SPACE FOR CULTURAL STUDIES

Abstract

Based on a series of interviews conducted in the summer of 2011 with fourteen key faculty and students of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at Birmingham University in England, including Lucy Bland, Rosalind Brunt, John Clarke, Paul Gilroy, Stuart Hall, Stuart Hanson, Richard Johnson, Gregor McLennan, Angela McRobbie, David Morley, Christopher Pawling, Andrew Tolson and Helen Wood, this work focuses on the emergence and development of the now defunct birthplace of British cultural studies. In an effort to understand the origins and contemporary landscape of cultural studies within British higher education today, certain questions must be posed to those most closely connected to the Centre: What were the historical conditions of possibility that allowed a particular formation of cultural studies to emerge in 1964 at an up-and-coming university in Birmingham? What does its closing in 2002 tell us about the conditions of possibility for its practice today? What will be the possibilities of its practice in the coming years? Through these questions, I demonstrate the intimate connection between the changing forms of cultural studies at the Centre during its existence and the larger movements in higher education today.

Keywords:

• Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
• University of Birmingham
• British cultural studies
• Lucy Bland
• Rosalind Brunt
• John Clarke
• Paul Gilroy
• Stuart Hall
• Stuart Hanson
• Richard Johnson
• Gregor McLennan
• Angela McRobbie
• David Morley
• Christopher Pawling
• Andrew Tolson and Helen Wood

Notes

1. As a result of both technical and personal issues, we have decided not to publish the actual interview with Angela McRobbie. Instead, we publish a brief ‘self-interview’ that she has written especially for this occasion.

2. I would also like to thank the Morehead-Cain Foundation for providing the funding that allowed me to conduct these interviews.

3. See interview with Rosalind Brunt and Christopher Pawling.

4. See 1969–1971 Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies Report.

5. See interviews with Richard Johnson, Stuart Hanson, Andrew Tolson, and Helen Wood.

6. See interview with Stuart Hall.

7. An analysis of these ‘minor’ programmes throughout higher education is certainly needed today.