Join AFINO for a course on Lesvos this summer
WP8 of the AFINO network is very happy to announce a course with the title:
“Transdisciplinarity in action: Quality, Values, and Foresight as challenges”.
The venue of the course is the Metochi Study Centre at the Greek island of Lesvos.
For information about the venue, see: https://www.uia.no/en/centres-and-networks/metochi .
The course dates are:
June 26th June arrival date
June 27th – July 2nd working days
July 3rd departure date
Caveat:
The organizers assume that the current pandemic will not impose further travel restrictions within the EU countries.
We do recommend / expect that all participants be fully vaccinated. – We have a preliminary limit of the maximum number of participants set to ca 20 people.
Extensions to this will need to be negotiated with the organizers. Consequently, participation will be granted on a first-come-first-served basis.
Target group and funding:
This workshop is mainly directed to PhDs and Postdocs, primarily from the AFINO network, but not necessarily restricted to these researchers. Other Norwegian research institutions and other researchers will be welcome if available places at Metochi and funds allow.
Applications should be sent to the course leader. For those participants accepted by the AFINO core group, travel tickets (economy air fare, train, ferry) will be covered by AFINO. Food and beverages during travel will not be refunded. Accommodation at Lesvos will be covered by AFINO.
Course leader: Matthias Kaiser (Matthias.kaiser@uib.no ).
Teachers: Silvio Funtowicz (SVT-UiB), Bruna De Marchi (SVT-UiB), Heide Hackmann (Exec.dir. of the International Science Council) and Nina Burleigh (NY journalist).
Registration and deadline:
All interested participants are encouraged to send a tentative registration to Giovanni De Grandis (Giovanni.grandis@ntnu.no ), with cc to Matthias Kaiser.
The deadline for pre-registration of interest is extended to 1 March 2022.
The organizers will respond within two weeks. The final and binding registration date with details about travel etc will be 29th of April.
Brief intro to the course:
WP8 of the AFINO network – informed by post-normal science – is guided by three substantive elements:
1) it asks normative questions concerning the practice of co-responsibility (co-production of knowledge and innovation);
2) it directs a searchlight on public engagement practices, aiming at extended peer communities and explores various tools in this regard;
3) it has a focus on the underlying question of (societal and individual) values and emerging social identities, as they remain highly elusive for empirical studies, and the concept of value-landscapes is introduced as a lens to gain insights into real value commitments and identities in society, thus informing designs of future scenarios.
The workshop will, on the one hand, provide the opportunity for young researchers of various disciplinary backgrounds to present their project ideas and discuss them in depth with the other participants. On the other hand, it will also provide input and lectures from senior researchers (to be confirmed) to stimulate the inclusion of the three focal points of WP8.
Credit points for attending the course will be given, though at the time of planning the course, the concrete details of the number of points is still work in progress.
A tentative course schedule:
Further information:
1) For booking an air flight to Lesvos you have to look for the airport Mytilini (MJT). Normally there may be direct flights on Sundays from Oslo from travel agencies, but Aegean Air, KLM, and SAS do also provide good options via Athens. A taxi between Mytilini airport and Metochi costs ca 50,-€, but the organizers will seek to arrange a convenient option with Maxi taxis if several people arrive / depart at roughly the same time.
2) The course leader, Matthias Kaiser, will stay another week at Metochi, i.e. 4th to 10th of July. If some of the participants want to extend their stay, and for instance have a week of writing on a paper at Metochi, they are welcome to do so, if arranged early enough. In this case, the costs for the accommodation should be covered by the participants or their home institutions.
3) We assume that all participants will participate in the whole program as much as possible. Presenters should send an abstract of their talk to the organizer one week before the start of the course.
4) In case prospective participants have any more queries, they are invited to contact the course leader by email.
Note – this announcement was updated on February 15th.
Featured image: Metochi Study Centre at Lesvos. Photo: UiA, Olav Breen.
