Monthly Archives: March 2019

Activists and architects of change

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Ana Maria Portugal, final year PhD student at the Birkbeck Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development (CBCD) and its affiliated TABLET Project, writes about the Bloomsbury Festival workshop she developed with the Birkbeck Public Engagement Team to get families thinking about screen time. 

On Sunday 21 October 2018 I was, together with the rest of the TABLET Team from Birkbeck CBCD, at the Brunswick Square taking part at the Family Hub of the Bloomsbury Festival. Together with the Public Engagement Team I liaised with the Festival, applied for funding, and designed a workshop where families had to back-stitch a join the dots emoji pattern. Written on the postcards were questions that prompted several important discussion strands about screen time – such as online safety and type of content.

We created a space for the whole family to promote gentle discussions about how screens are potentially changing our life. Inspired by facts and conversations, families sewed their own emoji response on screen templates and took them away as souvenirs.

The TABLET Team has been active in science dissemination and public engagement, working with the BBC, Guardian, and the Polka Theatre. But this time, I wanted to facilitate discussions on the topic of screen time in a gentle way, inspired by the work on craftivism and gentle protest by Sarah Corbett from the Craftivist Collective. After attending the ‘Developing Interactive Activities: Planning Workshop’ and hearing about the Bloomsbury Festival, I felt that its theme ‘Activists and Architects of Change’ fitted really well with what I wanted to do!

We had a big range of families participating (families with very young children, grandparents with older kids, groups of teenagers) and actively engaging with the activity, learning how to back-stitch and having conversations about screen time and use. Visitors could choose from four designs which had different levels of difficulty – the easiest one could be done by a four-year-old but the most difficult design was also the one that represented a more complex topic of discussion (so it required more time to craft and deliberate).

One year after I joined the Public Engagement Team’s workshop I came back again to share my experience. Looking back, I realised how putting together the workshop by myself, from developing the idea to organising its logistics, was very empowering, but also brought some specific challenges. Will I find the funding? What is the right balance between promoting scientific discussion and entertaining? How can I make sure the activity requires enough time to enable conversations while not compromising the time people have available?

So, for those interested in engaging the public with their work, here are my thoughts:

  • In general people like to chat and are very interested in understanding what academic people and scientists do. So if you are also keen in sharing your work, just go for it.
  • However, if you do have something physical that people can engage with or take home (even if it is not working exactly as it should!), that will attract more people and will make them stay longer too.
  • Be enthusiastic and kind when engaging with the public, and try not to presume how much they know or judge their views. Remember that public engagement is about a positive impact and that that will come from a two-way interaction!

Youth crime and violence: who hears the voices of black women?

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Black women activists in education came together for International Women’s Day to address the growing numbers of young lives lost through knife and gun crime. Dr Jan Etienne, Honorary Research Fellow in Social Policy and Education, discusses the event and the pressing need for a collective response from black women educators and mothers to this deepening crisis.

Michele Beute, lecturer, lawyer and performance poet

One year on from the Black Women, Womanist Learning and Higher Education conference held at Birkbeck, black women activists in education came together to discuss a pilot research study aimed at responding to the growing numbers of young lives lost in UK towns and cities through knife and gun crime. A pressing concern for members of the Womanism, Activism, Higher Education, Research Network (#BlackWomenHE) was the absence of a collective response from black women educators and mothers to a deepening crisis, predominantly involving black youth.

The event brought together black women academics; activists in education, youth work and the voluntary sector to structure key objectives of a pilot study seeking to consider womanist educational strategies for building stronger communities. One major question under consideration at the ‘Black Youth, crime and Violence – A Womanist perspective’ event was the nature of education at the centre of black women’s activism. A further question focussed on the intergenerational, educational strategies likely to affect change among black youth.

Professor Uvanney Maylor spoke of her own research, the value of black women’s voices and the significance of listening to the voices of young people, particularly across the primary and secondary school sector. She argued that it was now clear that many young black people did not often hear positive stories about their futures. At school, some are told they will not succeed. However, boys speak to their mother’s, their sisters, their aunts and as black women, and we can play a crucial role in nurturing these voices, enabling them to come forward and be heard.

Patsy Cummings, a local Councillor and member of Croydon’s Children and Young people sub committee spoke about knife crime in her area, the local strategy to reduce violent crimes and the importance of building relationships with young people. She pointed out that we do not have to be educators to agree that every child deserves a chance.  We need to work together and find ways to make our contribution and take responsibility for young people’s education – or the lack of it.

Lecturer, Lawyer and Spoken Word poet, Michele Beute, reflected on some of her own previous experiences pursuing a law degree and gave a staunch message to participant on ways to succeed. In a ‘Tanty Mauvais’ performance entitled: ‘Yuh see me face, but yuh doh see meh mind!’ (You see my face but you don’t see my mind), she stressed, the colour of your face is what is seen first, but do not be deterred, there are ways to rise up and pursue your dreams.The Womanism, Activism, Higher Education Research Network links the lives of black women in Higher Education with those of black women actively working in community settings.

The network explores intergenerational learning and the significance of learning in later years  and in particular, the value of volunteering in the lives of older and younger black women. The network brings together black women in Higher Education, including students, academics participating in social science research – sociology, psychosocial studies, politics and other areas; black women community activists’ and practitioner’s working in education, community, health, social work and related areas; groups focused on intersectionality, inclusion, social justice and addressing issues such as constructions of motherhood, youth and voluntary, community studies, faith, disability, sexuality, ‘race’, ethnicity, and culture as they impact on educational policy and practice in higher education.

To find out more about the work of the research network, contact:  Dr Jan Etienne, j.etienne@bbk.ac.uk. Etienne’s forthcoming book, ‘Crisis, Education and Community: Black Women, Higher Education and the Challenge of Activism’, will be published by IOE Press.

The event was sponsored by the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities.