and solidarity among racialised and marginalised bodies. Our network centers care and healing in academic spaces, offering underrepresented researchers and staff a space to reclaim ancestral knowledge systems and support each other in navigating the challenges of academia.

Please feel to contact us through intersectionalhealingnetwork@gmail.com 

Registration link: https://tinyurl.com/yyh4xs7s

Registration deadline: 4th December 2024 (midnight)

 
 

Activism-Oriented Networks

 

CHASE Feminist Network

The CHASE Feminist Network was borne of discussions wishing to provide spaces of resistance in what continues to be a patriarchal world and broader education sector, with ongoing and intersectional discrimination happening at all levels.

For more information, please contact: chasefeminist@gmail.com

Twitter: @ChaseFeminist
Website: www.chasefeministnetwork.com

 

CHASE Climate Justice Network

The CHASE Climate Justice Network emerged in Summer 2019 to centre Climate Justice and the climate emergency for arts and humanities researchers - to help us reflect, (take) care and work out what we can do in our different contexts. We understand Climate Justice as cutting across disciplines and methodologies. It intersects with multiple forms of activism including but not limited to feminism, anti-racist struggle, indigenous rights and the fight towards socio-economic equality at all levels. Since this crisis is unprecedented in human history, this network will address the urgent need to develop a language with and a context in which to speak about it.

If you would like to get involved, you can:

Call for Committee Members

The Climate Justice Network has been a rich forum of exchange for many of those involved. Unfortunately, the core members have either completed or are nearing the completion of their PhDs. For this reason, there are no plans to continue the network's activities beyond the current academic year. However, if there are current PGR students interested in climate and environmental justice issues who have ideas and enthusiasm to take the network forward, we would be delighted to support with administrative and practical experiences. Please get in touch!

Contact: Naomi: nhenn001@gold.ac.uk, or email chaseclimatejustice@protonmail.com

 

A Refugee Justice Network for a Borderless World

Network Description: This is the most critical juncture for studying the refugee crisis and impact of borders. Recent events across the world, from anti-immigrant violence to international travel regulations, and riots push us to evaluate the presence of borders and its impacts in our lives. As fight rages over the imposition of borders, it becomes important to understand and raise voice for the ones most affected by the borders—refugees of all sorts and the internally displaced living a life at the intersection of many discriminations. The network will encourage critical discussions on refugee-dom and effects of borders on human life and culture throughout history and in contemporary times through webinars, exhibitions and blog submissions from effected people, activists, researchers, and academics. The network will also aim to hold workshops to assess the refugee psychological space and asks for rights through policy submissions with help of groups related to such work in affected areas.

Motivation: Being a second generation India-Pakistan Partition survivor, the effects of borders on my personal life and family propelled me to develop the network for future work.

Contact: amritadasgupta58@gmail.com

 
 

Student Support and Advocacy Networks

 

Neurodiversity Network

More details to follow soon.

 

CHASE Alumni Network

CHASE KEH is currently developing a CHASE Alumni Network. Joining the network will allow former CHASE PhD researchers to connect with other scholars and professionals, maintain their relationships with their peers, and keep up to date with CHASE news and funding opportunities.

Members of the network will also provide support, advice, and mentoring for CHASE researchers wishing to undertake collaborative, knowledge exchange projects with non-higher education organisations, and will have the opportunity to act as supervisors for CHASE projects.

Former CHASE researchers who are interested in joining the alumni network can do so through the enquiry form on the CHASE knowledge exchange hub website: https://www.chasekeh.co.uk/for/alumni