Affect Café

AFFECT CAFÉ: What does research strategy feel like?

Friday, April 16th at 10.40-12.20 EEST

Organizers: Academic Affects project / Johanna Hokka, Elisa Kurtti, Pia Olsson, Tiina Suopajärvi and Oili-Helena Ylijoki

Talk about research strategies, international top research and excellence have become part of the everyday of today’s academic work. Researchers are expected to modify their research topics, methods and viewpoints as well as to select their forms and channels of publishing according to the contemporary science policy guidelines. These continuously shifting demands can evoke various feelings in us as researchers. They also affect the everyday lives and wellbeing of researchers both socially and materially. Thus, research strategies are not merely rational science political choices, but instead they are produced in various affective spaces and movements (Ahmed 2014).

In our project, we scrutinize the affective economy that is mobilised by research strategies. We are interested in the values, moral imperatives and the emotional hotspots the research strategies impose. Is there space and need for other kinds of movements within the universities, what could these movements be and what kinds of futures can be produced by them? And how far do these futures reach, beyond a quartal, a year or decades to come?

We welcome researchers to our workshop to discuss and share their emotions and experiences regarding research strategies and everyday life of academia. Our workshop is arranged in a learning café form where we share experiences and viewpoints related to the everyday lives of researchers in small groups. In line with the conference theme, our aim is to contemplate on the affects and their role regarding the wellbeing and everyday lives of researchers.

The discussions are recorded, and they will be used as our project’s research data. Participation in the workshop does not require abstract submissions, just enrolling on the workshop will suffice. The maximum amount of workshop participants is 18 people.

We invite you to share your academic affects with us!

The enrolment period is open until Monday 12.4.2021 and will close after 23:59.

The enrolment form can be filled here.

More detailed instructions regarding participation will be sent to the ones who have enrolled to the workshop closer to the time when the conference is held.

 

Reference: Ahmed, Sara (2014) The Cultural Politics of Emotion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.