Matt has been a key organiser of many academic events, most particularly with his work for the British Society for Phenomenology. Matt has worked in various roles in these events, leading the annual conferences in their revival from 2016-2019 and afterwards, as the conference moved into Online and Hybrid variants, as the Technical Lead.
2025
[Forthcoming] Lifeworlds in Crisis
Location: Dublin
Role: Technical Lead
Date: 27 - 29 August 2025
Theme: This conference aims to reconcile the theoretical foundations of phenomenology with its practical applications and critical potential, focusing on how applied phenomenology can function as an interdisciplinary research program to address the pressing issues of our time. Learn More
2024
Lived Experience in Theory and in Practice
Location: Bristol, UK
Role: Technical Lead
Date: 11 - 13 September 2024
Theme: The ability for phenomenology to centre embodiment in philosophical analysis has been a significant draw for theorists and practitioners—increasingly in transdisciplinary areas, such as health and medical humanities. Phenomenology also continues to offer rich approaches to lived time, to history and normativity, and to generative accounts of culture and ethics—from conceptualising the dynamics of time-consciousness through to critical interventions on contemporary issues. That phenomenology can span, integrate, trouble, unsettle, and renew our understanding of these experiential structures—embodiment and history—speaks to the exciting philosophical dialogues within the field today.Learn More
2023
Lived Experience in Theory and in Practice
Location: Manchester, UK
Role: Conference Director
Date: 29 - 31 August 2022
Theme: We aim to raise anew the question of lived experience, both in the theory and practice of phenomenology. Contributions come from those who apply this concept in their practice, those who seek to develop that conception, and those who ground it in the history of the phenomenological tradition. Learn More
2022
Engaged Phenomenology II
Location: Exeter, UK & Online
Role: Technical Lead
Date: 30 August - September 2022
Theme: ‘Engaged Phenomenology II: Explorations of Embodiment, Emotions and Sociality’ builds upon the themes and contributions of our 2020 online conference ‘Engaged Phenomenology’, and is an invitation for phenomenologists and practitioners to critically reflect on how lived experiences regarding embodiment, emotions and sociality are incorporated into their work. Learn more
2021
The Future as a Present Concern
Location: Online
Role: Technical Lead
Date: 1-3 September 2021
Theme: This conference seeks to contribute to understanding the future as a present concern both with respect to the underlying issues of temporal orientation and the pressing questions of today as we face into an increasingly uncertain future.
2020
Engaged Phenomenology
Location: Online.
Role: Reviewer and Technical Lead
Date: 3-5 September 2020
Theme: ‘Engaged Phenomenology’ seeks to complement the approaches of applied and critical phenomenology by investigating embodied lived experience through a plurality of voices, encouraging dialogue between phenomenology, as a philosophical approach, and other disciplines, in addition to practitioners and individuals outside the academy.
2019
The Theory and Practice of Phenomenology
Location: International Anthony Burgess Foundation, Manchester.
Role: Reviewer and Co-organiser
Date: 5-7 September 2019
Theme: The BSP Annual Conference is a longstanding and respected feature of the UK academic scene, providing a friendly and supportive forum for inter-disciplinary discussion. We actively seek to explore the interface between the theory and history of phenomenology and its practice by academics and professionals of many fields.
2018
The Theory and Practice of Phenomenology
Location: University of Kent
Role: Reviewer and Co-organiser
Date: 23-25 July 2018
Theme: In this openly themed conference, we are looking for submissions exploring phenomenological theory or its practical application. We would welcome papers that address phenomenology across a broad range of areas and issues including, but not limited to, the arts, ethics, medical humanities, mental health, education, technology, feminism, politics and political governance.
2017
Phenomenology: Theory and Practice
Location: University of Brighton.
Role: Reviewer and Co-organiser
Date: 11-13 September 2017
Theme: We are looking for submissions exploring phenomenological theory or its practical application. We would welcome papers that address phenomenology across a broad range of areas and issues including, but not limited to, the arts, ethics, medical humanities, mental health, education, technology, feminism, politics and political governance.
2016
The Future of Phenomenology
Location: International Anthony Burgess Foundation, Manchester.
Role: Project Leader
Date: 2-4 September 2016
Theme: We are looking for submissions on a broad range of topics including, but not limited to, classic phenomenology, neurophenomenology, phenomenology and technology, phenomenology and the medical humanities, ethics and phenomenology, phenomenology and mental health, phenomenology of education, corporate phenomenology, phenomenology and the life sciences, ethics and phenomenology, feminist phenomenology, phenomenology and political governance. In addition, we welcome papers examining the continuing legacy of traditional phenomenological thinkers including but not limited to Husserl, Heidegger, Jaspers, Scheler, Sartre, De Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty
2014
1st Annual IHSSR Research Student Symposium
Location: Manchester Metropolitan University.
Role: Co-organiser
Date: 10 May 2014
2013
The God Question: MMU Philosophy Cooperative
Location: Manchester Metropolitan University.
Role: Organiser and Host
Date: 15 March 2013