ISCHE 43 Pre-conference Workshop: Call for Participation

Pre-conference workshop at ISCHE 43 Milan: CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

Challenging Stagnant Hope: Educational Ecology, Public History and University-Community Engagement in the History of Education

Date: Tuesday 30 August 2022
Timeframe: 10:00–16:00

Convenors:

Angelo Van Gorp (University of Koblenz-Landau, Germany); Eulàlia Collelldemont and Núria Padrós (University of Vic, Spain); Inês Félix and Björn Norlin (Umeå University, Sweden); Ian Grosvenor (University of Birmingham, UK); Frederik Herman (University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland); Ana Paz (University of Lisbon, Portugal).

This workshop focuses on the history of the steel town Gary, Indiana. Once a symbol of educational progressivism and urban-industrial America, Gary is today the most segregated city in the United States and plagued by population decline, physical decay, joblessness, poverty, and crime. Gary’s debris made the city into a Mecca for urban explorers whose photos dominate the city’s imagery on the internet. Inspired by this imagery, in his documentary Stagnant Hope: Gary, Indiana (2014) filmmaker Alex J. Semchuck goes into the stagnant hope of Gary’s citizens to explore the city’s potential for revitalization. The workshop starts with a viewing of the documentary and employs three perspectives that serve as tools for analysis: urban exploring, public history, and university-community engagement. The combined perspectives aim at entering a discussion opening up possibilities for the study of educational ecologies in connection with a participatory turn in the history of education. The language will be English, but translation into other languages used in ISCHE can be provided should the need arise.

Schedule:

10:00-12:00 Introduction and viewing of the Documentary “Stagnant Hope”
12:00-13:00 Guided discussion on “Stagnant Hope”
13:00-14:00 Lunch
14:00-16:00 Extended discussion beyond “Stagnant Hope”, fed by impulses provided by the convenors

The number of participants will be limited to a maximum of 20, convenors not included. If you wish to participate, please send an email to Angelo Van Gorp (vangorp@uni-landau.de) by May 31 at the latest. Places will be allocated on a first come, first served base.