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Applications are invited for Marie Curie Training Site Fellowships available to doctoral students. The Training Site, is a network of 8 research groups in 6 EU countries:
- University of Rome, La Sapienza, Italy (co-ordinator of the MCTS-network and of the European PhD on Social Representation and Communication.)
- E.H.E.S.S., Paris, France
- University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
- London School of Economics, United Kingdom
- University of Helsinki, Finland
- University de Provence, France
- I.S.C. T.E - Lisbon, Portugal
- University of the Basque Country, Spain
These Universities were chosen from a wider network of 13 European universities offering of European PhD on Social Representation and Communication, (formally recognised doctorate, which may be followed in its own right or in addition to national doctoral studies), in the forefront of research in social representations and communication studies. Fellows will, therefore, have access to the leading experts in their field of research, including the founder of the S.R. Theory, prof. Serge Moscovici. The Marie Curie Training Site offers an innovative didactic system based on open distance learning and co-tutoring at their own University and up to two network Universities abroad. This system aims to develop fellows' research projects in a stimulating international environment open to multi-disciplinary and multi-methodological approaches.
Fellowships are available for stays of 3 months to 1 year at a network University abroad.
The Marie Curie Training site will pay the fellow a stay allowance of 1200 euro/month usually tax free, return travel expenses between the fellow's present country of activity and that of the host institution.
Fellows must be:
- Nationals of a member or associated states or have satisfied the five year residency requirement;
- 35 years old or less at the time of selection;
- enrolled in the doctoral studies in a similar subject to the European Doctorate on Social Representations and Communication.
Candidates for the Marie Curie Training site Fellowship can apply to the Scientific co-ordinator of the European PhD on Social Representation and Communication, using the application form:
Prof. Annamaria de Rosa
European Doctorate on Social Representations and Communication Research Center and Multimedia Lab
Università degli Studi "La Sapienza" Facoltà di Psicologia
Piazza dell'Ara Coeli, 1 - 00186 Rome -Italy
Tel. n. 0039-06-69380814 - Fax n. 0039-06-69294280
annamaria.derosa@uniroma1.it
The training site guarantees a fair selection of the eligible applicants on the basis of their scientific, merit, compatibility of their doctoral studies with the expertise at the Marie Curie Training Site and equal opportunities , particularly between women and men.
Description of the Research Area
The research area of the proposed doctoral training is a specialised area of social psychology - social representations and communication. This research area is open to multidisciplinary and multi-methodological approaches (experimental and field work). The theory of social representations has been one of the most important 20th century theories of the social construction of knowledge.
The study of social representations, which was originally specifically European, is currently a multilingual, world-wide enterprise with a substantial body of literature involving leading scholars from both social psychology and the social sciences: sociology, anthropology, education, economics, linguistics, semiotics and communication and media studies. Studies of "what" people know - and "how" it relates to the social groups to which they belong and to media- have been concerned with the social construction and representation of a particular object (e.g. politics, economics, new technologies, environment, health-illness, etc.) and its related scientific theories transformed into everyday knowledge.
Individual subject areas of Euro PhD research are highly relevant to EC programmes with a strong societal impact. They relate to Economics, Social and Human Sciences (sub-disciplines S-04 - Psychology and S-07 Media and Communication) within the Improving Human Research Potential and the Social-Economic Knowledge Base horizontal Programme (see for example some of the topical issues related to areas defined in action 4: national and supranational identities in European citizens, minority groups, unemployment and new forms of job, structural changes in family, gender studies, human rights....).
The Euro PhD itself falIs also within Confirming the International Role of Community Research.
Expected Benefit and Impact of Research Training
Since the Euro PhD has been operative since 1996 in the training of EU and non-EU postgraduates, the following benefits are already visible:
- Fellows are guaranteed by European standards as regards to selection and training procedures; research training in an international environment; intensive didactic stages in multicultural settings; training process assessment; officialisation of the qualification.
- Fellows will follow an international doctoral programme which operates through a formal agreement. The Euro PhD qualification is recognised by all training site network universities. The Euro PhD may be followed in addition to a national PhD.
- Fellows are offered a broader range of international expertise and approaches than would be possible at a national level: the training site includes the most highly qualified European experts in the field. Students are exposed not only to a variety of methodological approaches but to an international expert in their preferred methodological approach. The multidisciplinary approaches and facilities to which students are exposed in host universities gives them access to a far wider spread of research disciplines than would be possible nationally.
- Fellows are closely and individually monitored through an integrated system of physical mobility at host training sites (stage abroad) and open distance learning (virtual mobility), guaranteeing quality, long-term tutoring by a unique training system (the didactic triangle of a national tutor and two foreign co-tutors in addition to the wider teaching staff and Scientific Board available in the Euro PhD network).
- The system of open distance learning guarantees flexibility in meeting the needs of students; it enables students to organise their research in the way that they wish to within the confines of the didactic structure; open distance learning can also be adapted to provide more temporary or more specific training if required by the trainee. Under the open distance learning system, the Programme Director and Scientific Co-ordinator have access to students' research. Administratively speaking, this communal access is advantageous because it enables research training to be easily co-ordinated and supervised by the scientific committee.
- The Marie Curie Training Site scheme is a significant improvement because it should address the problem of financial support to Fellows for training stage abroad.
- Under the Euro PhD system a foreign tutor is chosen for his/her own specific area of expertise and will therefore be able to give more academically specific assistance than would be possible at national level. This is as beneficial to tutoring as it is to learning. As well as the obvious cultural/linguistic benefits of mobility, the virtual and physical mobility of tutors enables them to reflect on and refine their own tutoring methods; it also has a beneficial effect on their research. Yearly International Summer Schools related to the EUPhD training are a great occasion for acquiring expertise in co-teaching and for monitoring the results of the co-tutoring.
Target
- young researchers (aged 35 years or under), EU citizens (or from Associated states) enrolled in doctoral programmes out of the multi-partner Marie Curie Training Sites network or enrolled in the Euro PhD programme;
- participants in previous International Summer Schools dedicated to the European PhD on Social Representation and Communication who meet the requirements;
- young post-graduate members and affiliates of national and international scientific associations in Social Psychology enrolled in national doctoral programmes in a similar subject;
- young researchers interested in the Marie Curie Training Site in the position of applying for M.C. Fellowship;
- special target groups in the position of applying for M.C. fellowship - such as researchers who work in less-favoured regions of Europe (i.e. Portugal, Greece) and women researchers.
Coordinator:
Prof. Annamaria de Rosa,
European Doctorate on Social Representations and Communication Research Center and Multimedia Lab
Università degli Studi "La Sapienza" Facoltà di Psicologia
Piazza dell'Ara Coeli, 1 - 00186 Rome -Italy
Tel. n. 0039-06-69380814 - Fax n. 0039-06-69294280
annamaria.derosa@uniroma1.it