ESRC Festival of Social Science kicks off with ‘The Origin of States’
Warwick’s first event as part of the 2022 ESRC Festival of Social Science was led by the CAGE research centre based in the Economics department. Here, CAGE Events & Online Communications Officer, Josh Allen, reflects on the event.
CAGE’s contribution to the 20th ESRC Festival of Social Sciences Festival was a public lecture by Professor Omer Moav on The Origin of States - how farming shaped the world.
Over thirty people gathered at the recently restored and reopened St. Mary’s Guildhall in Coventry on the evening of Wednesday 26th October to hear the lecture.
The event was produced in partnership with the Warwick Institute of Engagement who provided advice, logistical and technical support and St. Mary’s Guildhall who gave use of their spectacular city centre venue.
What the event showed is the importance of choosing the right venue for a public engagement with research event.
St. Mary’s Guildhall as well as being an incredibly straightforward and easy partner to work with provided the perfect central Coventry location for Prof. Moav’s lecture to take place. The pairing of a traditional lecture public lecture with the century’s old interior of St. Mary’s Guildhall at the heart of Coventry’s historic core was near perfect.
Prof. Moav’s topic ranged broadly across time and geographical area, unsettling several long-established conventions through which the development of human societies is usually understood and conceptualised. This connection to the past, the historic exercise of power and its development over time naturally lent itself to a deeply historic civic venue like St. Mary’s.
Locating the event in a notable historic building, recently opened to the public to a far greater degree than previously, also attracted an engaged audience interested in past human societies, and in encountering and exploring interesting questions about change over time.
St. Mary’s would potentially be a less suitable venue for other social science public engagement events. Ones which are grounded in insight from data into the human present as opposed to the human past. However, the success of the event highlights that there exists an audience in Coventry (or willing to travel into Coventry), for engaging evening public talks and other events at the city’s growing array of high quality mid-sized public venues.
In addition to having the opportunity to attend in person Prof. Moav’s lecture was livestreamed via the Warwick Institute of Engagement YouTube channel. It can be watched below.