Songs of Solidarity is a bold interdisciplinary performance project that reimagines ancient epics through the voices of migrant communities today. Following on from the APGRD's highly successful Cultural Programme-funded workshop in December 2024, Fiona Macintosh (Emeritus Professor of Classical Reception and Senior Research Fellow, St Hilda’s) and Tom Nelson (Career Development Fellow in Ancient Greek, St Hilda’s) have received further funding from the University’s Cultural Programme to continue their collaboration and to support the development of a new epic narrative through devised performance, drawing on Gilgamesh, Iliad, Kalevala, and Ramayana.
Led by Dash Arts and PROJEKT EUROPA, in partnership with APGRD, this phase will involve a Writers’ Room with a number of emergent and seasoned writers, together with academics from Classics, Ancient and Near Eastern Studies, and the University’s Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS). Hosted at St Hilda’s from Monday 15 to Wednesday 17 December, the Writers’ Room will lay the foundation for a full-scale production in 2027.
On Wednesday 17 December at 5pm, there will be a public discussion about the project. For further information, email fiona.macintosh@classics.ox.ac.uk
Programme
Monday 15 December, JdP
-10am Welcome and coffee
Morning Session: What is an epic?
-10.30-12pm Led by Tom Nelson and Oliver Taplin
-Lunch 12-1pm, provided by APGRD
Afternoon session: What might epic look like now?
-1-2pm Led by Margaret Kean - The politics of epic: Armando Iannucci’s Pandemonian/ Philip Pullman’s The Book of Dust
-2-3pm Led by Katherine Harloe - Epic and power
-3-3.30pm tea
-3.30-4.30pm Justine McConnell - A Saint Lucian epic (online from Washington)
-4.30pm-5pm break
-5-6pm Georgina Paul - epic from an East German perspective: Barbara Koehler’s Niemands Frau
Tuesday 16 December, JdP
-10:00 Welcome Josephine Burton & Maria Åberg with Fiona Macintosh and Dan Byam-Shaw
-10.30-12pm
Viki Zaphiriou-Zarifi (SOAS; gender, migration & participatory arts)
Sam Ritholz (All Souls; identity, stigma & LGBTIQ+ inclusion in displacement justice) online
Session 2: Story, Identity & Representation: Ethics and Embodiment in Migrant Storytelling
-1-2.30pm
Delphine Boagey (Oxford; music, transnationalism & diaspora)
Sonita Alizada (Oxford; displacement, activism & feminism)
-2.30-3pm Break
Session 3: From Lived Experience to Epic Form
-3-4.30pm Led by Josephine Burton & Maria Åberg
Marl'ene Edwin (Goldsmiths, Centre for Caribbean and Diaspora Studies (CCDS)
Wednesday 17 December, JdP
Final Session Session: Framing the Journey Forward
-14.30 - 17.45 Collaborative session to set next steps, draft the framework for interviews, and define the ethical and dramaturgical questions guiding the next phase.
Facilitated by: Josephine Burton & Maria Aberg
During this session or at the end of this session we will have a wider conversation with the Oxford Cultural Programme and academics to share our findings and next steps.
5pm Drinks provided by APGRD