The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) has today launched a major strategic research programme that addresses the key issues of how people and societies communicate without using the written word.

Beyond Text: Performances, Sounds, Images, Objects focuses on how we learn from watching and imitating others, - how we learn from images and objects and how and why we respond to performance, sound and place.

Examples of some of the key initial research that is being undertaken include:

• how, by comparing 18th century correspondence (where men and women wrote to each other many times a day) with contemporary blogging practices it can be shown that the more things change the more they remain the same.
• how originality develops within the creative process, in this case through dance choreography.
• using the latest eye-tracking technology to observe how visitors actually observe art works when they enter a museum or gallery.
  

Led by Programme Director Professor Evelyn Welch the Beyond Text programme grew out of a recognition that today's digital culture means that communication is more rapid and often more transitory than ever before; performances, sounds, images and objects circulate swiftly on a global scale only to be replaced by even newer versions. Who controls and manages this material and its dissemination is now a key political, economic and legal question. Yet these are not new problems but ones with long historical roots.

The programme, two years in the making, has just funded 6 PhD studentships where students will work with institutions as diverse as the National Libraries of Scotland, the Art Fund and the White Cube Gallery, London.

The programme has also funded 15 networks and workshops to bring together groups of academics, artists and others to develop high-risk, innovative ideas and methods.

• Experts from Turkey, Georgia and the UK will come to the Courtauld Institute, London to compare how inscriptions become artworks in medieval Islam and Byzantium, a topic of considerable relevance today when figurative images can be so problematic for some religions.
  
• A network of specialists are working with theatre groups to explore how disability history can be performed and preserved.
  
• Another research group is questioning our current fears about rowdy public behaviour by looking at similar issues in the 16th century.
  

The programme will fund a further series of large and small projects in 2009 and will deliver the results of its research with a major festival in 2012.

Read more on the Beyond Text website.

END

Media Contact: Jake Gilmore, Communications Manager, j.gilmore@ahrc.ac.uk. Tel: 0797 099 4586

Enquiries about the scholarly content, aims and themes of the Beyond Text programme should be directed to Professor Evelyn Welch at:

Professor Evelyn Welch
School of English and Drama
Queen Mary, University of London
Mile End Road
London E1 4NS
Email: E.Welch@qmul.ac.uk

Arts & Humanities Research Council: Each year the AHRC provides approximately £100 million from the Government to support research and postgraduate study in the arts and humanities, from archaeology and English literature to design and dance. In any one year, the AHRC makes approximately 700 research awards and around 1,000 postgraduate awards. Awards are made after a rigorous peer review process, to ensure that only applications of the highest quality are funded. Arts and humanities researchers constitute nearly a quarter of all research-active staff in the higher education sector. The quality and range of research supported by this investment of public funds not only provides social and cultural benefits but also contributes to the economic success of the UK.