Spring may feel far away on a bleak November day but it doesn’t mean we cannot look ahead and plan for things to come. Curiouser & Curiouser : Challenging Convention and Celebrating the Unusual in Museums and Heritage is a three-day PhD symposium to be held in Leicester from 28-30 March 2011. The call for papers describes the event as  “challenging conventional perceptions of cultural institutions and the roles which they play in contemporary society.”

Definitions of what is acceptable within museums and collections are changing, catalysed by the blurring of boundaries once enforced by such factors as national identity, ethnicity, socio-economic position and public and personal ideologies. Is what was once considered bizarre or strange becoming more mainstream? What exactly is meant by ‘curious’ or ‘eccentric’, and need such words have pejorative connotations? from the Call for papers

The event is organised by the School of Museum Studies at the University of Leicester. The programme will feature both presentations and workshops and contributions are invited from the areas of  museum studies, cultural studies and allied subjects. Particularly welcome are submissions which propose to use innovative and experimental presentation strategies.

More information about the event and the call for papers is available in The Attic – a blog for the School of Museum Studies’ research students, University of Leicester, UK. To register, fill out the forms available from http://www2.le.ac.uk/projects/curiouser/delegates