英国索尔福德大学城乡可持续发展博士后职位

The Centre for Sustainable Urban and Regional Futures (SURF) is an inter-disciplinary research centre in the School of the Built Environment at the University of Salford. SURF’s research aims to generate understanding about how political, economic, social, technological and environmental changes interact to affect urban and regional futures.

SURF is a partner in a large four-year project, funded under the Cross-Research Council Programme on Connected Communities (http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/FundingOpportunities/Pages/connectedcommunities.aspx). Led by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Connected Communities programme aims to “to mobilise the potential for increasingly inter-connected, culturally diverse, communities to enhance participation, prosperity, sustainability, health and well-being by better connecting research, stakeholders and communities.” In 2012 three collaborative consortium projects were funded under the Cultural Economy theme.

One of these projects is on ‘Cultural Intermediation: Connecting Communities in the Cultural Urban Economy’. Led by the University of Birmingham (2012-2016), the consortium also includes the Universities of Salford, Liverpool John Moores, Birmingham City, City and Bristol. Cultural intermediation is a process which connects different kinds of communities into the creative economy and wider society. The research asks to what extent these processes meet the needs of urban communities in the 21st century and how they might operate more effectively (visit: http://culturalintermediation.wordpress.com/about/).

We are looking to appoint an outstanding individual as a post-doctoral Research Fellow to work across the project in delivering the work packages. The post is tenable for 18 months from April 2014 at Grade 7, £30,728.

The Research Fellow will specifically be employed to deliver work packages relating to community engagement and collaborative, participatory arts-based interventions in the Greater Manchester city-region. A particular emphasis is on setting up, developing, recording and providing a research report on the establishment of local commissioning panels to co-develop local cultural activities in the Salford area.

The successful candidate will be expected to hold a PhD or shortly to attain one and be able to demonstrate experience and insight across the arts and humanities and social sciences. They should have experience in practice-based arts interventions, as well as a firm grasp of cultural policy in an urban context and an ability to produce reports of a good quality. Local knowledge of and embeddedness in the Salford area will be a key advantage.

Once appointed, the candidate will work as part of a collaborative interdisciplinary and cross-institutional team. An equivalent post exists at the University of Birmingham.

The post-holder will report to Dr Beth Perry, Associate Director of SURF and will be located in SURF’s offices in Salford, Manchester. As a member of the SURF team, the successful candidate will also have the opportunity to engage in relevant Centre, School and University activities in the context of the overall portfolio of projects.