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The Testimonies Group got organized spontaneously sometime in 2006. It is currently based at Birkbeck College, University of London, Malet Street. It is not a formal organization of the College, but it has found a hospitable caravan indeed.

The group brings together at an informal and social setting academics, postgraduate and undergraduate students and nonacademics from various fields. It was originally set up by an academic and some of his students at the law school of Birkbeck College, but it now comprises within its regulars friends from film studies, politics, psychology, literature, philosophy, science and the arts and so forth from various institutions in and around London. Anyone is welcome to join us. There is no need to get in contact, though if you like do so. Just show up at any of the planned events and do let us know of your email address so that we can enlist you on the contacts.

We do not wish to unite ourselves under a common umbrella. The only thing that brings us together is that we like to meet up and watch films of interest. We don't share a politics as such, either. But we seem to be all concerned with apathy, egocentrism, career-radicalism and the pseudo-humanity that surrounds us. We also do not seem to hold the academic platform as a necessarily liberatory one. This already entails questions that we seem to be concerned with.

The testimonies group's purpose lies in question then as well as in organizing meetings and events of interest in relation to four main areas of concern: politics, philosophy, law and film.

The primary activity of the group at the moment is the following:

• The Testimonies Group meets once every month on a Friday evening at 18.30 to screen and discuss each time a film and matters that arise in relation to it, as to politics, film, philosophy, law and our everyday lives.

We are concerned with four main initial questions:

What does it mean to act? And to act ‘politically’ anylonger for that matter?

What does it mean to bear witness to an event?

When and how are subjects formed and deformed in our everyday lives?

When it comes to considering a ‘testimony’, where does its authority, if any,

come from?

The actual screening starts at 630. You are welcome to bring some drinks with you if you like. We then usually follow this up with someone's short introduction to the discussion and an informal discussion open to all. You are welcome to just attend the screening if you prefer. The screenings are staged for educational and discussion purposes and not for any commercial gain.

You can contact the group by writing to: BirkbeckGroupTestimonies@googlemail.com