Goldsmiths, University of London

:"For the Memphis department store, see Goldsmith's.":"For other uses of the term "Goldsmiths", see Goldsmith (disambiguation)."

Infobox University
name = Goldsmiths, University of London
latin_name =


image_size = 168px
motto =
established = 1891
type =
endowment =
staff =
alumni =
head_label = Warden
head = Professor Geoffrey Crossick
students = 7,615cite web |url=http://www.hesa.ac.uk/holisdocs/pubinfo/student/institution0506.htm |title=Table 0a - All students by institution, mode of study, level of study, gender and domicile 2005/06 |work=Higher Education Statistics Agency online statistics |accessdate=2007-03-31]
undergrad = 4,815
postgrad = 2,585
doctoral =
profess =
city = Lewisham, London
state =
country = United Kingdom
campus =
free_label =
free =
colours =
affiliations = University of London 1994 Group
footnotes =
coor = coord|51.4743|-0.0353917|display=title|type:edu
website = http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/
address =

Goldsmiths, University of London, is a constituent college of the University of London. Based in New Cross, London, Goldsmiths specialises in the teaching and research of creative, cultural and cognitive disciplines.

The institution was founded in 1891 as Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute by the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths. It was acquired by the University of London in 1904 and was renamed Goldsmiths' College. The word 'College' was dropped from its branding in 2006 (however "Goldsmiths' College", with the apostrophe, remains the institution's formal legal name).cite web |url=http://www.gold.ac.uk/rebrand/faq.php |title=Rebranding FAQs |accessdate=2007-03-06 |publisher=Goldsmiths, University of London |quote=it is now known as Goldsmiths, University of London. Apart from on formal, legal documents, you should now drop the word ‘College’ after Goldsmiths.]

History

In 1891, the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths set up the Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute (more commonly referred to simply as the "Goldsmiths' Institute" [ [http://www.aim25.ac.uk/cgi-bin/search2?coll_id=5499&inst_id=29 "Goldsmiths' College archives"] ] ), dedicated to "the promotion of technical skill, knowledge, health and general well-being among men and women of the industrial, working and artisan classes". The Institute was based in New Cross at the former Royal Naval School building. (This building, which was designed by the architect John Shaw Jr, is now known as the Richard Hoggart Building and remains the main building of the campus today.)

In 1904, the Institute was acquired by the University of London and was re-established as Goldsmiths' College. (The apostrophe was removed in a rebranding in 1993.) Shortly after the acquisition, in 1907, the college added a new arts building, designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield, to the back of the main building. During the Second World War it was decided to evacuate the students and faculty of the college to University College, Nottingham, a decision that proved wise when the main building was struck by an incendiary bomb and gutted in 1940 (the building was finally repaired in 1947). During the 1960s the college experienced a rapid expansion in student numbers and the main building was expanded and the Lockwood Building, Whitehead Building, Education Building, Warmington Tower and St James's Hall were all built during this period in order to accommodate the new students. In 1988 Goldsmiths became a full college of the University of London and in 1990 received its Royal Charter. Among its wardens have been Richard Hoggart and Ben Pimlott.

Goldsmiths has been highly-ranked by "The Good University Guide" as the top London university to study Media and Communications plus Visual Arts. Goldsmiths' campus is noted for its rich architecture, including Deptford Town Hall.

Location

The college is situated in New Cross, a highly populated area of south-east London with a considerable art and music scene. The college's main Richard Hoggart Building was originally designed as a school (opened in 1844) by the architect John Shaw Jr (1803-1870). In addition to this the college has built many more modern buildings to develop more of a campus, including the RIBA award-winning Rutherford Building completed in 1997 and the Ben Pimlott Building designed by Will Alsop and completed in 2005.

Research and teaching

Goldsmiths is best known for courses and research relating to creativity and culture, and has a reputation for producing visual artists, particularly those collectively known as YBA. This reputation was largely established by the influence of Michael Craig-Martin, Jon Thompson, Nick De Ville and Irit Rogoff as teaching staff. Its Sociology department has been important in the recent development of the discipline in Britain, with leading sociologists such as Paul Gilroy, Bev Skeggs, Nikolas Rose, Don Slater, Celia Lury, Les Back, Jeffrey Alexander and Kate Nash, working in the department in recent years. TERU, the Technology Education Research Unit, has been instrumental in understanding how design & technology works in schools; how to encourage learners towards creative interventions that improve the made world; and how to help teachers to support that process. The Writing Purposefully in Art and Design Network (Writing-PAD) has its main Writing-PAD Centre at Goldsmiths. The network now spans some 50 institutions across the art and design sector with 6 national and 2 International Writing PAD Centres. Goldsmiths is well-known for Cultural Studies. The Media and Communications Department, as well as the Centre for Cultural Studies, house some leading scholars in this field including James Curran, Scott Lash, Angela McRobbie, Sara Ahmed, Nick Couldry, John Hutnyk, and David Morley. In anthropology there are people like Stephen Nugent, Sophie Day, Catherine Alexander, Keith Hart and David Graeber, recently refused tenure at Yale because of his political commitments. The Goldsmiths anthropology department is also well known for its focus on visual anthropology. The realm of continental philosophy is represented with academics such as Howard Caygill, Alexander Düttmann and visiting professor Andrew Benjamin. Furthermore, in the area of Psychology there is Chris French a vocal sceptic of the paranormal who has appeared on television and radio on numerous occasions. Centre for Russian Music, director Alexander Ivashkin, is well known internationally for its outstanding archives (Prokofiev, Schnittke) and unique collections ( Stravinsky, Russian Piano Music first editions).

tudent life

The College provides, amongst other things, catering facilities, a chaplaincy, a medical centre, a nursery and a gym for student use. Additionally, Goldsmiths Students' Union runs two bars, The Green Room and, above, The Stretch, which links across Dixon Road from the Richard Hoggart Building, hosts numerous entertainment events including karaoke, a quiz and bingo on Mondays, the legendary Club Sandwich club night open until between 2 and 3am on Wednesdays and a variety of other nights often featuring indie music. The union also provides student representation [http://www.goldsmithsstudents.com] and runs both a student magazine (Smiths [http://www.smiths.gold.ac.uk/] ) and a radio station broadcast online and locally by FM (Wired [http://www.wired.gold.ac.uk/] ). All Goldsmiths students are also able to make use of the facilities of the University of London Union.

The university also owns 7 halls of residence which offer accommodation for students:
*Batavia Mews
*Chesterman House
*Dean House
*Loring Hall
*Surrey House
*Surrey House Annexe
*Raymont Hall

Goldsmiths has also been awarded either 5 or 5* rating in 2001 Research Assessment Exercise, which denotes research of international excellence for Anthropology, Art, Design, English, Media and Communications, Music, and Sociology departments.

ports, clubs, and traditions

Sports teams and societies are organised by the Goldsmiths Students' Union. The union runs 18 sports clubs, 11 of which compete in either University of London Union or BUCS leagues. In addition the union runs 35 societies, ranging from political societies (such as the very active Stop-the-War and Socialist Worker Student society) and identity-oriented societies (for instance the Sikh society and the LGBT society) to interest societies (the Film Society and the on-campus radio station Wired are the two largest Societies at the college) and more.

An amateur opera company based in the college, Opera Gold, draws its cast from college members past and present.

Palestine Twinning. Since 2006 Goldsmiths Student Union has been twinned with Al-Quds Open University and in May 2008, after a year of fund raising, the SU flew the Al-Quds Dean of Affairs and the equivalent of the Student Union President from the West Bank to visit Goldsmiths in London to spend the week with staff and students. The 'Twinning Campaign' motion passed declared support for Palestinians right to education and condemned the Israeli occupation. It also initiated a campaign to lobby the University to officially 'twin' with Al-Quds and offer 2 scholarships to 2 Al-Quds students. Goldsmiths' Staff Union pass a motion in support of the Twinning almost immediately afterwards.

Goldsmiths Students Union has a long tradition of radical politics, organising occupations against Top-Up-Fees during the 1990s when 8 students were expelled due to their refusal to pay their fees. After weeks of occupying lecture theatres, college management gave in and the 8 students were reinstated and allowed back onto their course without paying. Recently, socialist activist Jennifer Jones was elected Campaigns & Communications sabbatical officer 08/09, furthering the colleges well known left-wing political tradition. Since her time in office, Jones has initiated anti-privitisation campaign 'Goldsmiths Not For Profit' and remains President of the Stop-the-War group on campus.

Alumni

See also .

Film

*Bhavna Malkani Documentary Film Director
*Tom MacRae Screenwriter & Author
*Paul Bush Experimental Film Director

Journalism

*Sarah Sands, sometime editor of the "Sunday Telegraph".
*Keir Simmons, reporter, ITV News.

Literature

*Niven Govinden, novelist
*Hisham Matar, novelist
*Gladys Mitchell, author
*Julian Turner, poet
*R J Unstead, author
*Mike Phillips (illustrator), author
*John Harvey (author), creator of Resnick series of crime novels

Music

*Rob da Bank, Radio 1 DJ
*Tunday Akintan, creator of yorubeat music
*Jack Brymer, musician
*John Cale, musician
*Chris Corner, musician
*Graham Coxon, musician, former member of Blur, guitarist, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, painter.
*Patrick Frye III, composer, pianist, harpsichordist and historic re-creationist
*Simon Hale, musician, composer, arranger
*John Illsley, musician, bassist with Dire Straits
*Alex James, musician, member of Blur, bassist, songwriter, author
*Patrick Jonathan, composer
*Linton Kwesi Johnson, poet, musician
*Kanya King, founder of MOBO awards
*Malcolm McLaren, music manager, notably of the Sex Pistols
*Brian Molko, singer with Placebo
*indigo Moss, London based alternative band
*Pull Tiger Tail, New Cross based indie band
*Dave Rowntree, musician, animator and political activist, member of Blur
*Damon Albarn, musician, singer-songwriter, record producer, rhythm guitarist, keyboard player and principal songwriter of rock band Blur

Performers

*Emily Booth, actress and TV presenter
*Julian Clary, comedian
*Alex Zane, TV presenter

Politicians

*The Rt Hon Tessa Jowell MP, politician
*Cathy Jamieson MSP, Scottish politician
*Kerry McCarthy MP, politician
*The Rt Hon Lord Merlyn-Rees, politician
*Darren Johnson, Green Party politician

Visual arts

*Bernd Behr, artist
*Henry Bond, photographer and writer
*Matthew Collings, artist and art critic
*Ian Davenport, artist
*Grenville Davey, artist
*Angus Fairhurst, artist
*James Robert Ford, artist
*Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, artists
*Lucian Freud, artist
*Anya Gallaccio, artist
*Antony Gormley, artist
*Damien Hirst, artist
*Gary Hume, artist
*Michael Landy, artist
*Peter Lowe, artist
*Sarah Lucas, artist
*Mark McGowan, performance artist
*Steve McQueen, artist
*Cathy de Monchaux, artist
*Ian Monroe, artist
*Gareth Morgan, artist
*Matt O'dell, artist
*Julian Opie, artist
*Stephen Park, artist
*Richard Patterson, painter
*Simon Patterson, artist
*Cyril Edward Power, artist and architect
*Mary Quant, fashion designer
*Alan Rankle, artist
*Bridget Riley, artist
*Yinka Shonibare, artist
*Anj Smith, artist
*Sam Taylor-Wood, artist
*Mark Wallinger, artist
*Gillian Wearing, artist
*Vivienne Westwood, designer
*Mary White, ceramicist and calligrapher
*Catherine Yass, artist
*Walter Landor, pioneer in branding
*Liam Gillick, artist

ee also

*Education in London
*1994 Group

References

External links

* [http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk The official Goldsmiths website]
* [http://www.goldsmithsstudents.com The official Goldsmiths Students' Union website]