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Dr Christopher Wiley delivers Keynote lecture at international conference at the University of Amsterdam

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Dr Christopher WJanuary 2018_Amsterdam_Poster 2018 Workshop Transnational Perspectives on Artistsiley gave a Keynote lecture at the two-day international workshop, ‘Transnational Perspectives on the Writing of Artists’ Lives, 19th-21st centuries’, held at the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands on 25–26 January 2018.

Dr Wiley’s 50-minute paper, entitled ‘Musical Biography as a National and Transnational Genre’, explored the extent to which composer life-writing reflects the preoccupations and concerns of its time and place of origin while simultaneously embodying pan-European values that remain strikingly robust across texts from different countries and centuries.

Addressed to an interdisciplinary audience primarily from The Netherlands, France, the UK, and US, Dr Wiley’s lecture developed research previously presented at the University of Oxford, and generated much productive discussion from delegates.

An internationally acknowledged expert in the field, Dr Wiley has given a number of previous keynotes at conferences on biography, including the four-day ‘(Auto)Biography as a Musicological Discourse’ held at the University of Arts, Belgrade in 2008.

The full schedule for the workshop may be viewed here: http://www.uva.nl/en/shared-content/subsites/amsterdam-institute-for-humanities-research/en/events/events/2018/01/transnational-perspectives-artists-lives.html

The programme is also available online as a PDF: https://www.huizingainstituut.nl/v02/wp-content/uploads/Programme-Workshop-Transnational-Perspectives-on-Artists-Lives-2-Jan-18.pdf

Dr Christopher Wiley leads session at University of Surrey Teaching Symposium

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Dr Christopher Wiley at Surrey ExciTeS 2018Dr Christopher Wiley delivered a presentation and facilitated the ensuing discussion at the University of Surreys fifth annual Surrey ExciTeS (Excellence in Teaching Symposium) on Wednesday 3 January 2018.

His session, ‘From Research-led Teaching to Teaching-led Research: Keeping curricula contemporary’, explored the relationship between teaching and research and its implications for maintaining up-to-the-minute taught university curricula, for which substantial original research may necessarily be undertaken by the lecturer for the express purposes of teaching (as distinct from research previously conducted with a view to publication and used within the classroom only as a secondary endeavour).

To illustrate his arguments, Dr Wiley outlined aspects of the design of his first-year undergraduate module on Adele’s 25 album, previously discussed in a roundtable panel he convened for the Study Day on ‘Teaching and Creativity in Popular Music’ held at the University of Surrey on 10 June 2017.

Dr Wiley concluded his session by contending that the dichotomy often posited in the academic profession between teaching and research, typically viewed as two distinct (if not mutually exclusive) activities, is unhelpful for its omitting to take account of the extent of the middleground between them. He further suggested that just as teaching may be research-led, (pedagogic) research may itself correspondingly be led by teaching.

Dr Wiley has participated in all four previous Surrey ExciTeS events, delivering sessions in 201720162015, and 2014.