This January two up-and-coming international researchers will join the vibrant scholarly community of visiting fellows at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities (IASH) at the University of Edinburgh.
We’re delighted to introduce our inaugural 90th Anniversary Research Fellows, the first in a series of three rounds of fellowships that we are funding in partnership with IASH over the next three years.
The fellows will spend 10 months undertaking research and study at IASH, followed by two months in their home countries focused on engagement and dissemination in collaboration with British Council colleagues and stakeholders. The knowledge and insight they generate will complement our own evidence and expertise and inform our cultural relations programming and learning. It will also advance international knowledge exchange in areas of strategic interest such as international relations and soft power, international development, peace building and cultural diplomacy.
Both inaugural projects have questions of trust, decoloniality and connection at their core – topics that are fundamental both to our work and to the wider international context in which we operate.
We’ve asked the two fellows to introduce their research plans below and share their thoughts as they prepare to embark on a year of inspiration, discovery and learning.
Introducing … Anthea Moys
I am a South African multi-modal artist, educator, and practice researcher. My work explores the intersections of play, power, and decoloniality through arts-based workshops, play-oriented studies, performance, co-production and peer-to-peer learning. My research project is entitled Building Trust through Playing Unwinnable Games: A Decolonial Approach. The project will diversify the knowledge base in recognition of all the different bodies at play in play. Involving artists, researchers and community members from both the UK and South Africa, the project ensures the inclusion of under-represented communities in global research production.
What most excites or appeals to you about this fellowship programme?
What excites me about this fellowship programme is the space, time, and support I will receive to return to my practice as an artist and put my research skills to good use! In the co-creation of an interdisciplinary team of artists and researchers, I am thrilled to work and play with old peers and meet and play with new ones and see what we will come up with.
I am excited about the social ripples this project can create …
How do you hope the fellowship will support your research training and professional development?
It will help me develop my work as a practice researcher because I am at a pivotal point in my career where I would like to revisit, reignite, enhance and expand my practice with others in both UK and South African contexts, creating a bridge of sorts. Drawing on my lived and professional experience of two countries whose relationship to colonial violence runs deep, I see this postdoctoral fellowship position as foundational in contributing to this journey.
What impact do you want your fellowship project to have?
At the heart of my work is a deep commitment to relationship-building through play and practices of collective joy. In an increasingly alienated and polarised world, the project aims to explore how we can build trust through the learning, playing, unlearning and creation of unwinnable games. I want this project to imagine and co-produce a decolonial methodology that can be used in a variety of contexts to enhance critical thinking through different creative practices – performance art, drawing and unwinnable games being some of them. Going forward, this could be used and continuously developed by facilitators, teachers and artists.
Introducing … Viktoriia Bavykina
I am a Ukrainian curator and academic and have worked on the development of artistic practices in the context of political transformations in Ukraine and Russia, as well as on studies and exhibitions of Ukrainian photographic movements of the 20th and 21st centuries. My research project is entitled Reframing Histories: Art Movements in Postcolonial Studies. It will examine the colonial influence and decolonial efforts of countries affected by the colonialism of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union through investigating the formation of local art movements and art groups.
What most excites or appeals to you about this fellowship programme?
I'm incredibly honoured to have been chosen as a fellow on this programme. It offers an invaluable platform to deepen my expertise, connect with leading researchers, and access resources critical to advancing my work. I am also inspired by the British Council's vision for this fellowship, which embodies a mission of cross-border knowledge sharing and cultural exchange.
How do you hope the fellowship will support your research training and professional development?
Both the British Council and the University of Edinburgh are committed to research and examination in the field of postcolonial studies. This is important for me to maintain criticality and objectivity when researching such sensitive topics, considering my personal involvement and connection with the subject. A professional circle of colleagues and interlocutors can help maintain the balance to ‘think straight’ and see arguments from different points of view.
What impact do you want your fellowship project to have?
Of course, Ukraine has a special place in the study. Not only because I am Ukrainian but mainly because Ukraine is once again fighting for its right to independence and freedom and is a country against which Russia is waging a very real colonial war. Yet very rarely do we consider the territories that were part of the Soviet Union, and even earlier the Russian Empire, as colonised – which affects perceptions of their histories and cultures.
I would very much like my research to help reinterpret the historical and contemporary experience of these countries and their cultures and provide new insight for colleagues engaged in postcolonial studies.
Many thanks and good luck to both Anthea and Vika! We hope you are as inspired and excited as we are about these projects and we look forward to sharing further updates, outcomes and findings over the course of the year ahead.