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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.
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.
Dr Richard Noakes led `Connecting Cornwall', a project working with the Porthcurno Telegraph Museum (PTM) from February 2009 - July 2012, looking at the lives and careers of the `ordinary' men who operated the Victorian and Edwardian British submarine cable network.
The project was fundamental in building a working relationship with PTM that now paves the way for future research-based collaborations. The exhibition also raised the profile of PTM. A new section of the website was created for PTM, greatly improving its online presence and user experience. Impacts on the public have included providing access to previously unseen archival material, preserving and displaying artefacts of cultural heritage and in educating people with regards to their local history.
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 19th, 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 19th, 2013, the three episodes of The 10-Minute Puzzle described in this case study had been downloaded 14,418 times, with downloads continuing steadily.
Three research projects emerging from audio materials in the University of Edinburgh's Scottish Studies Archives (SSA) and from the Greig-Duncan folksong collection have forged a new understanding of the role of tradition in Scotland and internationally. These projects contribute to the reanimation of Scotland's rich traditional heritage by transferring into a contemporary context music and song preserved in these cultural artefacts. Through our websites (since 2010 ca. 9,000 hits per month from 98 different countries), public performances in Scotland, Ireland and North America, educational packages, CDs and radio broadcasts (ca. 50,000 weekly listeners 2008-13) we combine the old with the new, and have thus influenced the way the cultural and educational professions, performers and the general public engage with the traditional arts of Scotland.
This creative/critical collaboration sought to reclaim Spenser's The Faerie Queene for today's world, investigating how to remake this religious poem and national epic for diverse audiences and users, and exploring its potential to revivify religion and society, through artistic works and new liturgies. Impact beyond the academy was always at the conceptual heart of the project. Bringing together members of different faith groups, school communities, and cultural practitioners (musicians, puppeteers, poets), it engaged them in debate and sought to produce new cultural forms that would not only contribute to cultural life but affect civil society and public discourse. An unforeseen if powerful impact was a national debate and controversy over deployments of the figure of St George.
Dr Alexandros Paraskevas has demonstrated the benefits of implementing academic research and `scientific rigour' into global business practices. His conceptual approach to risk and crisis management has become highly acclaimed within the hospitality industry and has strengthened practices in a turbulent business environment. His research pioneered an effective partnership between the Oxford School of Hospitality Management and InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), resulting in the Group developing new risk management practices, enhancing its effectiveness in managing risks, saving costs and gaining worldwide recognition as industry leader in the field. These practices are continuously shared with the broader H&T industry through appropriate fora and dissemination platforms.
In the past five years, the research of Dr Mark Blackburn and Dr Rory Naismith has been crucial to transforming the personal and professional development of amateur metal detectorists and collectors. Early medieval coins discovered by the latter have been integral to this research, and dissemination of research conclusions has led detectorists to search more responsibly and report their finds. Dr Blackburn and Dr Naismith's research has thus shaped attitudes towards the heritage value of coinage among the general public, metal-detector users and in the commercial sector. Their success in achieving this impact has been based on presentation of research through electronic databases, public outreach and printed publications.
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.
The Bloomsbury Project, which gathers the results of archival research into the geographical, cultural, and social development of Bloomsbury, London, in the 19th century, has assisted and enriched the investigations of local historians and organisations into the area. The Bloomsbury Project website receives over 3,000 hits each month (and often closer to 5,000), Professor Rosemary Ashton's monograph Victorian Bloomsbury (2012) has been widely reviewed, and a series of well-attended public events has brought together members of the community working on Bloomsbury-related projects.