2019/20 funded projects

For further information contact: Dr Abigail Pearson – Law

This event explores attitudes around creating archives of disabled peoples’ experiences to increase awareness of disability rights issues and to shape future policy responses. Contributions will shape future funding bids and research teams concerning design, contribution, access and implementation. We aim to create a collective of voices and experiences which range from written to creative inputs, many of which could be made and submitted in participants’ own homes and communities. This will help to increase representation and participation. Participants will be supported to maintain the collection and disseminate future outputs to ensure that a range of voices are heard.

Event write up

For further information contact:  Alexandra Lamont – Psychology

This project is the first to explore the effects of charitable donations of musical instruments. We aim to uncover how access to music making can be supported by charitable schemes, the impact of donations on donors’ identities and wellbeing, and how connections through music can help support music-making in local, national and international settings. We plan to build and strengthen connections with academic and non-academic partners through visits, interviews, meetings and Community Music Days. The pilot work will appear in a journal article (in progress), and underpin a future substantial grant application to support ongoing work on this project.

For further information contact:  Prof. Anthony Wrigley – Law

The incidence of people diagnosed with dementia is likely to rise exponentially. Caring for this rising population is problematic, and utilising hospice care is an option that is becoming increasingly explored. The first qualitative phase of this proposed research is to critically explore the experiences, challenges and equity and parity of palliative and end of life services for people with dementia (and associated families) in Staffordshire. The outcomes of this first phase will inform the development of the research questions and methods which can then be tested further in a more substantial phase two of this study. 

For further information contact:  Dr Ceri Morgan – Humanities

At the end of October 2019, Anna Macdonald submitted a grant request to support a project exhibition and print publication (critical-creative) pamphlet to ACE, which is under consideration (£11 208). The ACE scheme requires a degree of matched-funding, which we are seeking with this application

For further information contact:  Dr David Ballantyne – Humanities

This one-day symposium on conflict, trauma, and memory will highlight the interdisciplinary connections between the research of Keele staff and external scholars in History, Music, Social Sciences, Law, Nursing, and Psychology, and will lead to subsequent external funding applications.

This symposium interrogates several related research questions. These include:

1. How have groups contested memories of conflict and/or trauma?
2. How do these memories shape subsequent behaviours?
3. How have heritage/tourism initiatives engaged with memories of conflict and/or trauma? 
4. How can these memories be used as a means for reconciliation?
5. How might experiencing conflict and/or trauma connect with social inequalities?

For further information contact:  Dr James Peacock – Humanities

Dr James Peacock (English) has applied for KISI funding to organize a seminar on gentrification in contemporary fiction at the ACLA Annual Meeting in Chicago in March 2020, and to organize a multidisciplinary symposium on gentrification at Keele in the summer of the same year. These events, which are relevant to two of KISI’s strands, “Tackling Inequalities” and “Supporting Communities,” will provide important networking opportunities and inspire conversations which will lead to future interdisciplinary, international research. Following these events, James will apply for an AHRC Networking Grant to establish the Gentrification Studies Network.

For further information contact:  Dr Pawas Bisht – Humanities

This pilot study aims to examine the manner in which long-term migrants in the UK from EU and non-EU backgrounds mobilise the past as a resource to construct social and political belonging in the aftermath of Brexit. In doing so, the project will examine the possibilities of the performance of memory as an ‘act of citizenship’ (Rothberg & Yildiz 2011:34). Employing a qualitative interview based approach, sixteen in-depth interviews, will be undertaken in the Stoke-on-Trent area. The pilot project will also facilitate a research symposium (in collaboration with colleagues from Loughborough University and other academic and non-academic partners) and will result in the development of an AHRC research bid examining migrant memories and citizenship in post-Brexit Britain.

People from minority communities are under-represented in dementia services and there is a perceived lack of understanding of the condition. The project will enable empowerment through accurate information and developing family/ community support.

We aim to build on the excellent support already provided within the family unit; and work in co-production to identify the challenges and barriers to accessing solutions.

This pilot study aims to identify gaps in the knowledge and information focussing on issues such as: dementia awareness; knowledge and information; disease progression; medication; services and resources available; and end of life support.

Outcomes will be disseminated locally, nationally and internationally, throughout the North Staffordshire social care and health community, and reputable journals.

The contact details of the project leads are: Hilary Stefanelli hilarystefanelli@approachstaffordshire.co.uk

Emerita Professor Sue Read: s.c.read@keele.ac.uk

Urban Wilderness are artists who create interventions working in disused land with children and local communities. Their work explores connection to place, personal creative action, and re-valuing ‘brownfield’ land. This KISI funded project will enable them to build on academic research by Dr Ben Anderson (Modern Historian, Keele University) into trespass and public access to private land. The project, ‘Brownfield Land & Social Justice’, aims to build a network of artists, activists, and academics in post-industrial regions with an interest in local urban land-use. The network will explore ways that disused land could benefit local communities.

If you are interested in finding out more, please contact info@urbanwildernesscic.com

The project will see Dr Khan and Dr Wright-Bevans drawing on existing data held by Aspire Housing to identify the key factors affecting the quality of life of residents in Newcastle-under-Lyme, including social, economic, political and environmental factors.

This event is an opportunity for the Keele populous to understand what decolonising the curriculum entails and how this can be reproduced within the university as a whole - going beyond the curriculum to enshrine decolonisation within the institution’s ethos. It will serve as a critical introduction as to how university institutions uphold and reproduce Eurocentric paradigms of knowledge, and why this is an issue for so-called centres of ‘critical thinking’; and how to take steps towards transforming these power dynamics amidst resistance and hostility within the Keele environment. This event will be introduced with a keynote lecture by Dr Sadhvi Dar, BSc, PhD, SFHEA from Queen Mary University, followed by parallel workshops which highlight the practical ways in which decolonisation can take form in the university environment.