The Language Campus Postgrad Group
The Language Campus Postgrad Group is a community of early career researchers that organizes various activities for supporting community building, research work and professional development. The activities include for example writing retreats, reading circle meetings, mentoring and an annual mini conference called Spring school. Some activities are organized online and others on campus. More information on the activities can be found in the monthly newsletter sent to the doctoral students.
The writing retreats offer peer support and peer pressure for working on your project. The meetings are called writing retreats, but you can work on anything you are working on at the moment: reading, transcribing, writing. The meetings start at 9.00 by sharing what participants are going to work on that day. The day ends at 15.45 with reflections on how everything went. You don’t have to join for the entire day. The meetings take place on Fridays online and/or face-to-face on campus. They are a good opportunity to meet other early career researchers.
The reading circle meetings are aimed at Language Campus doctoral students, in particular. The idea is to choose a classic text from our broad field and get together in an informal setting to share our thoughts. The reading circle serves both those who are already familiar with the texts/authors discussed, but also and especially those/us, who find their lists of "authors I should have read x years ago but didn't have time" growing longer. Instead of recent research, we focus on classic texts that can sometimes be difficult to approach on your own. The texts are generally in English but other languages can be used in the meetings as well. The schedule of meetings will be announced, eg. on the Language Campus mailing list. Meetings will take place online and/or face-to-face on campus.
Photo 1. Heidi Layne and Apoorwa Hooda as keynote speakers at the Spring school 2024.
Peer and group mentoring is aimed at supporting the thesis-writing process at different stages of the PhD journey rather than concentrating on the content of PhD thesis as such. Mentoring meetings are confidential and the topics discussed are chosen according to the participants’ needs. The groups meet according to their own schedules. The meetings take place online and/or on campus.
The Spring school is a small-scale conference where especially early-stage PhD students get to practice their presentation skills in a supportive and friendly environment. University staff members are recruited to comment and give constructive feedback on the presentations. Depending on the annually changing theme, sometimes expert talks, workshops or panel discussions are also included in the program. The Spring school is a great opportunity to connect with other PhD researchers and learn about their research. As the event is organized by the PhD students themselves, the Spring school is also a good opportunity to gain experience in organizing the event and to influence its content.
The Postgrad Group has , where you can find more information about its activities. Join in!
More information: Pauliina Puranen
Photo 2. Ilkhom Khalimzoda and Edwin Nfor as keynote lecturers at Spring school 2024.
