CRASSH - the first seven months

The Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) has made significant progress since its launch in February 2001.

Support staff and a Deputy Director have been appointed; seminars, conferences and workshops have been held; the first wave of project proposals are being considered and plans have been submitted for a permanent new home for the Centre on the Sidgwick site.

Professor Ian Donaldson is pleased with the Centre's progress thus far:

"We have laid firm foundations for the future. We are building an excellent support team and I am delighted to welcome Professor John Morrill as Deputy Director. His international reputation as an early modern historian will enhance the academic authority of the Centre. His thorough knowledge of Cambridge will be invaluable as we build partnerships across the University and as a member of the AHRB he brings a wealth of skill and experience in research funding. "

CRASSH aims to be a central, co-ordinating body for arts social sciences and humanities, that supports and animates research - especially, though not only, of an interdisciplinary kind - right across the faculties.

At the launch of the Centre in February Professor Hugh Mellor expressed the hope that CRASSH would help members of the Schools of Arts and Humanities and Humanities and Social Sciences in the search to secure external funding for their research projects. CRASSH and the School of Humanities and Social Sciences have now jointly funded the appointment, in the University's Research Services Division, of the first full-time Contracts and Applications Manager solely responsible for projects in the arts, social sciences, and humanities.

CRASSH has also organised a series of research days when staff can learn more about the work of funding bodies and the processes of applying for major research grants. David Eastwood, the Chief Executive of the AHRB was the guest speaker at the first event and future events will be addressed by Professor Richard Brook, Director of the Leverhulme Trust; Dr Gordon Marshall, the Chief Executive of the ESRC and Viscount Runciman and Mr Peter Brown, President and Secretary of the British Academy respectively.

CRASSH is currently encouraging a number of projects: on the histories and cultures of psychoanalysis; on the cultural consequences of the Wall Street collapse of 1929; and on the creation of virtual theatres and performance spaces from the early modern period. These projects, once fully funded and adopted,will be accommodated in the Centre, and each may run for several years.

As well as supporting a wide range of research projects and activities, CRASSH will focus on a major theme each year. Its first theme is The Organisation of Knowledge and is an opportunity to explore some of the ways in which systems of knowledge have been created and sustained by different societies at different historical periods.

The theme was launched in the summer with a conference on The Idea of the Encyclopedia, organised by Professor Bryan Turner, Head of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences and Professor Mike Featherstone of the Centre for Theory, Culture and Society at Nottingham Trent University. Other activities under development include projects related to museums and material culture organised by Professor Martin Daunton and others and a series of workshops and conference on electronic knowledge. Ideas for further activities around this year's theme will be discussed at an open meeting on 26 November, 2001.

Professor Donaldson hopes that CRASSH can have a major impact on the work of the University:

"Whilst the Centre's size and location are still limited, its plans and aspirations are very considerable. As CRASSH's programmes develop over the coming months, and its Visiting Fellows from various part of the world begin to arrive in Cambridge (from Michaelmas Term 2002), it is hoped that the Centre will begin affect the University's intellectual landscape as dramatically as the arrival of those new science and technology buildings in western Cambridge have changed its physical landscape."