Ms Maike Dinger

My PhD research project is an interdisciplinary study, which combines different perspectives in the Humanities, and is being carried out under the supervision of Dr Scott Hames (University of Stirling) and Dr Michael Higgins (University of Strathclyde).

I hold degrees in Cultural Studies and Philosophy (BA) and National and Transnational Studies (MA) and am particularly interested in links between culture, politics, national identity, and participation. I am also experienced in project management and organisation, working and volunteering for various academic, cultural, and political youth projects.

Funding Awards

Being Human – A Festival of the Humanities Organisation for Public Engagement format with the National Library of Scotland Scottish Referendum Café, November 2022

Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities (SGSAH) Funded Internship: The Scottish Parliament Oral History Project, May 2021-22

Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities (SGSAH) Cohort Development Fund, Training event "How to become an academic YouTube celebrity?", November 2021

Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Training Partnership Scholarship - partial PhD funding, 2019-2023

Event/Presentation

Paper Presented 'Mediating ‘indyref’ – digital political debate and activism during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum', PSA Media and Politics Group Conference, Novemeber 2022 University of Liverpool (Hybrid)

Paper Presented 'The missing voices of ‘indyref’ – media representation, (dis)enfranchisement and participative action during the 2014 Scottish referendum campaign', MeCCSA Conference Silenced Voices, September 2022 Robert-Gordon University Aberdeen

Invited Panellist, MeCCSA Policy network roundtable on the history of the BBC and future challenges for Public Service Media MeCCSA Conference Silenced Voices, September 2022 Robert-Gordon University Aberdeen

Paper Presented 'Multiple Scotlands: finding Celtic voices in Scottish (post-)indyref literature', 3rd World Congress of Scottish Literature, June 2022 University of Prague (Hybrid)

Invited Speaker 'The Scottish Parliament’s Oral History Project', Modern Research Group, April 2022 University of Stirling

Invited Speaker 'Between argument and document – Indyref fiction(s) and representing the many voices of the debate', Literature & Languages Research Seminar Series, April 2022 University of Stirling (Online)

Paper Presented 'Mediating “indyref”: representations and participative action across different media', JMC Research Seminar, April 2022 University of Strathclyde (Online)

Paper Presented 'The 2014 Scottish independence referendum and arts-based campaigning for self-government', SFEE Conference Scotland and Nationalism: cultural and political aspects of Scottish identity from the medieval period to the present, October 2021 Université de Picardie Jules-Verne, Amiens (Hybrid)

Invited Speaker 'Fiction(s) of political participation: representations of indyref', IAMHIST Symposium on BBC and Indyref, October 2021 University of Glasgow (Online)

Paper Presented 'Conflicting narratives – narratives of conflict? Popular activism and media representations during the 2014 referendum debate', Postgraduate Conference ‘Conflict, Rebellion, and Popular Protest’, July 2021 University of Glasgow

Paper Presented 'Research in progress: Fiction(s) of Political Paricipation', Summer School Sovereignty, Independence and Constitutional Change, June 2021 Centre for Constitutional Change, Edinburgh (Online)

Paper Presented '(Dis)Union in times of crisis - (re)framing arguments for Scottish independence', ASEN Conference Nationalism in Crisis, April 2021 LSE London (Online)

Organiser, Arts and Humanities Postgraduate Conference, May 2020 University of Stirling

Paper Presented 'Writers in the Public Sphere: Fictional Politics of the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum', Conference Writing and Imagining 21st-century Scotland: Dialogues across Spaces and Forms, June 2018 Aix-en-Provence

Professional Membership

PGR Representative and Member International Association for the Study of Scottish Literatures https://www.iassl.org/

University Contribution

Editor University of Stirling Postgraduate Journal Spark

Member of Stirling University Feminist Reading Group

Postgraduate Representative and Member Stirling University Modern Research Group

Member of Journalism, Media and Communications Research Seminar Group, University of Strathclyde

Member of Oral History Group, University of Strathclyde

My PhD research project, entitled Fiction(s) of Political Participation: Literature, Media and the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum, combines cultural, media, and literary studies perspectives with contemporary politics to analyse how political participation was mediated during the Scottish independence referendum campaign from 2012 to 2014. As such, it investigates modes of representation and myth-making in and through literature and media texts, with a specific focus on the links between political developments, cultural practices, emerging narratives, social representation, and public voice.

In order to discern text-based practices of public opinion formation processes between national institutions and Scottish citizens, a corpus of literary texts, media representations, grassroots interventions, personal statements, and oral history interviews with cultural actors and journalists will be analysed. By comparing literary and media representations of ‘popular participation’ to first-hand accounts by cultural and media elites as well as citizens, this project adds a crucial new dimension to the critical engagement with the different voices of the Scottish independence debate.

The project is partially funded by the Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities and commenced in October 2019.

University of Stirling:

MMAPPDS MSc Media Management Dissertation (Supervisor)

POLU9A1 Politics of the British Isles (Tutor)

PREPP94 Communication and Democracy (Guest Lecturer)

University of Strathclyde:

P3103 Introduction to Journalism, Media and Communication (Tutor and Lecturer)

P3209 Theories and Methods (Tutor)

P3211 Gender Issues In The Media (Guest Lecturer)

P3308 Communicating Politics: Truth, Legitimacy, Participation (Tutor and Guest Lecturer)

P3968 Communication and Media Theory in an International Context (Tutor)

QQ228 Writing Through Time 2 (Tutor)