Document B
University of Newcastle upon Tyne
Faculty Recognition of Research Groups
As part of its continuing strategy to identify, promote and support areas of research
excellence, the Faculty wishes to identify existing and emerging research groups. You are
invited to submit an application for approval.
We hope to keep the administrative burden of the application process to a minimum. If you
require information on grant income this can be obtained from Ms Sam King in Research and
Innovation Services (Sam.King@ncl.ac.uk, ext 3461), or by contacting Maggie Tarbit, Faculty
RIS Officer (ext 6131) or Jane Mann, Faculty Deputy Head of Administration (ext 6109).
To be eligible for FRG status the groups must:

Contain three or more academic members of staff

Identify a School or Institute which hosts the group

Provide evidence of research activity at a level consistent with 5/5* RAE
submission

Provide a credible strategy for future research programmes
The benefits to the Faculties and the University are:
 Further clarification of research strengths
 Effective promotion of strengths within and outwith the Faculty
 Appropriate targeting of funding initiatives and investment
The benefits to the groups are:

Increased likelihood of Faculty and University funding

Direct notification of funding and partnership opportunities known to the Faculty

The establishment of an identity within the Faculty

Permission to use the group name on University letterhead

Permission to display a Faculty website

Faculty recognised research groups may eventually also apply for University
recognition as flagship "Centres" or "Acorns"
The procedure for establishing a group

Submissions should be made to, and will be assessed by, FRSG

Submissions should be made on the attached pro-forma

Each submission should be countersigned by the appropriate Head of School or
Director of Institute
While it will be possible to apply to establish a new research group at any time in the future, if
you are clear about your research strategy it is in the group's best interests to apply sooner
rather than later.
Proposals for the creation of FRGs should if possible, therefore, be submitted to Jane
Mann, Faculty Deputy Head of Administration, by not later than 25 th April 2003 for
consideration by Faculty Research Strategy Group.
Nevertheless, in those cases where it appears implausible that a proposal could be submitted
by the required deadline, applications are encouraged to reach Jane Mann by not later than
30th May 2003 in order to be considered at the following FRSG meeting.
Similarly, please contact Jane Mann if you have any questions about the process, or require
information to complete the application.
Application for Faculty Research Group Status
Group Name: Americas Research Group…………………………………………
Institute or School: NIASSH…………………………………..
(in which the group is to be based)
Lead Applicant: …Diana Paton…………………………………….
Academic group members:
Dr John Beck (English)
Dr Keith Brewster (Historical Studies)
Professor David Campbell (Geography, Politics, Sociology)
Dr Maria Fernandez-Toro (Modern Languages)
Dr Susan-Mary Grant (Historical Studies)
Dr Jens Hentschke (Modern Languages)
Dr Peter Kellet (Architecture, Planning and Landscape)
Dr Vanessa Knights (Modern Languages)
Professor Richard Middleton (Arts and Cultures)
Dr David Oldroyd (Business School)
Dr Diana Paton (Historical Studies)
Dr Gemma Robinson (English)
Dr Penny Spikins (Historical Studies)
Other associated members
(e.g. Associated outside staff. Do not include RAs or technical or clerical staff)
Dr Andrea Noble (Department of Spanish, University of Durham)
Dr Michael Derham (School of Modern Languages, University of Northumbria)
Dr Andrew Kaye (Department of History, University of Durham)
Research Achievements (100 words max)
(Not including individual research achievements)
 Grant from the Newcastle University AHRF, with the Post-Colonial Research
Group, for speakers series 2003-4.
 Co-authored article (Paton, Beck, Robinson) under consideration by Radical
History Review: ‘Teaching The Americas’, arising out of the intellectual work
of designing the Americas MA.
 Conferences, seminars, seminar series including:
o Wilson Harris: Imagination Global Imagine (May 2002)
o Caribbean Research Seminar in the North, seminar in Newcastle
(September 2001).
o Exploratory Seminar Series on Interdisciplinary, Counter-Disciplinary,
and Cross-Institutional Work (organized by Latin American Studies
and Hispanic Studies at the Universities of Durham and Newcastle,
ongoing).
Research Strategy (100 words max)
Aims:
 Provide supportive and stimulating environment for staff and postgraduates


with research interests in the Americas.
Increase PGR students.
Foster collaborative research ideas, where appropriate.
Strategy:
 Speakers series: 5 high profile speakers annually, some shared with
Postcolonial RG.
 ‘Dialogue Afternoon’ semester 1 2003-4: brief research presentations by
local speakers.
 Support for conferences organised by group members, eg Hentschke 2005:
‘Statistics, Mapping, and Organogramas for a Rational Institution-Building’;
Knights 2005: ‘Popular Music in the Hispanic and Lusophone World’.
 Host Caribbean Research Seminar in the North 2004 or 2005.
 Develop website of research interests.
Current active awards
Total active
Major awards
Beck: URC internal research fellowship 2002.
Hentschke: AHRB Research Leave Award, 1st semester 2001-2
Kellett: £230,000 DfID-funded international comparative research project examining
the environmental impacts of home-based enterprises in four cities (including
Cochabamba, Bolivia).
Knights: British Academy small grant: £3,300, URC internal research fellowship of
£8,892.
Spikins: AHRB Innovative grant (£49,696) for ‘Searching for Submerged Sites:
Predictive models using GIS’.
Publications
List the top 10 publications from the group since December 2000.
Beck, John. Writing the Radical Center: William Carlos Williams, John Dewey, and
American Cultural Politics (Albany: State University of New York Press,
2001).
Campbell, David. “Time is Broken: The Return of the Past in the Response to
September 11,” Theory and Event 5:4 (2001). Available at
http://www.jhu.edu/theory_&_event/
Grant, Susan-Mary and Peter J. Parish, eds. Legacy of Disunion: The Enduring
Significance of the American Civil War (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State
University Press, 2003).
Hentschke, Jens. 'O surgimento do estado intervencionista no Brasil', in: Amos
Nascimento (ed.), Brasil. Perspectivas Internacionais (Piracicaba: Ed.
Universidade Metodista 2002), 273-307.
Kellett, P. 'The Construction of Home in the Informal City' Journal of Romance
Studies, Special Issue on 'Spaces of Transculturation: Architecture and
Identity in Latin America', Volume 2, No 3, Winter 2002, 17-31.
Knights, Vanessa. ‘Transgressive Pleasures: The Latin American Bolero’ in Cultura
Popular: Studies in Spanish and Latin American Popular Culture, (eds.)
Shelley Godsland & Anne M. White (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2002), 209-228
Middleton, Richard. 'Work-in(g)-practice: configurations of the popular music
intertext', in The Musical Work: Reality or Invention, ed. Michael Talbot,
University of Liverpool Press, 2000, 59-87.
Paton, Diana (ed), A Narrative of Events, since the First of August 1834, by James
Williams, an Apprenticed Labourer in Jamaica (Durham: Duke University
Press, 2001).
Robinson, Gemma. '"If free writes no happier alphabet": Martin Carter and poetic
silence', small axe (forthcoming 2004).
Spikins, P.A. 2003. ‘Prehistoric People of the Pennines: Reconstructing the
lifestyles of hunter-gatherers on Marsden moor.’ English Heritage and West
Yorkshire Archaeology Service Publications (uses ethnographic evidence
from Tierra del Fuego)
Other supporting evidence (100 words max)
The group grows out of the desire of many scholars of the Americas at Newcastle to
explore connections and comparisons across the hemisphere, and across
disciplines. We recognize that the societies and cultures of Latin America, North
America and the Caribbean share extensive common experiences (for instance
colonialism, slavery and emancipation, consolidation of 'post-colonial' states,
exploitation of and resistance by indigenous peoples), and have a long history of
interaction (through migration, US dominance, border zones).
Many group members have influential recent publications predating 2001 (eg Grant,
North Over South 2000; Campbell, Writing Security 1998; Middleton, Reading Pop
2000).
Signatures:
Lead applicant:…………………………………………………….
Head of School:……………………………………………………
Director of Institute:……………………………………………….
Date: …29 May 2003…………………………………………………………….