̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Joanna Page

Cambridge initiative to address risks of future engineered pandemics

cjb250 — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 08:00:39 +0000

These are some of the questions being addressed by a new initiative launched today at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, which seeks to address the urgent challenge of managing the risks of future engineered pandemics.

̽��ֱ��Engineered Pandemics Risk Management Programme aims to understand the social and biological factors that might drive an engineered pandemic and to make a major contribution to building the UK’s capability for managing these risks. It will build a network of experts from academia, government, and industry to tackle the problem.

Increased security threats from state and non-state actors, combined with increased urbanisation and global mobility, means the threat of deliberate pathogen release must be taken seriously as must other intertwined aspects of pandemic risk such as mis- and disinformation, the erosion of trust in a number of institutions and an increasingly volatile geopolitical context. Further potential risks are posed by recent developments in gene-editing tools and artificial intelligence, which have rapidly advanced technological capability that may make it easier to engineer potential pandemic pathogens.

Professor Clare Bryant from the Department of Medicine at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge said: “There is a great opportunity to take a joined-up approach to managing the risks posed by engineered pandemics. We need experts and agencies across the spectrum to work together to develop a better understanding of who or what might drive such events and what their likely impact would be. And we need evidence-informed policies and networks in place that would help us respond to – or better still, prevent – such an eventuality.”

̽��ֱ��aims of the Engineered Pandemics Risk Management Programme are:
To develop the conceptual underpinnings for the risk management of engineered pandemics based on interdisciplinary research
To support the capability of the UK’s engineered pandemic risk policy and practice, including building and maintaining networks that connect government, academia and industry.
To strengthen the international networks that will support this work globally

There are four main strands of work:

Social determinants of engineered pandemic threat

This strand will look at the actors who have the potential to engineer harmful pathogens, either deliberately or accidentally. It will ask questions such as: What could motivate bioterrorism in the coming decades? Who might the relevant actors be? What are the kinds of engineered pandemic that someone might want to create?

Dr Rob Doubleday, Executive Director of the Centre for Science and Policy at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, said: “ ̽��ֱ��common narrative is that there’s a wide range of potential actors out there who want to create bioweapons but don’t yet have the technical means. But in fact, there’s been very little work to really understand who these people might be, and their relationship to emerging technology. To explore these questions, we need a broad network including social scientists, biosecurity researchers, criminologists, experts in geopolitics and counterterrorism.”

̽��ֱ��strand will also look at the governance of scientific research in areas that may facilitate an engineered pandemic, whether unwittingly or maliciously, aiming to deliver a policy framework that enables freedom of intellectual research while managing real and apparent risk in infectious disease research.

Professor Bryant said: “As scientists, we’re largely responsible for policing our own work and ensuring integrity, trustworthiness and transparency, and for considering the consequences of new knowledge and how it might be used. But with the rapid progress of genomic technologies and AI, self-regulation becomes more difficult to manage. We need to find governance frameworks that balance essential scientific progress with its potential misapplication.”

Biological determinants of engineered pandemic threat

Recognising that the most likely cause of an engineered pandemic would be the deliberate release of a naturally-occurring pathogen – viral or bacterial, for example – rather than a man-made pathogen, this strand aims to understand what might make a particular pathogen infectious and how our immune systems respond to infection. This knowledge will allow researchers to screen currently available drugs to prevent or treat infection and to design vaccines quickly should a pandemic occur.

Modelling threats and risk management of engineered pandemics

̽��ֱ��Covid-19 pandemic highlighted practical problems of dealing with pandemic infections, from the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE) to ensuring a sufficient supply of vaccine doses and availability of key medications. Modelling the potential requirements of a pandemic, how they could be delivered, how ventilation systems could be modiﬁed, what biosafety measures could be taken, for example, are all key challenges for managing any form of pandemic. This strand will address how existing modelling approaches would need to be adapted for a range of plausible engineered pandemics.

Policy innovation challenges

Working with the policy community, the Cambridge team will co-create research that directly addresses policy needs and involves policy makers. It will support policy makers in experimenting with more joined-up approaches through testing, learning and adapting solutions developed in partnership.

̽��ֱ��Engineered Pandemics Risk Management Programme is supported by a £5.25 million donation to the Centre for Research in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CRASSH) at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge. ̽��ֱ��team intends it to form a central component of a future Pandemic Risk Management Centre, for which it is now fundraising.

Professor Joanna Page, Director of CRASSH, said: “Cambridge has strengths across a broad range of disciplines – from genetics and immunology to mathematical modelling to existential risk and policy engagement – that can make a much-needed initiative such as this a success.”

To find out more, visit the Engineered Pandemic Risk Management website.

Covid-19 showed us how vulnerable the world is to pandemics – but what if the next pandemic were somehow engineered? How would the world respond – and could we stop it happening in the first place?

There is a great opportunity to take a joined-up approach to managing the risks posed by engineered pandemics

Clare Bryant

Martin Sanchez

Illustration showing global pandemic spread

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Licence type:

Public Domain

̽��ֱ��researcher finding inspiration for the planet’s future in Latin American art

cg605 — Tue, 23 Mar 2021 18:13:32 +0000

Joanna Page has been exploring how work by Latin American artists can help to bring humanity back into a relationship with nature and give us hope for the planet’s future.

Agreement brings Cambridge closer to Mexico

pbh25 — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 08:19:20 +0000

̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge is enhancing its links with Mexican higher education institutions by signing an agreement with the Universidad de las Américas Puebla (UDLAP) for the establishment of an academic mobility programme in the arts, humanities and social sciences.

̽��ֱ��purpose of the agreement, which is valid for five years in the first instance, is to create an annual Visiting Fellowship. ̽��ֱ��Cambridge-UDLAP Visiting Fellowship will allow two scholars from Cambridge and two scholars from UDLAP to spend between four and eight weeks at the partner institution. Supported by the UDLAP Foundation, it will serve to strengthen academic links and enhance the potential for research collaboration between the two universities.

This is the first agreement of its kind between the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and a Latin American higher education institution. ̽��ֱ��agreement was signed at the end of 2015, officially designated as the “Year of Mexico in the UK” and “Year of the UK in Mexico” as a way of strengthening ties and enhancing mutual understanding between both countries.

UDLAP was founded in 1940 as a private university, and is consistently ranked among the top Mexican universities. Its president, Luis Ernesto Derbez, was Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs (2003-2006) and, before that, the country’s Secretary of the Economy (2000-2002). ̽��ֱ��city of Puebla, where the university is located, is less than 70 miles from Mexico City. It was founded in 1531 and is world-known for its colonial architecture. It was selected as one of UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites in 1987.

̽��ֱ��Cambridge-UDLAP Visiting Fellowship will be open to full-time research staff at both institutions in all areas of the arts, humanities and social sciences. In Cambridge, it will be managed by the Centre of Latin American Studies (CLAS), an interdisciplinary research and postgraduate teaching centre which acts as a hub for research on Latin America across the whole university.

Speaking after the signature of the agreement, Dr Joanna Page, Director of CLAS said: “ ̽��ֱ��Cambridge-UDLAP Visiting Fellowship will help to strengthen the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s expertise in the field of Mexican arts, humanities and social sciences. This is an exciting opportunity for researchers here to spend time in Mexico, consulting libraries and archives, collecting data, and exchanging ideas with experts in relevant fields. By welcoming scholars from UDLAP at Cambridge, we also hope to establish much closer links with one of Mexico’s most dynamic universities, and to lay the groundwork for mutually beneficial collaborations. Visiting Fellows from UDLAP will join the strong, interdisciplinary research community based at the Centre and I have no doubt that their visits will lead to many interesting conversations and open up opportunities for future research.”

On behalf of UDLAP, Chancellor Dr Luis Ernesto Derbez, added: “In the knowledge society, the future will be for those who dare to innovate, to think differently, and to believe in the transformational power of ideas. This agreement between UDLAP and Cambridge brings that future closer by offering an extraordinary opportunity for scholars at both institutions to know our countries and cultures better, and to develop cutting-edge research on the arts, humanities and social sciences. ̽��ֱ��current challenge, for our universities, is to engage in collaboration with the objective of producing original knowledge that could not have been created without this partnership. Cambridge scholars will find a vibrant community of students and faculty at UDLAP, while our researchers will surely take advantage of staying at one of the most prestigious universities in the world. We hope this will be the first step in a long and successful academic relationship.”

̽��ֱ��first call for applications to the Cambridge-UDLAP Visiting Fellowship will be made in early 2016.

For further information, please contact the Centre of Latin American Studies, admin@latin-american.cam.ac.uk

Picture credits: “A view of UDLAP campus” ©UDLAP

Annual visiting fellowship created with the Universidad de las Américas Puebla (UDLAP).

̽��ֱ��Cambridge-UDLAP Visiting Fellowship will help to strengthen the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s expertise in the field of Mexican arts, humanities and social sciences.

Dr Joanna Page, Director of the Centre of Latin American Studies

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Falklands/Malvinas: A national cause

bjb42 — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 10:44:46 +0000

A bleak archipelago in the South Atlantic, with a population of around 3,000 and temperatures that rarely rise above 13 degrees, there seems little to commend the Falklands, or Islas Malvinas. Offshore oil reserves have aroused new economic possibilities in the region, but the islands’ main industries remain sheep farming, fishing and tourism. Many justifiably wonder why these rocks are the subject of such bitter diplomacy or why, in 1982, the lives of more than 900 people had to be lost in their name.

Thirty years after the conflict, however, the debate between Britain and Argentina over who owns the Falklands/Malvinas shows little sign of abating – indeed, the anniversary of the war has reignited tensions between the two. At the same time, their attitudes are hardly the same. While Britain continues to stress its commitment to the islanders’ right to self-determination, popular interest in the UK is nothing compared with the passions that the Malvinas arouse in Argentina.

There, when the Government calls for negotiations with the British, it is guaranteed huge public support. In Argentina, memorials to the war and posters reasserting the country’s claim to the islands are a common sight, while young people often get tattoos of the Malvinas in the national colours. Such zeal seems odd in the UK, where a war over a territory that even the Prime Minister’s husband had to look up in an atlas at the time, now tends to feel long-since gone.

̽��ֱ��key to understanding Argentina’s very different point of view lies not with what the islands are, nor with natural resources. It is about what they represent. For many British people, the story of the Falklands War is a simple one, in which the country fought for its fellow-citizens and won. Argentinian ideas about the islands are usually much more complex, and often deeply emotional as well.

Since the war, a number of Argentinian writers, poets, academics and filmmakers have expressed, debated and critiqued those ideas and feelings in works which show how central the Malvinas are to the way Argentina perceives itself as a nation. Many of these works will be the subject of a conference at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge on June 9^th, five days before the 30^th anniversary of the conflict’s end. Academics from Britain, Argentina and elsewhere will join forces to discuss the war’s cultural legacy, because, they argue, doing so allows us to better understand the debates and controversies that the conflict has inspired in Argentina.

Although this will not be an event about rights to sovereignty, Dr Joanna Page, from the ̽��ֱ��’s Centre for Latin American Studies and a specialist in Argentinian culture, argues that the current political debate over who owns the islands should be informed by a better understanding of the social and cultural weight of the Malvinas in Argentinian history.

“When I go to Argentina, people often ask me about what people here in Britain think about the islands,” she said. “If you tell them that most people don’t really think about them at all, that’s very difficult for them to understand. For them, the memory of the war runs much deeper, it reaches much further into how Argentina thinks of itself as a nation, and those ideas are still evolving to this day.”

“In spite of all the political wrangling, there is not a lot of understanding in Britain about why the islands are so important to Argentina. It doesn’t seem to make sense. When you start looking back through the history and the literature, however, you realize how far they are tied up with ideas about nationhood and identity. Exploring how the Malvinas are represented in cultural texts reveals a lot more about what motivates Argentina’s performance on the diplomatic stage.”

Page’s own research on evolving Argentinian perspectives on the war has been influenced by the work of the political scientist, Vicente Palermo, and the historian, Federico Lorenz, who will be one of the keynote speakers at the conference. Palermo argues that since the country achieved independence from Spain in 1810, its national identity has been founded on a number of clear, fundamental ideas.

Where some countries define themselves primarily in terms of a shared culture, for example, territorial integrity – the land itself – is core to Argentina’s sense of national identity. ̽��ֱ��nation’s destiny is often represented in history and literature as frustrated by colonial powers who have invaded the land and ransacked its riches. Another key notion that Palermo identifies in Argentine national identity is that of unity, of a cause that brings everyone together.

These ideas sit perfectly with that of the Islas Malvinas: a physical territory, usurped (according to one version of history) by imperial British forces, and now a cause which the nation can unanimously throw itself behind. If, for the British themselves, the islands are curious and remote, to the Argentinians they are a national icon.

As Lorenz shows, however, remembering the war in Argentina is a complicated question. It was perpetrated and lost by a deeply corrupt military junta, which had been in power since 1976 and was guilty of numerous human rights abuses. ̽��ֱ��invasion of the Malvinas was partly an opportunistic act to shore up its popularity. Some 650 Argentinians lost their lives as a result. Perhaps as many veterans again have killed themselves since.

̽��ֱ��dilemma this creates is whether to remember the Malvinas War as just another crime committed by the military regime, or as a legitimate popular and national cause. Argentina’s cultural output since the war reflects this dilemma. “In the years following 1982, the war was associated with the regime and many people distanced themselves from it,” Page said. “They forgot, rather conveniently, that they had poured on to the streets to support it when it began. After defeat, the war was seen as a horrible mistake and it was a relief to many that it could be seen as a chapter that closed with the end of the dictatorship.”

̽��ֱ��desire to forget has often been summed up in the term desmalvinizacion, a “don’t mention the war” mentality which presided in Argentina for many years. Literature and film of the period often portrayed the conflict not as a fight with the British, but as an expression of internal strife. ̽��ֱ��war for the Malvinas became a coincidental backdrop to a battle within Argentina itself.

Often, this was achieved by focusing on how officers (representing the junta) abused and even tortured their conscripts (the ordinary Argentinian) in the freezing conditions of the Malvinas. ̽��ֱ��1984 film Los chicos de la guerra, for example, showed frightened adolescents being press-ganged into an absurd conflict not of their making. In 2004, the award-winning Iluminados por el fuego picked up many of these themes.

Ironically, those who fought never approved of such works, even though they claimed to be telling their story. Los chicos de la guerra provoked an angry response from veterans, and even Iluminados por el fuego has come in for criticism because the memoir on which it is based was more ambiguous. As a book, it described exemplary conduct among officers as well. That was conveniently erased in a film which aimed to show the ordinary soldier as a victim of the government, and the war as a cruel and expensive mistake.

What fascinates scholars like Page is that other perspectives on the war are now starting to emerge more clearly. In historical and cultural narratives, the war has often been separated from the broader campaign to reclaim sovereignty over the islands, remembered, in the words of a popular saying, as una causa justa en manos bastarda - a righteous cause in the hands of bastards.

That cause is alive and kicking. Cultural texts on the war – novels, poetry, film and comics – reveal a huge range of responses to the legacy of the Malvinas war and Argentina’s continued campaign for sovereignty. Many do not simply stick to recording the events of the war or its impact then and now, but stray into fantasy or parody. In the view of Carlos Gamerro, another keynote speaker whose seminal novel, ̽��ֱ��Islands, comes out in English translation this month, the only way to understand the nationalist fictions in which Argentinians present the war is by giving it an obviously fictional treatment. If the history of the islands has been shaped by their mythical role in Argentine nationalism, then history and fiction are not so far apart.

Amid the recent political heat, Page hopes that the conference will help to cast a more dispassionate and analytical eye on the question of how the Malvinas have been imagined within Argentina. “There are people coming to Cambridge on the 9th who feel that the debates in Argentina about the Malvinas are still very restricted, and perhaps more so with the recent resurgence of nationalist feeling about the islands,” Page added. “Just as the past overshadows the politics of the present, the politics of the present define the ways in which we look at the past. One of the things we want to ask is what role culture plays in shaping history.”

Thirty years after it ended, the Falklands/Malvinas War still casts a long shadow over the lives of many Argentinians. A conference marking the anniversary next week will look at how it has been represented in history, literature, cinema and other media, showing how through these we can better understand why Argentina cares so much about the islands.

Exploring how the Malvinas are represented in cultural texts reveals a lot more about what motivates Argentina’s performance on the diplomatic stage.

Joanna Page

Wikimedia Commons.

Argentinian graves in East Falkland. While soldiers were often characterized as victims of the junta in the war’s immediate aftermath, they are now seen by many as patriots who died for a righteous cause.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you use this content on your site please link back to this page.

Yes

New perspectives on Latin America

lw355 — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 14:44:59 +0000

Shaped by indigenous cultures and colonial influences, and with a contemporary history that encompasses acute political competition, social unrest and economic change, Latin America is a stimulating region for academic enquiry. Cambridge’s Centre of Latin American Studies – with its extensive library and one of the largest collections of Latin American films in the UK – provides a hub to link the many Latin Americanists based in faculties across the ̽��ֱ��.

For researchers such as Dr Charles Jones, who is based in the Department of Politics and International Studies and will take up the Directorship of the Centre at the start of the academic year, the region provides unique insights into international relations. ‘ ̽��ֱ��republics of Latin America became independent from their European colonisers 200 years ago,’ he explains. ‘After two centuries of separate existence, they are still largely dominated by elites of European descent, yet conduct their relations with one another very differently, holding distinctive views about international law, diplomacy and conflict resolution. Being able to compare regions is fascinating – it’s rather like being able to conduct a laboratory experiment in international relations.’

Research linked through the Centre is diverse: ranging from the study of modernist architecture to the colonial history of the Andes; and including, as highlighted here, cinema, violence, religion and multiculturalism.

Visualising Argentina

̽��ֱ��study of Latin American film and visual arts is a particular area of expertise at the Centre. Drs Joanna Page, Geoffrey Kantaris, Erica Segre and Rory O’Bryen are shedding light on the region’s vibrant creative legacy and opening up Latin American culture to a wider audience.

Dr Page has focused on Argentina, where the visual arts have responded in innovative ways to the experience of dictatorship, rising costs, unemployment and crime. Argentine cinema, which entered a boom period in the 1990s, is a compelling period of film-making for her, as she explains: ‘Film directors had to create a new kind of aesthetic, born of economic necessity. They often shot in black and white, on streets with natural lighting or in a single apartment, using friends as actors. ̽��ֱ��films register the anxieties and fears, civil unrest and social disintegration in contemporary Argentina.’

Other forms of visual culture have also been important vehicles for social and political critique in Argentina, especially in response to the military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, a period of state-sponsored violence. ‘One example is the post-apocalyptic comic El Eternauta written by Héctor Oesterheld,’ she explains. ‘It typifies the intellectual and philosophical heritage of the science fiction genre in Argentina in engaging with political issues and was written before Oesterheld himself was kidnapped and became one of the disappeared.’

‘Argentina’s appropriation of science fiction is often heavily ironic given the genre’s strong association with European and North American imaginaries,’ adds Page. ‘ ̽��ֱ��result is a radical form of social critique.’

Violence in ‘Black Rome of the Americas’

Social anthropologist Dr Marta Magalhaes works in Salvador, Bahia. This UNESCO World Heritage Centre, once capital of colonial Brazil, is often referred to as the ‘Black Rome of the Americas’ because of its strong Afro-Brazilian heritage. ̽��ֱ��aim of her research was to examine what the ongoing urban regeneration of the colonial historic centre meant to its original, now-displaced, residents, but what she found instead was that Bahians wanted to speak about their experiences of violence in the city.

‘Brazil is a powerhouse – a resource-rich, technologically competent, vigorous democracy that has made great strides to close the gap between rich and poor,’ she explains. ‘But it also suffers from a persisting cocktail of violence, drugs, gangs and police intervention.’ In recent months, escalating violence in the favelas (shantytowns) of Rio de Janeiro has taken centre stage as police operations have attempted to take control.

Dr Magalhaes’ fieldwork in Salvador has uncovered a perception by its inhabitants of violence as a constant presence. ‘My research has focused on understanding what this sense of violence does to people’s relation to themselves. On my last trip, I was struck by the fact most Bahians I spoke to were articulating their views on violence as an epidemic, not as a war as in Rio. By sensing violence as an epidemic that can claim them at will, they became potential victims of this faceless phenomenon, effectively feeding the fear.’

As her work continues, she hopes that a better understanding of the complexities of how violence is perceived and affects different people in practice might inform discussions on the effective solutions to bring about its reduction.

Born again in Latin America

In recent decades, predominantly Catholic Latin America has undergone what has been referred to as ‘the largest mass conversion in history’, as Pentecostalism has grown explosively across the region and beyond its shores.

Dr David Lehmann, from the Department of Sociology and Acting Director of the Centre, was among the first to draw attention to this apparent revolution in Latin American culture: ‘Pentecostalism, which had been growing gradually, exploded into the public consciousness in the 1980s, and grew to number almost 20% of the population in some countries. In recent years, Latin American Pentecostalism has been exported, and churches such as the Brazilian Universal Church of the Kingdom of God are now present worldwide.’

Pentecostalism has long been associated with developing countries and migrant groups. ‘It gives a voice to the voiceless and supports people in setting themselves ambitious targets, emphasising salvation by worldly success in this world as opposed to the afterlife,’ explains Lehmann. His work asks what the economic and political implications are of the spread and what it tells us about globalisation.

Connected with the underlying theme of religion, Dr Lehmann is also working on multiculturalism in Latin America, focusing on how issues of ethnicity and cultural difference are accepted and promoted. Funded by the British Academy, he is documenting and understanding developments in Latin America, and looking from a Latin American standpoint at Europe’s struggle with the contested issue of multiculturalism.

‘Latin America deserves academic attention because it is a region where, despite serious issues of racial, ethnic and socioeconomic exclusion, it does not have the history and bitterness of racial confrontation in the modern period that we find in Europe and the United States,’ he explains. ‘That’s not to say that discrimination doesn’t exist. But knowledge of policies to counter racial exclusion, such as the almost unique investment in intercultural universities, should be of interest elsewhere in the world. We can learn from the Latin American experience.’

At the Centre of Latin American Studies, interdisciplinary research is offering a new perspective on the creativity, challenges and lessons that can be learned from Latin America.

We can learn from the Latin American experience.

Dr David Lehmann

Francisco Valdez, Rosario, Argentina

El Eternauta, Argentina

Legacy of El Libertador

For the past 40 years, the academic community has benefited from the arrival of distinguished Latin American scholars through the Simón Bolívar Chair in Latin American Studies.

̽��ֱ��Fellowship was established by the Venezuelan Government in memory of Simón Bolívar (El Libertador) – the foremost leader of Latin American independence in the 1820s – and has brought a host of illustrious figures to Cambridge. Among those who have taken up the Chair for a one-year teaching and research sabbatical are Mario Vargas Llosa, winner of the 2010 Nobel prize in Literature, and sociologist Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who later became President of Brazil.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you use this content on your site please link back to this page.

Yes