On 25 to 26 February Felicia took part in the “Crucible” organised by the Future Leaders’ Fellowship Development Network. These are residential workshops designed to foster collaborations between researchers and introduce new ways of thinking and working.

On 17 February Felicia took part in the What Now / What Next? CPD Study Day at our project partner, the Bowes Museum. The study day set out to explore ways to connect with communities that don’t, won’t, or can’t access our spaces, offering practical approaches to widening representation and fostering inclusion.

In January Felicia was invited by the University of Zurich to deliver a three-hour lecture for their Advanced Studies in Applied History Programme, an exciting and ambitious degree delivered by over 100 lecturers on their campus in Zurich but also across Georgia, Sicily, and the US.

On the 7^th of November Floris was invited to hold a talk at Kansai Gaidai University in Japan.

If you noticed that our news section went a little quiet, that’s because life took over for all of us. We are proud and happy to report that Rémi and Oliver were offered – and accepted – new permanent positions (you can read about that in separate posts), and Felicia went on maternity leave in December 2023, returning to work part time in September 2024. Floris also went on parental leave and now works part time on the project and part time as a history lecturer for Northumbria. Our period of leave and moves to part-time working means that our project got extended until September 2026!

As part of our ongoing partnership with the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle, Felicia and Floris gave public talks at the museum in June. Focussing on textiles and ceramics, these talks were designed to highlight how the project’s themes of migration and technological innovation are reflected in the fantastic collections at the Bowes.

Our Project PhD student, Oliver Gunning, has been offered a post as Administrative Officer at Historic Environment Scotland, the country’s lead public body established to investigate, care for and promote Scotland’s historic environment.

On the 7th of May Floris travelled down to Durham to take part in a workshop at Durham University. The “Asian Connections: Flows of People, Medicines, Ideas, and Practices” workshop was held at the Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies (IMEMS) .

On the 4th and 5th of April the project held its Migration – Innovation Conference at the German Museum of Technology.

On the 4th and 5th of April we will host the ‘Migration – Innovation: Human Mobility & Technological Innovation in History’ conference at the German Museum of Technology in Berlin.

On the 7th of March, Floris and Oliver once again went to the Oriental Museum in Durham in order to run the teacher training day for Durham University School for Education’s PGCE students as part of a continued collaboration with the University’s Library and Collections Learning and Engagement team.

We want to share the excellent news that Rémi Dewière, post-doc on our project, has a new position as Lecturer at L’Orientale University in Naples, Italy.

The Project will facilitate a series of workshops with migrant makers at the Shipley Gallery in Gateshead which will result in an exhibition showcasing the objects and skills they have brought to their new home in the Northeast of England.

On Tuesday October 31st the whole team took the train down to Durham to do another teacher training day at the Oriental Museum in Durham

Felicia visited Hotspur School in Newcastle to run two sessions with all year four children (a total of 60 pupils and their teachers). This formed part of our project’s ambition to make contemporary classrooms more inclusive, by demonstrating that ethnic and cultural diversity which characterise contemporary society already existed in the past.

On Wednesday 11th October, Felicia, Floris, and Oliver travelled to our project partner, the Bowes Museum at Barnard Castle to discuss and plan collaborative outputs, which we are very excited about

In October 2-3, 2023, Rémi Dewière attended an international conference entitled "Thinking in the Multiverse: Unraveling the Layers of Islamic Diplomatic History" sponsored by the NYU Abu Dhabi Humanities Research Fellowship for the Study of the Arab World.

On the 29th of September, Felicia, Floris, Oliver and Rémi all visited the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin to take part in a symposium.

On 26 September, the project team visited the Deutsches Technikmuseum, our international project partner in Berlin.

On September 20th and 21st the UKRI-FLF ‘Migration, Innovation, Adaptation’ project held two workshops, organised by Remi Dewiere and Floris Van Swet: the ‘Migration Matters Workshop’ and ‘Migration and Entrepreneurship in Early Modern Technology Transfers’ at Northumbria University.