Stuart Hall Archive Project Symposium, 2024 

Friday 3 May 

University of Birmingham, Muirhead Tower, Room 112 

Session 1 and Session 3 can be accessed online – check ‘online’ at Registration 

 A one-day event to explore progress and findings on the Stuart Hall Archive Project and to invite interlocuters, partners, protagonists to share their work and engage in dialogue. An Exhibition of material from Stuart Hall’s archive will be accessible throughout the afternoon. 

Registration is free: https://www.tickettailor.com/events/stuarthallarchiveprojectattheuniversityofbirmingham/1224322 

 Outline of the Day 

9:30 arrival 

9:45 welcome 

10:00-12:30 Session 1: ‘A Cure for Marriage: A case study in method’ 

12:30 Extended lunch with visits to the archive exhibition 

14:00 Session 2: Screening of ‘Tyger, Tyger’ (1967)  

15:15-15:30 Tea 

15:30-17:30 Session 3: ‘Conjunctures: Futures and Inheritences’ 

 

Session 1: ‘A Cure for Marriage: A case study in method’ (1968—1970)  

This session is dedicated to discussion of the unpublished manuscript of ‘A Cure for Marriage: A Case Study in Method’ written by Stuart Hall with Richard Hoggart, Tim Moore, Janet Mendelsohn, Richard Rogers and Trevor Millum, and contributions from many of the students at the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies in 1968/1969. 

• Nick Beech, ‘“A Cure for Marriage”: A seminar room, in Birmingham, in 1968’ 
• Angela McRobbie, ‘Re-Thinking Women’s and Girls’ magazines as Genre’ 
• Francesca Sobande, ‘A Controlling Desire for Fantasy and A Cultural Studies “Cure” for Escapism’ 
• Julie Whiteman, ‘Reflections on cultural studies and consumer research’ 

Nick Beech, ‘A Cure for Marriage’: A seminar room, in Birmingham, in 1968  

‘A Cure for Marriage’ was long thought lost. Generated by Stuart Hall, Richard Hoggart and the graduate students of the Centre between 1968 and 1970, the ‘Case study in method’ was referred to by Stuart Hall, former staff, students and historians of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies as a key statement of the project of cultural studies in the late-1960s, a bridge between the early work of Hoggart’s, The Uses of Literacy (1957), and Hall and Paddy Whannel’s The Popular Arts (1964), and the mature work of the Centre following Hoggart’s departure in 1969 and the engagement with structuralism, neo-Marxism, psychoanalysis, feminism and the politics of ‘race’ and ethnicity. My paper provides an outline of the text, and an initial sketch of the conditions of its making, the forces operative within the Centre and beyond, political and personal. 

Dr Nick Beech Associate Professor (Social Policy) at the School of Social Policy and Society, University of Birmingham and a lead on the Stuart Hall Archive Project. 

 

Angela McRobbie, Re-Thinking Women’s and Girls’ magazines as Genre  

This short talk will first provide an engaged response to the Cure for Marriage Project with reference a) to the place of literary and cultural theory in the CCCS at the time and b) to the unfolding of feminist scholarship from the mid-1970s, tracing its focus and concerns c) the magazine as women’s genre then and now in the digital age.   

Angela McRobbie is Professor Emeritus, Goldsmith’s University of London and Fellow of the British Academy.  

 

Francesca Sobande, A Controlling Desire for Fantasy and A Cultural Studies “Cure” for Escapism 

Whose and what desires, fantasies, and forms of escapism are engendered in/by/as Britain? How is digital culture and artificial intelligence (AI) implicated in that and associated ideas about imagination? What does all of this tell us about romanticisation, mythologisation, and material conditions and conjunctures today? Addressing the gender, racial, class, and geo- politics of pop culture’s nurturing of (collective) fantasy and (individualistic) escapism, this sharing considers the “cures” (fluid remedies) presented by cultural studies and its many meaningful provocations about care and crisis.  

Dr Francesca Sobande, Senior Lecturer in Digital Media Studies at the School of Journalism, Media and Culture, Cardiff University  

 

Julie Whiteman, Reflections on cultural studies and consumer research  

A Cure for Marriage: a case study in method presents an exciting and illuminating insight into the development of the cultural studies movement at the home of British cultural studies, The Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies. This movement went on to influence individuals, industries and disciplines far beyond the Centre walls. This presentation reflects on the influence and value cultural studies has had on consumer research, tracing a line from A Cure for Marriage to contemporary consumer research via feminist critical marketing and consumer research. Drawing on current research into ageing female sexuality, the evolving representation of the feminine is used as an illustrative example of cultural meaning construction and communication. 

Following on from the central focus of A Cure for Marriage, the methodological form and theoretical function of cultural critique, this work argues for the enduring importance of interrogating the relationship of the particular to the general, and asks what are we looking at and for in analyses of cultural texts, and what is the value of this for social life? 

Julie Whiteman is a Lecturer in Marketing at Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham  

 

Session 2: ‘Tyger, Tyger’ (1967)  

In 1967 the BBC broadcast an Omnibus special on William Blake’s poem ‘The Tyger’. Including contributions from Robert Graves and Kathleen Raine, directed by Christopher Burstall, the film consists of responses to the poem by infants, primary school and secondary school children. There are also contributions from Richard Hoggart and Stuart Hall. ‘Tyger, Tyger’ provides insight on the distinct approach to literature taken by Hall and Hoggart, and how they intervened in the culture of their time.   

Following the screening, Nick Beech, Dr Asha Rogers, and Dr Katharina Karcher will introduce research activities for 2024/25 across the College of Arts and Law engaged with Stuart Hall’s work and legacy.  

 

Session 3: ‘Conjunctures: Futures and Inheritances’  

Led by Prof Pat Noxolo and Rebecca Adams, this session will explore new emerging approaches to engagement with archives, and particularly Stuart Hall’s papers, for pedagogical, community, and political activism.  

 

The Stuart Hall Archives on Display  

A selection of Stuart Hall Archive Collection material will be on display at the Cadbury Research Library. This display will include texts written by Hall during his time at the CCCS, as well as examples of and activism. Several materials will also be selected from the University of Birmingham’s wider CCCS archive.