Our latest book Social Work with Disadvantaged and Marginalised People (Prof Jonathan Parker & Prof Sara Ashencaen Crabtree)
is published by Sage. The work offers theoretical and practice based perspectives and insights into the complexities and importance of working with people at the margins of societies. Everyone who works with people and especially social and community workers need to understand the powers and processes that lead to disadvantage and marginalisation and to develop the knowledge, skills and values necessary to bringing about positive change and upholding social justice and human rights.
This need is reinforced in our present uncertain and insecure times. When the idea of writing this book was first mooted by our publishers we wondered what new approach could be brought to an area that seemed well trodden already in social work. What we found during the process of writing, however, was that there was a great deal to say on this hugely, perhaps fundamentally, important topic, in relation to the transition of social work as a profession operating in a society riven with inequities and divisions.
All times are ‘interesting’ for someone somewhere, but it seems a truism that we are currently living through a time of monumental and deeply uncertain transitions in the UK that will have a decisive bearing on lives and futures. Within the country we see that public services are stretched to crisis point and that public service pay caps are plunging public sector workers and many other working people into penury. We see that poverty is increasing, incomes are falling compared to rising household costs, and social welfare nets offer considerably less security than formerly.
Where then does this leave today’s social work graduates for whom amongst others, we have written this text? They are entering a beleaguered, under-funded profession and it could be said that social work is living through the ‘worst of times’, but, maybe also one of the best, to paraphrase Dickens’ novel A Tale of Two Cities. The knowledge base of social work often constructs the concept of crisis as creating the tipping point to necessary change. We would suggest that this maybe where we currently are in England, we certainly hope so. For while the slow and unedifying helter-skelter journey downwards has taken time, as will the spiralling journey upwards, this can occur and maybe must occur, for the profession to survive. If change does happen and the profession eases itself up to a standing position, bedraggled and in tatters maybe, it should also take matters into its own hands and refuse to serve as political ‘whipping boy’ any longer, in the interests of marginalised and disadvantaged individuals and families everywhere in the England and the UK as a whole. If it fails to do this then it could be that social work in England, at least, will not survive into the future as a recognisable profession that adheres to international standards and values. If such were the case, then that indeed would be counted among the greatest national tragedies of our time.
The BBSRCs
NERC 
Our
EPSRC is holding a two-day
Hydreco Hydraulics is sponsoring and supporting two PhD projects from BU’s Department of Design and Engineering, in the Faculty of Science and Technology. One project involves the design and provision of the mechanical parts, while the other project involves the provision of the control systems. The company has just started testing the first prototype valve and its control system algorithm. The aims of the planned tests are to study the performance of the valve, compare it to the simulation predictions, and to identify its mechanical characteristics needed to fine tune the control algorithms.
Mr Philip Godfrey and 




The first Chapter, “Performative Social Science”, in J. P. Matthes, C. S. Davis, & R. F. Potter (Eds.), The International Encyclopedia of Communication Research Methods, rehearses the development of Performative Social Science (PSS) as a research approach and method, developed over ten years at Bournemouth University through publication, film, research, workshops, Masterclasses, and PhD studies. Jones explains that PSS is not simply ‘art for art’s sake’ instead of research. PSS is research and dissemination practices based in the philosophy of Relational Aesthetics and has much in common with Social Constructionism. The ‘audience’ or reader/viewer are key to PSS, as is the wider community.
The second Chapter, “Emotivity and Ephemera Research”, in Innovative Research Methodologies in Management: Volume I, edited by L. Moutinho and M. Sokelem provides an in-depth worked example of PSS. The Chapter reports on a two-day experimental workshop in arts-led interviewing technique using ephemera to illicit life stories and then reporting narrative accounts back using creative means of presentation. The workshop took place at Bournemouth and participants were all University faculty members. A key to the process was in replicating what research participants may be feeling and going through when they share very personal stories with researchers. The exercise built a respect for this process by acknowledging that fact through the personal experiences and emotive connectivity of workshop participants.










BU contributions to successful Global Health conference
New paramedic science paper by BU’s Dr. Ursula Rolfe
Congratulation on newly published systematic review
Equitable Partnerships in Global Health Research
Horizon Europe Cluster 3 (Civil Security for Society) 2026 Calls Now Open
MSCA Doctoral Networks 2026 Call Information Webinar
ESRC Festival of Social Science 2026: Application Deadline Extended to Thursday 25 June 2026
Reminder: Register for the ESRC Festival of Social Science 2026 Information Session
ECR Funding Open Call: Research Culture & Community Grant – Apply now
ERC Advanced Grant 2025 Webinar
Update on UKRO services
European research project exploring use of ‘virtual twins’ to better manage metabolic associated fatty liver disease