Professor Nuria Triana-Toribio from the Hispanic Studies Department will give her KIASH Inaugural lecture , ‘Spanish Film Cultures’ on Friday 13 March at 6pm in Grimond lecture Theatre 2.

No film comes about without a film culture to sustain it. Film cultures are the institutions, legislation, working practices and cultural actors that encourage some kinds of film and prove fallow ground for others. In Spain during the long transition to democracy from Franco’s dictatorship (1968-1978) a new film culture was built that distanced itself from the old. However, the transition in film, like the transition in politics, was more easily imagined than achieved. Elements of the old film culture persisted, even among the progressives, while film historians, signed up to the project of the new film culture, have been reluctant to acknowledge these vestigial traces, which have become the ‘bad objects’ of Spanish film studies. But as Ezra Pound once said, ‘you can’t know an era merely by knowing its best’. This lecture will consider the development of Spain’s dominant film culture since 1968 by examining one such bad object, the popular f ilm magazine Nuevo Fotogramas, long considered too frivolous to have played any serious part in the transition, in spite of the cosmopolitan outlook of its writers and editors.

The lecture will be followed by a drinks reception in the Grimond Foyer.

Further details cab be found on the SECL website.

Professor Quentin Skinner will be asking this question at our annual Renaissance Lecture on Tuesday, 24th March 2015 at 6pm in Lecture Theatre 1, Grimond Building. All are welcome to attend, and there will be a wine reception afterwards.

One of Machiavelli’s aims in The Prince is to persuade us that the truly virtuoso prince should follow the virtues so far as possible, but should be ready to abandon them when this alternative seems necessary for the maintenance of the state. This is certainly what Machiavelli appears to claim about the virtue of justice. But if we turn to his examination of the so-called ‘princely’ virtues, especially clemency and liberality, we encounter a very different argument. Machiavelli complains that, in our corrupt modern world, some actions regarded as virtuous may in fact be instances of vice, while other actions condemned as vices may in fact be virtues. The aim of the lecture is to disentangle Machiavelli’s complex views about the relationship between virtue and political success.

Professor Quentin Skinner is Barber Beaumont Professor of the Humanities at Queen Mary, University of London. His research centres on early-modern Europe, and one of his principal interests lies in the Italian Renaissance. He has published books on Machiavelli, on early Renaissance political painting, on ideals of civic virtue, and has edited Machiavelli’s The Prince.

Join in the Canterbury Big Quiz at the University’s Sports Centre on Friday 24 April from 7pm.

Quiz organisers, the KM Group, are trying to recruit 50 teams to represent the University’s 50th anniversary. They’d love you to be part of it – and if you’re the top University team, you could win a special prize.

The KM Group is also offering University staff and students a special discount code, UKC50,  giving £10 off of team entry and free drink on arrival.  There will also be a bar provided by Barclay’s and a Ploughman’s supper to enjoy.

To book your table of eight, visit www.kmbigquiz.co.uk and select event booking, or click here.

On Tuesday 10 March, Jobshop will be hosting its annual Recruitment Fair in Darwin Conference Suite, from 12 noon to 3pm.

This year’s Recruitment Fair is even bigger with thirty exhibitors attending the event.  Students can come along to the event to meet a range of exhibitors including; Canterbury Historic River Tours, Charlton Athletic, RNLI, Holiday Extras, Saga Group and Kent Hospitality to name a few! The exhibitors are looking to recruit for part-time, temporary and seasonal staff, so there is something for everyone. For a full list of exhibitors please go to the kent union website.

As well as meeting a range of local and national organisations, students will also receive 5 Employability Points simply for attending the event!

To find out more, please go to the event’s Facebook page.