Summary of the impact

The Panacea Society was an inward-looking religious community formed in Bedford in 1919. In 2001 a few reclusive members remained — some of the last representatives of a religious sub- culture dating back to the 1790s. Since 2001, members of the Oxford Faculty of Theology have been instrumental in advising and enabling this Society to evolve from a closed religious group into a charity funding social and educational initiatives and a public museum explaining apocalyptic religion to general audiences. Oxford-based researchers have produced notable academic outputs through discoveries in the Panacea Society archives; findings which shaped and informed the new museum.

Summary of the impact

Promoting public diffusion of philosophical research via new and online media, The 10-Minute Puzzle podcast series seeks to engage lay audiences with some of the central puzzles driving contemporary research in analytic philosophy. As of September 19^th, 2013, there had been over 63,000 downloads.

The series has two interrelated aims: to provide an innovative springboard for listeners (who may have had no previous exposure to philosophy) to engage with these puzzles on their own, and to provide a new, free resource for educators at all levels to stimulate interest in contemporary philosophy at any age.

As of September 19^th, 2013, the three episodes of The 10-Minute Puzzle described in this case study had been downloaded 14,418 times, with downloads continuing steadily.

Summary of the impact

Buddhists and non-Buddhists across the world, educators, students and chaplains are among those who have benefited personally, academically and professionally from the imaginative dissemination of Bristol's pioneering research into Buddhist Death Rituals in Southeast Asia and China. Exhibitions, talks, printed and online learning materials, image archives and websites have all been brought into play. These multiple approaches to the sharing of new knowledge have led to beneficial impacts on a wide variety of individuals, from schoolchildren on the brink of adulthood to people receiving comfort on their deathbed.

Summary of the impact

Writing Lives is a community storytelling project. It develops creative writing with people and communities as a way of expressing their past and present, and has resulted in a self-sustaining model of community arts practice. It demonstrates the following impact:

• Empowering people and communities to gain confidence in self-expression;
• Developing a listening and responsive model of participation, which ensures participants feel ownership over their involvement, which is tailored to meet their objectives, rather than being pre-structured and `imposed';
• Supporting a diverse range of voluntary sector organisations in engaging people and communities;
• Evolving partnership models which do not end abruptly with the initial project but endure and deepen beyond the research grant period.

Summary of the impact

William Wordsworth's poetry is of lasting value to our cultural and national identity and to perceptions of the Lake District. The desire to communicate core Wordsworthian principles shapes and informs the research undertaken by the Wordsworth Centre, Lancaster University, which seeks to vitally reconnect poetry and the region in the twenty-first century. Such research has produced an increased engagement with Wordsworth's poetry and transformed the understanding of his work and its continuing relevance for a range of beneficiaries.

Two research projects undertaken through collaboration with the Wordsworth Trust, Grasmere have realised considerable impact in the assessment period through three main channels:

1) a pioneering website, designed for diverse users, containing the first digital versions of selected Wordsworth manuscripts, which has received over 580,000 hits;

2) contributions to the visitor experience at Dove Cottage, Grasmere;

3) 40 `Wordsworth Walks' around Grasmere and its environs involving over 950 participants from a range of different groupings (business, public sector, general public).

Summary of the impact

How can digital technology redefine choreographic practices? This is an important question in terms of: the impact of networked technologies in connecting individuals virtually; screen interfaces as mediated contexts for embodied communication; the impact of technology in mediating experiences of motion. Interest in these questions is manifest in both academic, practice-led research and professional arts contexts.

This case study identifies how interdisciplinary, collaborative choreography and technology research projects undertaken within the Centre for Applied Research in Dance have focussed on choreographic innovation in live, mediated networked environments and the development of software tools enabling new methods of choreography and documentation.

Summary of the impact

The medieval seals projects have enabled substantial non-academic audiences to engage more effectively with and appreciate more fully the cultural heritage of Britain. There is now a deeper understanding among schoolchildren and adult interest groups (e.g. local history societies) of the importance of seals in medieval culture and their role in establishing identities. The projects have also alerted heritage professionals to the significance of seals as a heritage asset, and developed their skills in preserving and presenting this undervalued resource. In attracting visitors to Wales and the Marches through exhibitions and outreach events the projects have delivered an economic return.

Summary of the impact

`The Sublime Object' was a major AHRC-funded project of the Tate Britain, which used a range of open access media, free public exhibitions and events to promote new understanding of the ways in which perceptions of the Sublime in the external landscape are shaped by cultural experiences, and which was substantially shaped by Professor Philip Shaw's work.

Shaw worked with Tate Education/Learning to develop initiatives that would engage Tate's gallery and online audiences closely in an exploration of the concept of the Sublime, a theoretical concept encompassing ideas of the great, the awe-inspiring, and the overpowering. Through the collaboration of the public, artists, and academics, this work articulates ways in which the Sublime is experienced today. Shaw's research conceptually underpinned the project, helping to shape the ideas of artists, Tate visitors (in person and online), and curators. His thinking for pieces commissioned by the project was, in turn, shaped by this dialogue, demonstrating the enrichment of research via its initial impact.

Summary of the impact

The Stonehenge Riverside Project was carried out between 2003 and 2010, to determine the purpose of Stonehenge by investigating both the monument and the surrounding landscape. The project's reach and importance have been considerable, from training and inspiring the next generation of professional archaeologists to stimulating people worldwide with new knowledge about Stonehenge, providing artistic inspiration and changing perceptions and beliefs about the use of the site, leading to significant economic, cultural and technological benefits.

Summary of the impact

As a prize-winning poet, novelist and teacher of Creative Writing, Professor Philip Gross's work is concerned with the development of individuals' creative practice (both adults' and children's), outside the academy as well as inside it. His work has led to a wider awareness of the ways in which creative process, particularly through cross-arts collaboration, can enhance our understanding of some of the most urgent challenges of contemporary society. Offering models of peace-building and communication in an age of cultural diversity and migration, it encompasses creative ways of envisioning the environment as well as human issues of dispossession, health and ageing.