Lecturer in Music, University of Liverpool Dr Sam Murray is a lecturer in music industries joining to cover for Dr Sarah Price who is on research leave. Alongside this role he is a lecturer in music business and arts management at Middlesex University, which he joined at the end of 2019 following his work as a Policy & Research Officer for UK Music, the main campaigning and lobbying group for the music industries in the UK. He has also previously worked with the Council of Music Makers. He has previously been a research associate at Teesside University on the Creative Fuse North East project, and a research assistant at Cardiff University as part of Creative Cardiff. He also previously worked for UK Music as a Policy & Research Officer working on their Music by Numbers Report as well as regional city reports exmaining music-making in Manchester and Sheffield. He also worked on policy research in support of reducing business rates for grassroots music venues, changes to the visa system to benefit musicians and improving support for the live music industry in Wales. For over 10 years Sam has played Clarinet with the touring band Me and My Friends and has released three albums Beneath a Level Head (2012), Hide Your Way (2016), Look Up! (2018) and Before I Saw the Sea (2023) with the band. The band have performed on BBC Radio 4's Loose Ends Programme, featured on french station Radio Nova's compilations NovaTunes 3.5 and 3.9 and have performed at many of the UK's biggest festivals including Greenman, Shambala and Kendall Calling. Sam's research has specialised in examining music policy, particularly within music cities. For his PhD he undertook extensive ethnographic research exploring the music scene in Portland, Oregon and exmaining the impact of local policy making. He also co-authored Mapping Cardiff's Creative Economy a report into the state of the creative industries in the Welsh capital. He project managed ground-breaking innovation pilots for Teesside University as part of Creative Fuse North East and worked on successful innovation projects such as Unfolding Theatre's Multiverse Arcade debuted at the Great Exhibition of the North in 2018. His research has appeared in City, Culture & Society as well as the Green European Journal. He has also been part of the music education advisory group for the Senedd Culture, Welsh Language and Communications committee resulting in the Hitting the Right Note Inquiry into funding for and access to music education report and recently appeared before the committee to give evidence to their Live Music Inquiry. More recently he has published chapters on The Kingsmen's 'Louie Louie', Céline Dion's performer-audience interactions in her Las Vegas residency and has forthcoming work on teaching methodologies in music industry studies.
Associate Professor of Geography and International Relations, Mount Holyoke College Serin D. Houston’s research draws on qualitative methods and a geographic perspective to examine questions of equity and justice from the individual to the global scale. Her book, Imagining Seattle: Social Values in Urban Governance (2019), uses Seattle as a lens to analyze the translation of sustainability, creativity, and social justice from theory into praxis. Studying not only what policies and programs say, but also how they work in practice, Houston finds that racism and classism, matched with market-driven mandates, constrain the realization of these social values within the urban governance of Seattle, Washington. With research assistants from Mount Holyoke, Houston investigates sanctuary policies and social movements in the United States. This research has resulted in publications about sanctuary as a process rather than a place designation, the impacts of neoliberalism on sanctuary policies, and the framing of noncitizens as either extraordinary or ordinary in sanctuary social movements. A more recent research project focuses on climate change and human migration. In collaboration with Kiana London, Houston considers the geopolitics of climate change and migration in the Pacific region and the meaning and modes of knowledge production in such spaces. Finally, Houston’s interest in pedagogy and high impact learning has led to collaborations with colleagues at Mount Holyoke and publications about global/local community engagement and scholarship. At Mount Holyoke, Houston mentors independent studies and teaches the following courses: Cities in a Global Context; Climate Migration; Global Movements: Migrations, Refugees, and Diasporas; Research Methods; Sense of Place, Sense of Planet; and World Regional Geography.
Lecturer in Forensic Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University I have a decade of experience working in secure psychiatric hospitals, both in Germany and the UK. My expertise is in the risk and threat assessment of highly violent individuals, especially those that become radicalised. Both my background in Forensic Psychology and my experience as a Hostage and Crisis Negotiator for the NHS Trust equips me with a unique perspective to the counterterrorism debate. Other areas of my work focus on improvement of psychological Trans care and using roleplaying in therapeutic settings.
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Life and Environmental Science, University of Sydney I have a PhD in Marine Biology, specifically coral physiology and biochemistry, focusing on how corals protect themselves against environmental stress caused by climate change. My research spans tropical and temperate reef ecosystems, with a range of organisms such as corals, algae and fish gastrointestinal tracts, with the common theme of marine microbial ecology. My research as a microbial ecologist involves looking at bacteria to understand their role in health and function under a changing climate. My day-to-day activities include experimental design, fieldwork, lab work, data analysis, manuscript writing and science communication work.
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry & Behavioural Neurosciences, McMaster University & Chair Suicide Prevention Community Council of Hamilton, McMaster University I have held senior management roles in academic health institutions, community hospitals, research institutes and universities in Ontario. I am a Fellow of the Canadian College of Health Care Leaders and a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives. I received the Innovation Award from the University of Toronto, Institute for Health Policy Management and Evaluation for my work in launching the Ontario Cancer Research Ethics Board and the Order of Hamilton for advancing suicide prevention initiatives for our city. I was also awarded the Kim Harper Service Award by The Hamilton Academy of Medicine for city-wide suicide prevention work.
Lecturer of Political Science, University of Mpumalanga Sifiso Ndlovu is political science lecturer at the University of Mpumalanga. She previously held a post-doctoral research fellowship at the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Studies (JIAS)-University of Johannesburg and Public Affairs Research Institute (PARI). Her PhD project at the University of the Witwatersrand broadly examined intersections and divergences in the articulations of belonging to ethnic identity and nation-building in post-apartheid South Africa in the culturally heterogeneous KwaMhlanga region. She also holds MA in political studies, an honours degree in political studies and a BA in political studies and sociology, all from the University of the Witwatersrand. Her research interests include ethnic identities, particularly Ndebele ethnicity, the state in Africa, African politics, public policy, democratisation, social justice and the politics of nation-building, belonging and citizenship. She has published journal articles and book chapters on Ndebele material culture, the politics of belonging and nation-building. She has received academic awards and scholarships, including the Next Generation Social Sciences in Africa doctoral fellowship, University of the Witwatersrand’s Council Postgraduate Merit Scholarship, National Research Foundation (NRF) bursary, and University of the Witwatersrand’s Postgraduate Merit Award Doctoral Scholarship.
