Arts for social justice

I'm Me is a creative research project that works with learning disabled and autistic artists to explore questions of identity, representation and voice.

Learning disabled and autistic people lack power in our society. They are often seen as vulnerable and needing protection or care. At the same time they are rarely given a voice, even on issues that directly relate to disability. I'm Me works with learning disabled and autistic artists' lived experiences, placing them at the centre of the research process.

Lead by Professor Matthew Reason, I'm Me works with Mind the Gap and in partnership with a network of 6 disability arts companies: About Face, Confidance, Hijinx, Lung Ha, Open Theatre, and Under the Stars. It is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and runs from May 2023 to June 2025.

I'm Me Project

How can people rebuild their lives after spending time in prison?

How do we help people reconcile their experiences and the path they have taken to define a different course for their lives in the future?

Led by Rachel Conlon, The Prison Partnership Project involves staff and students from drama and other disciplines working directly with women in prison to explore their experiences, reflect on their choices and rediscover their identity in the outside world.

Prison Partnership Project

This project developed from an ISJ Community Research Grant. It was led by Dr Jo Gibson, Dr Zheng Chai and Emmanuel 'Manny Loveankh' Ebokosia from music social enterprise True Cadence. We took a co-produced place-based approach to map under 18 music provisions in the young and diverse London Borough of Barking and Dagenham.

Through a combination of qualitative and creative methods that centre young people’s perspectives we learnt that music provisions (especially pathways to learning about music business for under 18s) are decreasing and inequitable. Furthermore, LBBD has some of the lowest music provisions in London.

We hosted an event called Beats and Boroughs to share our findings and collectively reflect with young people, musicians and organisations about how to cultivate varied and equitable music pathways for young people.

From the success of this, True Cadence has been awarded funding from Westfield East Bank Creative Futures to develop Beats and Boroughs, an East London Music Network in collaboration with young people and organisations in Hackney, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Waltham Forest.

Bringing together university lecturers, students, archivists and thinkers from a wide range of disciplines, the Cinema and Social Justice project aims to explore film's vital role in shaping our understanding of the world around us.

Our focus is on the social justice work that cinema does and the questions which cinema can answer for us. How can film encourage discussions regarding the subjects of race, gender and sexuality, homelessness, poverty, education, healthcare, or policing, in addition to ecological justice in sustainability, and ecological consciousness and climate anxiety? Can these discussions, facilitated through film, bring about meaningful social change?

The project is lead by Dr Martin Hall and Dr Lauren Stephenson. Find us on X (formerly known as Twitter): @CinemaJustice