2017 Graduate summer field school: Narratives of memory, migration, and xenophobia in the European Union and Canada

Narratives
© Canadian Museum for Human Rights / Aaron Cohen

GS 501: Narratives of memory, migration, and xenophobia in the European Union and Canada (units: 1.5)

Dates: July 16 - 27 (Hungary, Germany, France) / August 16 - 26, 2017 (Canada)

Registration fee: $750 (includes accommodations throughout Europe and Canada, intra-country travel within Europe, a one-way ticket from Winnipeg to Victoria, and all breakfasts in Europe)

Additional costs: Tuition, return airfare (arriving to Budapest/leaving from Marseilles) (arriving to Winnipeg/leaving from Victoria (as necessary)), travel insurance

The deadline for applications was March 17, 2017. 

This international graduate summer school* is open to students from any university and will be of particular interest to those in the Humanities, European Studies, Memory Studies, Holocaust Studies, Social Sciences, Education, Fine Arts and Music. Organizing/participating universities include: Aix-Marseille Université (France), Universität Osnabruck (Germany), and Eötvös Loránd University (Hungary). Registered students will study and travel for three weeks in Hungary, Germany, France and Canada engaging in intercultural discussions and musical performances at sites of traumatic memory.

At each location, students will reflect on how narratives (both written and musical) of the past inform the present context of migration and xenophobia, in particular the Syrian refugee crisis. Furthermore, students will examine how each of the four countries under study is responding through its own conception of multiculturalism and refugee settlement policies. 

During the final week of the summer school, students will have the opportunity to present their research projects (written, oral and/or musical) at an interdisciplinary symposium at the University of Victoria. This symposium will bring together emerging and established scholars, students, musicians, composers, community leaders, and members of the public for an interdisciplinary and intercultural discussion on the role of memory and narratives of the past as a political tool and opportunity for cultural reconciliation. A particular objective of this symposium will be to use the Canadian experience with multiculturalism, and the recently published Truth and Reconciliation Commission report as a comparative touch point for understanding pan-European challenges in light of the current refugee crisis.

As part of the summer school, a two-day symposium, entitled "Intercultural dialogues: Narratives of memory, migration, xenophobia and European identity" was held at UVic on the 24th and 25th of August, 2017.Both the summer school and the symposium were part of the "Intercultural dialogues: Narratives of memory, migration, xenophobia and European identity" grant. 

Instructor: Charlotte Schallié (Germanic Studies) contact for more info

Contributing faculty: Dániel Péter Biró (School of Music), Helga Hallgrimsdottir (Sociology), and Helga Thorson (Germanic Studies).

* upper-level undergraduate students may be considered, as space permits