BU Research Blog

Category / Global engagement

October 15, 2021

UK-China Workshop on Advancing wearable technology: promoting physical activity and mobility among older adults in China

ECR Network, Events, Global engagement, Uncategorized sarahprice

The University of Portsmouth and Shanghai Jiaotong University are organising a joint workshop on ‘’Advancing wearable technology: promoting physical activity and mobility among older adults in China’’. The workshop is organised as part of The Newton Fund Researcher Links programme which provides opportunities for early career researchers from the UK and China to interact, learn from each other and explore opportunities for building long-lasting research collaborations.

The workshop will take place on the 9-10th December 2021 for the UK meeting in Portsmouth and there will be a hybrid delivery with the partner in China. Travel costs will be covered for travel within the UK.

The organisers would like to invite early career researchers to apply to attend this workshop which will provide a multidisciplinary platform for UK and Chinese early career researchers to share their research expertise, and to work across disciplines to develop innovative approaches to wearables which can promote health and socioeconomic development in China and other countries. Early career researchers will have the opportunity to present their research in the form of poster presentation and work with expert mentors who are established researchers from the UK and China. There will be a focus on building links with industry promoting acceleration of knowledge transfer of wearables. There will also be the development of a web-based forum and a network/consortium to extend the discussion and continue to build research links after the workshop.

Please find further information here – applications need to be received by the University of Portsmouth by 31st October 2021.

October 7, 2021

A small or a large national survey?

BU research, Featured academics, international, open access, Publishing, Research news, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Congratulations to Dr. Pramod Regmi and Dr. Nirmal Aryal on the acceptance of their paper ‘Risk of kidney health among returnee Nepali migrant workers: A survey of nephrologists’ [1]. This paper has been accepted by the Asian Journal of Medical Sciences, after having been rejected previous by another scientific journal . The reason for rejection was the small sample size of 38 nephrologists (=medical specialists in kidney disease). We think one of the reasons for acceptance of this research by the Asian Journal of Medical Sciences is the high proportion (74.5%) of all Nepal’s nephrologists who participated in this national study. Although the absolute number of participants is low there are only 51 kidney experts in the whole country and three-quarters took part in this study!

Dr. Nirmal Aryal was until recently based in the Department of Midwifery and Health Sciences and he will be starting later this month as a Research Associate at Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Trust. Dr. Pramod Regmi is Senior Lecturer in International Health in the Department of Nursing Sciences. This paper was also co-authored with a nephrologist Dr. Arun Sedhai based in Chitwan (Nepal) and a public health expert based at the UN organisation, International Organization for Migration (IOM).

This paper which will be Open Access and hence freely available for any reader across the globe adds to the growing research evidence published by Bournemouth University’s researchers on migration and health, especially of migrants from Nepal [2-21].

Well done!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH)

References:

Aryal, N., Sedhain, A., Regmi, P.R., KC, R.K., van Teijlingen, E. (2021) ‘Risk of kidney health among returnee Nepali migrant workers: A survey of nephrologists’, Asian Journal of Medical Sciences (accepted).
Simkhada, B., Vahdaninia, M., van Teijlingen, E., Blunt, H. (2021) Cultural issues on accessing mental health services in Nepali and Iranian migrants communities in the UK, International Journal of Mental Health Nursing (accepted). https://doi.org/10.1111/inm.12913
Adhikary, P., Aryal, N., Dhungana, R.R., KC, R.K., Regmi, P.R., Wickramage, K.P., Duigan, P., Inkochasan, M., Sharma, G.N., Devkota, B., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P. (2020) Accessing health services in India: experiences of seasonal migrants returning to Nepal. BMC Health Services Research 20, 992. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-020-05846-7
IOM [International Organization for Migration]. (2019) Health vulnerabilities of cross-border migrants from Nepal. Kathmandu: International Organization for Migration.
Aryal, N., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Trenoweth, S., Adhikary, P., Simkhada, P. (2020) The Impact of Spousal Migration on the Mental Health of Nepali Women: A Cross-Sectional Study, International Journal of Environmental Research & Public Health 17(4), 1292; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph1704129
Regmi, P., Aryal, N., van Teijlingen, E., Adhikary, P. (2020) Nepali migrant workers and the need for pre-departure training on mental health: a qualitative study, Journal of Immigrant & Minority Health 22, 973–981.
Adhikary, P. van Teijlingen, E. (2020) Support networks in the Middle East & Malaysia: A qualitative study of Nepali returnee migrants’ experiences, International Journal of Occupational Safety & Health (IJOSH), 9(2): 31-35.
Simkhada, B., Sah, R.K., Mercel-Sanca, A., van Teijlingen, E., Bhurtyal, Y.M., Regmi, P. (2020) Health and Wellbeing of the Nepali population in the UK: Perceptions and experiences of health and social care utilisation, Journal of Immigrant & Minority Health (accepted).
Regmi, P., van Teijlingen, E., Mahato, P., Aryal, N., Jadhav, N., Simkhada, P., Syed Zahiruddin, Q., Gaidhane, A., (2019) The health of Nepali migrants in India: A qualitative study of lifestyles and risks, Journal of Environmental Research & Public Health 16(19), 3655; doi:10.3390/ijerph16193655.
Dhungana, R.R., Aryal, N, Adhikary, P., KC, R., Regmi, P.R., Devkota, B., Sharma, G.N., Wickramage, K., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P. (2019) Psychological morbidity in Nepali cross-border migrants in India: A community-based cross-sectional, BMC Public Health 19:1534 https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-019-7881-z
Aryal, N., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Mahato, P. (2019) Adolescents left behind by migrant workers: a call for community-based mental health interventions in Nepal. WHO South East Asia Journal of Public Health 8(1): 38-41.
Aryal, N., Regmi, P.R., Faller, E.M,, van Teijlingen, E., Khoon, C.C., Pereira, A., Simkhada, P. (2019) ‘Sudden cardiac death and kidney health related problems among Nepali migrant workers in Malaysia’ Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 9(3): 755-758. https://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/25805
Adhikary P, van Teijlingen E., Keen S. (2019) Workplace accidents among Nepali male workers in the Middle East and Malaysia: A qualitative study, Journal of Immigrant & Minority Health 21(5): 1115–1122. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10903-018-0801-y
Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen, E.R., Gurung, M., Wasti, S. (2018) A survey of health problems of Nepalese female migrants workers in the Middle-East & Malaysia, BMC International Health & Human Rights 18(4): 1-7. http://rdcu.be/E3Ro
Adhikary P, Sheppard, Z., Keen S., van Teijlingen E. (2018) Health and well-being of Nepalese migrant workers abroad, International Journal of Migration, Health & Social Care 14(1): 96-105. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJMHSC-12-2015-0052
Adhikary, P, Sheppard, Z., Keen, S., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Risky work: accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar & Saudi Arabia, Health Prospect 16(2): 3-10.
Simkhada, P.P., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Aryal, N. (2017) Identifying the gaps in Nepalese migrant workers’ health and well-being: A review of the literature, Journal of Travel Medicine 24 (4): 1-9.
Aryal, N., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Adhikary, P., Bhatta, Y.K.D., Mann, S. (2016) Injury and Mortality in Young Nepalese Migrant Workers: A Call for Public Health Action. Asian-Pacific Journal of Public Health 28(8): 703-705.
Sapkota, T., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E. (2014) Nepalese health workers’ migration to United Kingdom: A qualitative study. Health Science Journal 8(1):57-74.
Adhikary P, Keen S and van Teijlingen E (2011). Health Issues among Nepalese migrant workers in the Middle East. Health Science Journal.5 (3):169-i75 DOI: 2-s2.0-79960420128.
Adhikary, P., Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen E., Raja, AE. (2008) Health & Lifestyle of Nepalese Migrants in the UK, BMC International Health & Human Rights 8(6). Web address: www.biomedcentral.com/1472-698X/8/6

September 30, 2021

Congratulations to FHSS PhD student Abier Hamidi

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Today FHSS’s PhD student Abier Hamidi was notified that the manuscript “HIV epidemic in Libya: Identifying gaps” was accepted for publication by the editor of the Journal of the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (JIAPAC) published by SAGE [1]. This literature review as part of Abier’s PhD research included 24 studies: Ten primary research studies, six online news articles, five Government reports, one letter to the editor, one manuscript, one online database. The paper concluded that despite the low-quality data, the literature suggests there is an increase in HIV infection rates in Libya. Culturally sensitive research on sexual activities, women, HIV preventative methods and attitudes of the Libyan public will assist in developing an effective National AIDS Programme, reducing stigma, supporting People Living with HIV (PLWHIV) and decreasing infection rates.

Abier’s PhD project is supervised by Dr. Pramod Regmi (Senior Lecturer in International Health) and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH).

Reference:

Hamidi, A., Regmi, P., van Teijlingen, E. HIV epidemic in Libya: Identifying gaps, Journal of the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (JIAPAC) (forthcoming)

September 30, 2021

Nepal research published

BU research, COVID-19, Global engagement, international, open access, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Yesterday saw the publication of a new scientific paper on the health care system in Nepal. The latest BU paper ‘Health facility preparedness of maternal and neonatal health services: A survey in Jumla, Nepal’ is a collaboration between academics at the University of Huddersfield, Liverpool John Moores University and the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) at Bournemouth University [1]. This is the third paper led by Pasang Tamang, who is currently a PhD student at the University of Huddersfield [2-3].

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References

Tamang, P., Simkhada, P., Bissell, P., van Teijlingen, E., Khatri, R., Stephenson, J., (2021) Health facility preparedness of maternal and neonatal health services: A survey in Jumla, Nepal, BMC Health Service Research 21:1023. https://rdcu.be/cyD01
Tamang, P., Mahato, P., Simkhada P., Bissell, P., van Teijlingen, E. (2021) Pregnancy, Childbirth, Breastfeeding and Coronavirus Disease: What is known so far? Journal of Midwifery Association of Nepal (JMAN) 2(1): 96-101.
Tamang, P., Mahato, P., van Teijlingen E, Simkhada, P. (2020) Pregnancy and COVID-19: Lessons so far, Healthy Newborn Network [14 April] healthynewbornnetwork.org/blog/pregnancy-and-covid-19-lessons-so-far/

September 29, 2021

BU academic interviewed for major Romanian newspaper on her research on Romanian Diaspora and emotions

Awarded & submitted bids, BRIAN, BU2025, Fusion, Global engagement, humanities, Impact, NHS, policy, Public engagement, Research Centres, Research communication, Women's Academic Network edolea

BU academic, D r. Alina Dolea, gave an extensive interview on her research on Romanian Diaspora, the emotional costs of migration, the constant identity struggles, as well as the role of diaspora in public diplomacy. She was interviewed by Elena Stancu, Pulitzer Center’s Persephone Miel Fellows 2021, and photographed by Cosmin Bumbuț; since 2019, the two journalists have been living in a caravan and travelling throughout Europe to document the 5 million Romanian migrants within their project titled “Plecat” (Away/ On the road). They are currently in the UK, gathering stories of migration and giving a voice to the over 1 million Romanians who are currently living here.

The interview was published simultaneously on Teleleu website „Migrația la noi pare să fie ca un di vorț complicat, cu multe reproșuri și frustrări, și cu încercări de împăcare” « Teleleu (Migration seems to be for Romanians a sort of messy divorce, with mutual blame games, frustration and make-up trials) and in the major Romanian newspaper Libertatea: Cercetătoare, despre viața românilor în Marea Britanie: „E ridicol când îi auzi pe guvernanți că vor să-i aducă acasă. Îi aduci o lună, un an și apoi pleacă din nou” (Researcher, about the life of Romanians in the UK: “It is ridiculous when you hear government officials wanting to bring back home the Romanians abroad. You bring them back for a month, a year and then they leave again”).

As an interesting fact, the editor-in-chief of Libertatea newspaper is Catalin Tolontan, who lead the team of investigative journalists featured in the Academy Awards and BAFTA nominee documentary “Collective” – About the film — Collective (collectivefilm.co.uk).

September 28, 2021

And the publication date is….

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Postgraduate Research, Publishing, Research news, student research, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

You may have seen the BU Research Blog two years ago congratulating Bournemouth University’s MSc Public Health graduate Hana Dinh on the acceptance of her paper ‘‘Factors influencing engagement in premarital sex among Vietnamese young adults: a qualitative study’ [1].

In April 2019 this paper was published ‘online first’ in the International Journal of Adolescent Medicine & Health. Last month, two years later, her paper finally appeared in print. Hana’s paper had originally been accepted by this journal in 2018, it was put online in 2019 and now it has been formally published. It can still be a long process for an academic paper to get into print as we have discussed elsewhere [2]. Hence the title of this blog, the question to me is ‘What is the appropriate publication date for this article on my CV?

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH (Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health)

References:

Dinh, T., van Teijlingen, E. (2021) Factors influencing engagement in premarital sex among Vietnamese young adults: a qualitative study, International Journal of Adolescent Medicine & Health, 33(4), 20180201. https://doi.org/10.1515/ijamh-2018-0201
van Teijlingen E., P.P., Simkhada, B., Ireland, J. (2012) The long & winding road to publication, Nepal Journal Epidemiology 2(4): 213-215

September 21, 2021

Dr. Pramod Regmi teaching last weekend

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Publishing, Research Training, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Dr. Pramod Regmi, Senior Lecturer in International Health and Interim Global Engagement Lead in the Department of Nursing Sciences, was invited last weekend to speak at the Third Global Nepali Health Conference, London. He taught on ‘How to write a scientific paper’ with Dr. Om Kurmi from Coventry University and Dr. Bibha Simkhada from the University of Huddersfield (and Visiting Faculty at BU’s Faculty of Health & Social Sciences).

Well done.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

September 20, 2021

Improving Interagency Collaboration: Innovation and learning in Criminal Justice Systems

BU research, EU, Global engagement, open access, Research Centres Jonathan Parker

We are pleased to announce the publication, via Open Access and print, of this research volume stemming from our EU MSCA Rise project Improving Collaborative practice between correctional and mental health services or the COLAB project. Improving Interagency Collaboration: Innovation and Leanring in Criminal Justice Systems is edited by our former Social Sciences and Social Work colleague Prof Dr Sarah Hean and other partners in the project this Open Access edited collection seeks to build on our cross-European research and improve collaboration between criminal justice and welfare services in order to help prepare offenders for life after serving a prison sentence. It examines the potential tensions between criminal justice agencies and other organisations which are involved in the rehabilitation and reintegration of offenders, most notably those engaged in mental health care or third sector organisations. It then suggests a variety of different methods and approaches to help to overcome such tensions and promote inter-agency collaboration and co-working, drawing on emerging research and models, with a focus on the practice in European and Scandinavian countries. For academics and practitioners working in prisons and the penal system, this collection will be invaluable.

The book contains chapters from former Centre for Seldom Heard Voices PhD student Dr Will Dugdale and current PhD student Jo Wells, alongside Faculty of Health and Social Sciences academics, Dr Vanessa Heaslip, Dr Angela Turner-Wilson, Dr Richard Heslop, Prof Dr Sara Ashencaen Crabtree and myself, Prof Dr Jonathan Parker. Our work contributes to the Centre for Seldom Heard Voices drive to include the marginalised and voiceless. We explore the contested concept of vulnerabilities in the context of criminal justice and mental health and into which people in contact with criminal justice systems are usually placed without critique. Normative positions that suggest vulnerability is something that offenders possess in themselves, because of certain characteristics they own, is critiqued as limited and indicative of structural power relations and an alternative consideration of vulnerability as something constructed within and by social structures and processes is offered. Drawing on aspects of an action learning approach, previous research evidence and research undertaken during the COLAB project an ‘etemic’ understanding (both insider and outsider) of vulnerability that allows an integration of agentic and structural factors is presented. We call for the inclusion of offenders in the design and conduct of services as a more humane and mature approach at a time in which current Government directives become harsher, ideological and dismissive of humanity.

September 16, 2021

BU researchers launch Olympic and Paralympic analysis report

Global engagement, Impact, Knowledge Exchange, open access, Publishing, Research communication, Research news Daniel Jackson

We are delighted to announce the publication of Olympic and Paralympic Analysis 2020: Mega events, media, and the politics of sport

Edited by Daniel Jackson, Alina Bernstein, Michael Butterworth, Younghan Cho, Danielle Sarver Coombs, Michael Devlin and Chuka Onwumechili

Featuring 114 contributors from leading academics from around the world – including several from BU staff and PGR students – this publication captures the immediate thoughts, reflections, and insights from the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games from the cutting edge of sport, communication and media research.

Published in the wake of the Tokyo 2020 Games, these contributions are short and accessible. Authors provide authoritative analysis of the Olympics and Paralympics, including research findings and new theoretical insights. Contributions come from a rich array of disciplinary influences, including media, communication studies, cultural studies, sociology, political science, and psychology.

As always, these reports are free to access.

The report can be found onhttps://olympicanalysis.org

Direct pdf download is available at:

https://bit.ly/Olympic_Paralympic_Analysis-2020_large

https://bit.ly/Olympic_Paralympic_Analysis-2020_small

The table of contents is below.

Section 1: Tokyo & Mega-Events

1. The typhoon games (Toby Miller)
2. A green Olympic legacy for future generations? (Brett Hutchins and Ben Glasson)
3. The rise of critical consciousness in Japan: An intangible and unintended legacy of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games (Koji Kobayashi)
4. Host city and mega-events: Olympic legacy in Japan (John Horne)
5. Lessons from Tokyo: the impact of the Paralympics in Japan (Dennis J. Frost)
6. Let’s play! Inspiring an inclusive mindset with a hands-on Paralympic experience for children and teenagers in Japan (Olga Kolotouchkina and Carmen Llorente-Barroso)
7. The Olympic & Paralympic sponsorship without category exclusivity: Background of sponsorship exclusivity in Olympic and Paralympic Games (OPG) (Shintaro Sato)
8. Power sharing: Olympic sponsorship and the athlete’s personal brand (Bettina Cornwell)
9. What happened to Rule 40 at Tokyo 2020? (John Grady)
10. The Olympic Games and ambush marketing via social media (Gashaw Abeza)
11. The soft power of the Olympics in the age of Covid 19 (J. Simon Rofe)
12. Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, nationalism, identity and soft power (Gayle McPherson and Solomon Ilevbare)
13. Tokyo 2020, East Asian geopolitics and Olympic diplomacy (Jung Woo Lee)
14. Cultural programming at Tokyo 2020: the impossible Olympic festival city? (Beatriz Garcia)
15. Anti-sex beds? Fake news! : why this video went massively viral? (Maki Hirayama)
16. Counting cases, counting medals: Containing the Olympic contagion during the Tokyo Games (Courtney M. Cox)
17. Public relations as the key in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games (Argyro Elisavet Manoli and Sungkyung Kim)
18. The Tokyo 2020 Organizing Committee’s veil of effective public relations to help save itself and the start of the Games (Karen Hartman)
19. Environmental leadership showcased in the Olympic Games (Brian P. McCullough)
20. Simone Biles and prioritizing athlete well-being (Kathleen Bachynski)
21. Pride and burden of striving for perfection at the Olympics (Wycliffe Njonorai)
22. Deliver a medal or apologize: A daunting task imposed on Japanese Olympians (Hatsuko Itaya)

Section 2: Media Coverage & Representation

23. What place is this? Tokyo’s made-for-television Olympics (David Rowe)
24. How do we truly interpret the Tokyo Olympic ratings? (Andrew C. Billings)
25. ‘A Games like no other’: The demise of FTA live Olympic sport? (Raymond Boyle)
26. The fleeting nature of an Olympic meme: Virality and IOC TV rights (Merryn Sherwood)
27. Tokyo 2021: the TV Olympics (Peter English)
28. The Olympic Channel: insights on its distinctive role in Tokyo 2020 (Xavier Ramon)
29. Reshaping the Olympics media coverage through innovation (José Luis Rojas Torrijos)
30. Temporality of emotionalizing athletes (Sae Oshima)
31. New Olympic sports: the mediatization of action sports through the Olympic Games 2020 Tokyo (Thomas Horky)
32. Media wins medal for coverage of athletes as people, instead of entertainers (Ryan Broussard)
33. Reporting at a distance. Stricter working conditions and demands on sports journalists during the Olympics (Jana Wiske)
34. Nigeria: Olympic Games a mystery for rural dwellers in Lagos (Unwana Akpan)
35. Tokyo 2020: A look through the screen of Brazilian television (William Douglas de Almeida and Katia Rubio)
36. Equestrian sports in media through hundred Olympic years. A roundtrip from focus to shade and back again? (Susanna Hedenborg and Aage Radmann)
37. An Olympic utopia: separating politics and sport. Primary notes after analyzing the opening ceremony media coverage of mainstream Spanish sport newspapers (Xavier Ginesta)
38. “Everything seemed very complicated”: Journalist experiences of covering the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games (Veronika Mackova)
39. “A ceremony for television”: the Tokyo 2020 media ritual (Andressa Fontes Guimarães-Mataruna, Adriano Lopes de Souza, Renan Petersen-Wagner, Doiara Silva dos Santos, Leonardo José Mataruna-Dos-Santos and Otávio Guimarães Tavares da Silva)
40. The paradox of the parade of nations: A South Korean network’s coverage of the opening ceremony at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (Ji-Hyun Ahn)
41. Simone Biles, journalistic authority, and the ideology of sports news (Michael Mirer)
42. Representing high performance: Brazilian sports journalists and mass communication professionals discuss their philosophies on producing progressive Paralympic coverage (Fernanda Silva and John Watson)
43. How digital content creators are shaping meanings about world class para-athletes (Carolyn Jackson-Brown)
44. Is the Paralympic Games a second-class event? (Tatiane Hilgemberg)
45. Representations of gender in media coverage of the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games (Toni Bruce)
46. Reshaping the superhuman to the super ordinary: Observations on the Tokyo 2021 Paralympic games through Australian broadcasting coverage (Simon Darcy and Tracey J. Dickson)
47. Super heroes among us: A brief discussion of using the superhero genre to promote Paralympic Games and athletes (Cody T. Havard)
48. ”Unity in Diversity” – The varying media representations of female Olympic athletes (Riikka Turtiainen)
49. Why we need to see the “ugly” in women’s sports (Erin Whiteside)
50. Twitter conversations on Indian female athletes in Tokyo (Kulveen Trehan)
51. Between sexualization and de-sexualization: the representation of female athletes in Tokyo 2020 (Jörg-Uwe Nieland)
52. Megan Rapinoe: The scary Bear for many Americans? (Molly Yanity)
53. Representations of gender in the live broadcast of the Tokyo Olympics (Toni Bruce)
54. “The gender-equal games” vs “The IOC is failing black women”: narratives of progress and failure of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (Cheryl Cooky)
55. The male and female sports journalists divide on the Twittersphere during Tokyo 2020 (Haim Hagay and Alina Bernstein)

Section 3: Performance & Identity

56. ‘The Games they are a-changin’’: footnotes on Olympic athletics in transition post-Tokyo 2020 (Christopher D. Tulloch)
57. Tokyo 2020: athlete welfare and coping with new anxieties (Emma Kavanagh and Keith D. Parry)
58. Tokyo Olympics: When athletes are faced with the impossible (Dikaia Chatziefstathiou)
59. Twitter helps normalize discussions on mental health beyond athletes (Yuya Kiuchi)
60. Communication of athlete risk with head injuries in the 2020 Olympics (David Cassilio)
61. Racist slurs, stubborn animals, and colonial fear (Karsten Senkbeil)
62. Tokyo 2021 and the LGBTQ athlete (Rory Magrath)
63. The media coverage of the Tokyo 2021 Paralympic Games: Visibility, progress and politics (Emma Pullen, Laura Mora and Michael Silk)
64. It’s complicated: Disability media and the Paralympic Games (Katie Ellis)
65. Companies escape attention as debate on women’s uniform rages (Steve Bien-Aime, Melanie Formentin and Michelle Crowley)
66. Policing the uniforms and sportswear of Tokyo 2020: Commercialism in the name of competition (Linda Fuller)
67. Despite “Gender Equal Olympics,” focus still on what women are wearing (Adrianne Grubic)
68. Black women and Tokyo 2020 games: a continued legacy of racial insensitivity and exclusion (Manase Kudzai Chiweshe)
69. Naomi Osaka Bearing the Torch for a Mixed Race Japan (Jennifer McClearen)
70. Bodies of change: Women’s artistic gymnastics in Tokyo 2021 (Carly Stewart and Natalie Barker-Ruchti)
71. How the female athletes of the Tokyo Olympics are reframing the way we think about motherhood (Kim Bissell and Tyana Ellis)
72. When women aren’t women enough to compete (Anne Osborne)

Section 4: Fandom & National Identity

73. Home advantage in the Summer Olympic Games: evidence from Tokyo 2020 and prospects for Paris 2024 (Girish Ramchandani)
74. Fans as MVP, or the need for sensuous audiences in sport (Meredith Bagley)
75. Silence in the stands: Does it matter for fans? (Dorothy Collins)
76. Red, white, and rivalry: A brief discussion of United States rivalry at the Tokyo Olympic Games (Cody Havard)
77. Empty stadiums and the other sites of Olympic fandom (Lou Antolihao)
78. Sports betting and the branded purity of the Olympics (Jason Lopez)
79. National and ethnic Chinese identities on the Indonesian badminton court (Friederike Trotier)
80. How much is too much home-nation focus in Olympic coverage? (Andrew Billings)
81. The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games: British imperial identity affirmed (Edward Loveman)
82. Communicating corporate social responsibility at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games (Jake Kucek)
83. Americans on ideological left more engaged in Summer Olympics (Darin W. White)
84. South Korea’s changing status and perspective on Japan (Seok Lee)
85. The Men’s 1500 metres: Not quite erasing the ghosts of history (Garry Whannel)
86. Ghana: Poor local organizing, and absence of football team dampens interest (Ernest Acheampong and Ralph Frimpong)
87. Historical disputes, national identity, and the South Korea-Japan summit that did not happen (Guy Podoler)
88. Pop culture diplomacy: Japan’s use of videogames, anime to promote the Olympics and appeal to younger audiences (Adolfo Gracia Vázquez)
89. At the intersection of COVID-19 and Tokyo Olympics 2020: Vlogs and the expression of Chinese nationalist sentiments (Tianwei Ren)
90. Fandom and digital media during the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games: A Brazilian perspective using @TimeBrasil Twitter data (Renan Petersen-Wagner, Andressa Fontes Guimarães-Mataruna, Adriano Lopes de Souza, Doiara Silva dos Santos, Leonardo José Mataruna-Dos-Santos and Otávio Guimarães Tavares da Silva)
91. National hierarchy in Israeli Olympic discourses (Ilan Tamir)

Section 5: Politics of Sport

92. At Tokyo Games, athlete activism takes front row seat despite IOC’s attempts to silence athletes (Yannick Kluch, Nina Siegfried, Mary A. Hums and Eli A. Wolff)
93. Transgender participation at the Tokyo Olympics: Laurel Hubbard and a media tempest (Holly Thorpe, Shannon Scovel and Monica Nelson)
94. The sacred space of the Olympics (Anthony Cavaiani)
95. Media frames and the ‘humanity’ of athletes (Adam Rugg)
96. We want reform (Shaun M. Anderson)
97. In search of voice: behind the remarkable lack of protest at the Tokyo Paralympics (Filippo Trevisan)
98. The revolt of the Black athlete continues (Letisha Engracia Cardoso Brown)
99. WeThe15 shines a spotlight on disability activism (Damian Haslett and Brett Smith)
100. Will #WeThe85 finally include #WeThe15 as a legacy of Tokyo 2020? (Simon Darcy and Tracey J. Dickson)
101. Activism starts with representation: IPC Section 2.2 and the Paralympics as a platform for social justice (Nina Siegfried, Dr. Yannick Kluch, Mary A. Hums and Eli A. Wolff)
102. The colonization of the athletic body (Billy Hawkins)
103. Forced hijab and female athletes in postrevolutionary Iran (Shahrzad Enderle)
104. Pay equity & the Tokyo 2020 Olympics (Ellen Staurowsky)
105. Equal remuneration for a Paralympian (Mark Brooke)
106. Rooting for U.S. Olympians: Patriotism or polarization? (Amy Bass)
107. Anti-Olympics activism (Jules Boykoff)
108. The new kids on the block: Action sports at the Tokyo Olympic Games (Holly Thorpe and Belinda Wheaton)
109. Is there space on the podium for us all? (Jan Burns)
110. Softball’s field of Olympic dreams (Pamela Creedon)
111. Now you see them, now you don’t: Absent nations at Tokyo Paralympic Games (Nancy Quinn and Laura Misener)
112. The Tokyo Paralympics as a platform for change? Falling well short of sport and media ‘opportunities for all’ (Gerard Goggin and Brett Hutchins)
113. Tokyo 2020 Paralympics: inspirations and legacies (David McGillivray)
114. What social media outrage about Sha’Carri Richardson’s suspension could mean for the future of anti-doping policies (Natalie Brown-Devlin, Gary Wilcox, and Kristen Leah Sussman)

September 9, 2021

University of Cape Town hosts International Summit on the SDGs in Africa 13-15 September

Events, Global engagement sarahprice

The University of Cape Town will be hosting an International Summit which seeks to accelerate progress towards the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and mobilise action behind the African Union’s ‘Agenda 2063: The Africa We Want’ framework.

This three-day virtual Summit will connect stakeholders from across the world and foster meaningful and lasting relationships among government, business, academia and civil society, to develop new solutions and approached for meeting the continent’s development needs.

More information about this free event can be found here.

BU’s collaboration with the University of Cape Town has been formalised through a partnership agreement in early 2020. The partnership with the University of Cape Town is based on a longstanding collaboration between the BU Orthopaedic Research Institute (ORI) through Professor Rob Middleton and Associate Professor Tom Wainwright and Dr Delva Shamleyat the Division of Clinical Anatomy and Biological Anthropology at the University of Cape Town.

September 4, 2021

BU contribution to development of Nepali academics

BU research, Events, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Publishing, Research news, Research Training, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Yesterday we had the pleasure of running an Academic Writing Workshop for academics and postgraduate students in the Department of Health & Physical Education based at the Sanothimi campus of Tribhuvan University. Tribhuvan University is the oldest and largest university of Nepal. We base these training session on our various publications on academic publishing, [1-14] and we used the opportunity to advertise our forthcoming textbook on the matter [15].

Prof. Padam Simkhada, Professor of Global Health and Associate Dean International at the School of Human and Health Sciences at the University of Huddersfield and FHSS Visiting Professor.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH)

References

Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen E., Hundley, V., Simkhada, BD. (2013) Writing an Abstract for a Scientific Conference, Kathmandu Univ Med J 11(3): 262-65. http://www.kumj.com.np/issue/43/262-265.pdf
van Teijlingen, E, Hundley, V. (2002) Getting your paper to the right journal: a case study of an academic paper, J Advanced Nurs 37(6): 506-11.
Pitchforth, E, Porter M, Teijlingen van E, Keenan Forrest, K. (2005) Writing up & presenting qualitative research in family planning & reproductive health care, J Fam Plann Reprod Health Care 31(2): 132-135.
van Teijlingen, E, Simkhada, PP, Rizyal A (2012) Submitting a paper to an academic peer-reviewed journal, where to start? (Guest Editorial) Health Renaissance 10(1): 1-4.
van Teijlingen, E, Simkhada. PP, Simkhada, B, Ireland J. (2012) The long & winding road to publication, Nepal J Epidemiol 2(4): 213-215 http://nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/7093/6388
Hundley, V, van Teijlingen, E, SimkhadP (2013) Academic authorship: who, why and in what order? Health Renaissance 11(2):98-101 www.healthrenaissance.org.np/uploads/Download/vol-11-2/Page_99_101_Editorial.pdf
Simkhada P, van Teijlingen E, Hundley V. (2013) Writing an academic paper for publication, Health Renaissance 11(1):1-5. www.healthrenaissance.org.np/uploads/Pp_1_5_Guest_Editorial.pdf
van Teijlingen, E., Ireland, J., Hundley, V., Simkhada, P., Sathian, B. (2014) Finding the right title for your article: Advice for academic authors, Nepal J Epidemiol 4(1): 344-347.
van Teijlingen E., Hundley, V., Bick, D. (2014) Who should be an author on your academic paper? Midwifery 30: 385-386.
Hall, J., Hundley, V., van Teijlingen, E. (2015) The journal editor: friend or foe? Women & Birth 28(2): e26-e29.
Sathian, B., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E., Roy, B, Banerjee, I. (2016) Grant writing for innovative medical research: Time to rethink. Med Sci 4(3):332-33.
Adhikari, S. D., van Teijlingen, E. R., Regmi, P. R., Mahato, P., Simkhada, B., & Simkhada, P. P. (2020). The Presentation of Academic Self in The Digital Age: The Role of Electronic Databases. International J Soc Sci Management, 7(1), 38-41. https://doi.org/10.3126/ijssm.v7i1.27405
Pradhan, AK, van Teijlingen, ER. (2017) Predatory publishing: a great concern for authors, Med Sci 5(4): 43.
van Teijlingen, E (2004), Why I can’t get any academic writing done, Medical Sociol News 30(3): 62-63. britsoc.co.uk/media/26334/MSN_Nov_2004.pd
Wasti, S.P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Hundley, V. with Shreesh, K. Writing and Publishing Academic Work, Kathmandu, Nepal: Himal Books

August 23, 2021

New interdisciplinary paper

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Knowledge Exchange, NHS, Publishing, Research Integritiy, Research news, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Congratulations to Dr. Shanti Shanker in BU’s Department of Psychology and Dr. Pramod Regmi in the Department of Nursing Science on their paper ‘The Interdisciplinary Team Not the Interdisciplinarist: Reflections on Interdisciplinary Research’ which was accepted over the weekend by the journal Europasian Journal of Medical Sciences. This interesting paper is co-authored with two BU Visiting Faculty, Ms. Jillian Ireland, Professional Midwifery Advocate in Poole Maternity Hospital (University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust) and Prof. Padam Simkhada based at the University of Huddersfield. Co-author Dr. Sharada Wasti is also based the University of Huddersfield.

With interdisciplinary research growing in popularity, researchers, lecturers, journal editors and funders to consider how this is going to work in reality. This paper argues that interdisciplinary working is with in the team, not ‘in a person’. Multidisciplinary teams provide unique opportunities for researchers from different disciplines (and hence different ways of working and thinking) to collaborate with one another. We need to be careful not to try to create interdisciplinarists, or at least, not too many. We need people who are strong in their discipline and open-minded/flexible/reflective enough to see the value of other people’s disciplines.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMWH (Centre for Midwifery & Women’s Health)

Reference:

Shanker, S., Wasti, S.P., Ireland, J., Regmi, P., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E. (2021) The Interdisciplinary Team Not the Interdisciplinarist: Reflections on Interdisciplinary Research, Europasian Journal of Medical Sciences 3(2):1-5.

August 4, 2021

Health is not in a vacuum

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, open accecss, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Last night I misread a call from BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth. To be fair the email included two different request to contribute to two different kinds of blog posts with different set of instructions. Of course, I managed not to simply to swap these instructions around, but mix them up properly. The result is the text below that does not fit either of the two calls, I think.

The question I tried to address was: “Tell us how your research published in BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth has links to wider issues than health!. The actual call in the email was: “Tell us about your contribution to the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) – We invite our Editorial Board Members who have research or personal interests related to the SDGs to contribute a blog post to our BMC Series Blog network discussing your work/interests as these relate to the SDGs”.

My adopted question explains the title ‘Health is not a vacuum’. The short overview of the blog I drafted focused on all the papers I have published in this journal over a fifteen-year period from 2006-2021 [1-11]. Not surprising for a sociologist of health & illness, my argument is that there are nearly always issues wider than SDG 3 ‘Good health and well-being’ in the way health care/service or health policy factors affects maternity care and midwifery. Social, cultural and economic factors affect the way maternity services ares provided, used and perceived. SDG 5 ‘Gender equality’ springs to mind first, but also important is SDG 4 ‘Quality education’, especially of girls, and SDG 1 ‘No poverty’, of course strongly linked with SDG 10 ‘Reduced inequalities’.

Gender is highlighted or at least part of the argument in many of our papers in low- and middle income countries [2,3,5, 7,10,11], but also in a high-income context [1,6]. Education, both health education and education more generally, for example education levels of maternity service users, appears in several papers [1,6,8-11] whilst poverty is a key factors in several papers based on our work in Nepal [2,3,5,6,11]. Several of our papers address issues wider than health that are not strictly speaking SDG, such as paper on cultural differences in postnatal quality of life among German-speaking women living either side of the Swiss-German border [4], and of course, our paper on media and childbirth [6].

Last, but not least, all papers published in BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth are Open Access and freely available online!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH (Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health)

References:

Hall, J., van Teijlingen E. (2006) A qualitative study of an integrated maternity, drugs and social care service for drug-using women, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth, 6(19) biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2393-6-19.pdf
Dhakal, S., Chapman, G., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen E., Stephens J., Raja, A.E. (2007) Utilisation of postnatal care among rural women in Nepal, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 7(19). Web: biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2393-7-19.pdf
Simkhada, B., Porter, M., van Teijlingen, E. (2010) The role of mothers-in-law in antenatal care decision-making in Nepal: A qualitative study. BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 10(34) biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2393-10-34.pdf
Grylka-Baeschlin, S., van Teijlingen, E.R., Gross, M.M. (2014) Cultural differences in postnatal quality of life among German-speaking women – a prospective survey in two countries, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 14: 277. https://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2393-14-277
Milne, L, van Teijlingen, E, Hundley, V., Simkhada, P, Ireland, J. (2015) Staff perspectives of barriers to women accessing birthing services in Nepal: A qualitative study BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 15:142 biomedcentral.com/1471-2393/15/142 .
Luce, A., Cash, M., Hundley, V., Cheyne, H., van Teijlingen, E., Angell, C. (2016) “Is it realistic?” the portrayal of pregnancy and childbirth in the media BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 16: 40 http://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12884-016-0827-x
Sharma, S., van Teijlingen E, Hundley, V, Angell, C., Simkhada, P. (2016) Dirty and 40 days in the wilderness: Eliciting childbirth & postnatal cultural practices and beliefs in Nepal BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 16: 147 https://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12884-016-0938-4
Symon, A., Pringle, J, Cheyne, H, Downe, S., Hundley, V, Lee, E, Lynn, F., McFadden, A, McNeill, J., Renfrew, M., Ross-Davie, M., van Teijlingen, E., Whitford, H, Alderdice, F. (2016) Midwifery-led antenatal care models: Mapping a systematic review to evidence-based quality framework to identify key components & characteristics of care, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 16:168 http://rdcu.be/uifu
Symon, A., Pringle, J., Downe, S, Hundley, V., Lee, E., Lynn, F, McFadden, A, McNeill, J, Renfrew, M., Ross-Davie, M., van Teijlingen, E., Whitford, H., Alderdice, F. (2017) Antenatal care trial interventions: a systematic scoping review & taxonomy development of care models BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 17:8 http://bmcpregnancychildbirth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12884-016-1186-3
Ladur, AN, van Teijlingen E, Hundley, V. (2018) `Whose Shoes?’ Testing educational board game with men of African descent living in UK, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 18:81. http://rdcu.be/JXs0
Arnold, R., van Teijlingen, E., Ryan, K., Holloway, I. (2019) Villains or victims? An ethnography of Afghan maternity staff and the challenge of high quality respectful care, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 19 :307 https://rdcu.be/bPqlj

July 29, 2021

BU conference presentation on migration and COVID-19 in Nepal

BU research, conferences, COVID-19, Featured academics, international, Research news, Uncategorized, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Yesterday Dr. Pramod Regmi, Dr. Shovita Dhakal Adhikari, Dr. Nirmal Aryal and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, all based in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences, presented at the tenth Annual Kathmandu Conference on Nepal & the Himalaya. Their paper ‘Moral panic and othering practices during Nepal’s COVID-19 Pandemic (A study with returnee migrants and Muslims in Nepal)’ was co-authored by Dr. Sharada Prasad Wasti from the University of Huddersfield and Shreeman Sharma (Department of Conflict, Peace & Development
Studies, Tribhuvan University, Nepal). The presentation was partly based on research funded by the British Academy.

July 22, 2021

Two international midwifery publications by Prof. Vanora Hundley this month

BU research, Featured academics, Global engagement, international, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized, Women's Academic Network, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Yesterday the international journal Midwifery (published by Elsevier) announced that our paper “Male Involvement in Promotion of Safe Motherhood in Low- and Middle-Income Countries. A Scoping Review” has been published online. [1] This paper is based on Dr. Alice Ladur’s innovative PhD thesis on men’s involvement in their partners’ maternity care in Uganda. This is Alice’s second PhD paper, her first one was published in BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth. [2]

The second international midwifery paper that came out last week is ‘Slovenian midwifery professionalization: Perception of midwives and related health professions’ which appeared in the European Journal of Midwifery. [3] This paper is written with colleagues from Slovenia: Polona A. Mivšek, Majda Pahor, and Valentina Hlebec.

References:

Ladur, AN, van Teijlingen E, Hundley, V. (2021) Male Involvement in Promotion of Safe Motherhood in Low- and Middle-Income Countries. A Scoping Review, Midwifery 103 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0266613821001698
Ladur, AN, van Teijlingen E, Hundley, V. (2018) `Whose Shoes?’ Testing educational board game with men of African descent living in UK, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 18:81. http://rdcu.be/JXs0
Mivšek, AP, Hundley V, van Teijlingen, E, Pahor, M, Hlebec V. (2021) Slovenian midwifery professionalisation: Perception of midwives and related health professions, European Journal of Midwifery:30 https://doi.org/10.18332/ejm/137664

July 4, 2021

Unsatisfactory conference attendance?

BU research, conferences, COVID-19, Events, Global engagement, international, Research communication, Research news, Training, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

Over the 15 months many academics have learnt to use online tools to communicate with colleagues, students, the media, politicians and the general public. The COVID-19 pandemics forced us to introduce (more) virtual classrooms, internet-based tutorials, online marking, Zoom and Teams meetings (and other platforms!) as well as online conferences and workshops, albeit each with their own limitations. In general, we often marvel about the internet and online conference technology as well as value the reduction of our carbon foot print, reaching global audiences and so on.

The past three weeks I attended three international conferences in three countries without leaving my living room, including the postponed 2020 ICM (International Confederation of Midwives) conference. Perhaps there is an element of online-working fatigue, but I am beginning to see more and more disadvantages of online conferences. First, the contact with fellow presenters, chairs and the audience is more superficial than at a physical conference. At a conference held in person you meet people over lunch or coffee or people simply stop you in the corridors of the conference centre to discuss or challenge your paper or express their ideas for future studies.

Secondly, many conferences seem to use two online systems and have different ways of running online conferences, at one of the recent conferences the presenters and the audience were in different cyber spaces, so as a presenter you had no idea how many people attended or how the audience reacted to what you have just said. Moreover, in one conference any questions people in the audience had written in the chat box were invisible to the speakers. These questions had to be read out by the chair, who was tasked with linking the two cyber spaces, that of speakers and that of the audience. At another conference the chair largely let the speakers deal with questions in the chat without any direction or guidance, as a consequence I was still answering questions in the chat long after the next speaker had started.

Thirdly, because I was not physically away I didn’t attend as many of the sessions at any of the three recent conferences as I would have liked to. This issue is similar in nature as the ‘old’ problem of attending a face-to-face conference at your own institution. Since you are not away your students, colleagues, etc. manage to find you and expect you to do something else instead of attending the conference. Fourthly, you don’t meet up in person with international colleagues, therefore, you don’t get a chance to discuss long-term ideas, plans, problems over a meal and a beer.

I am still positive about online conferences, but perhaps not as enthusiastic as I was in a BU Research Blog in April last year! In this blog I pointed out that Donald Nicolson in his book Academic Conferences as Neoliberal Commodities raised the question about return of investment of a conference [1-2] not just for the conference organisers (and funders) but also for individual academics. Internet-based conferences are cheaper than face-to-face conferences although often not free, two of my three international conferences had a registration fee, moreover there is the opportunity cost for the academic in attending a conference, especially if one does not receive the traditional benefits of meeting like-minded people in person.

Some thought for Sunday morning.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References:

Nicolson. D.J. (2017) Academic Conferences as Neoliberal Commodities, Palgrave Macmillan.
Nicolson. D.J. (2018) Guest post by Donald Nicolson: The problem of thinking about conferences and Return on Investment (ROI)

June 14, 2021

ReSpace Symposium: On Place, Memory and Histories – International Artist Talks

Awarded & submitted bids, conferences, ECR Network, Fusion, Global engagement, international, Knowledge Exchange pcallus

The ReSpace Symposium will take place this week at the InsideOut & OutsideIn – international AHRC-GCRF festival on arts-based, participatory learning. The international festival focuses on arts-based, participatory pedagogies aimed at dealing with difficult, silenced or contested pasts and presents; and for imagining new futures. It is co-organized by Nita Luci and Linda Gusia, University of Prishtina, and Stephanie Schwandner-Sievers, Bournemouth University, PIs on the the four-year multi-disciplinary AHRC-GCRF project ‘Changing the Story’. Registration is free; the full programme and registration link available here: https://changingthestory.leeds.ac.uk/.

The ReSpace Symposium sets out to present a discussion on how art and architecture engages with place and history and how we can use these methods to encourage young people to explore cultural heritage.

Chaired by Dr. Oliver Gingrich, post-doctoral researcher at the National Centre for Computer Animation, this symposium offers a chance to hear from a range of different stakeholders across Rwanda, Kosovo and the UK involved in the ReSpace project about their work.

This panel is structured into two parts and features artists and researchers who recontextualize space, place and memory in their practice: Bekim Raku recently featured his project Prishtina Public Archipelago at the Venice Biennale and will present this project at the ReSpace symposium here. Ayọ̀ Akínwándé is an artist, activist, researcher, curator and writer who will be presenting his projects Face-Me-I-Face-You, Ogoni Cleanup and Sacred Grove; Dr. Paula Callus, the ReSpace project lead, will provide an introduction of the ReSpace project, followed by Ntigulirwa Marie Amelie and the esteemed sociologist Assumpta Mugiraneza, who will discuss aspects of the ReSpace project in the context of architecture. The artists Susan Sloan and Alfred Muchilwa will discuss their creative practice working with students across three countries.

https://respace.bournemouth.ac.uk/events/

The international festival focuses on arts-based, participatory pedagogies aimed at dealing with difficult, silenced or contested pasts and presents; and for imagining new futures. Registration is free; the full programme and registration link available here: https://changingthestory.leeds.ac.uk/.

Students and project leaders at University of Prishtina, together with their global colleagues in Bournemouth, Rwanda and elsewhere, co-created, and experimented with innovative, arts- and research-based methods of learning, including animation, architecture, music, video, and poetry. The festival brings together project participants to explore some of the mutual learning and reflect on questions such as, why, and how, arts-based methods can enhance civic education and critical thinking.

Changing-the-Story is a four-year international, multi-disciplinary project which supports the building of inclusive civil societies with, and for, young people in post-conflict settings, now coming to its completion. It was a collaborative project between universities, INGOs, artists, grassroots civil society organisations and young people across the world. It asked ‘how the arts, heritage, and human rights education can support youth-centred approaches to civil society building in post-conflict settings across the world.’

June 9, 2021

DRIVE project Stories and Toolkit

Awarded & submitted bids, EPSRC bthomas

The DRIVE project (Digital Reading for Inclusivity, Versatility and Engagement) was funded by the UKRI under its Digital Innovation for Development in Africa (DIDA) strand. Full details of the project can be found here. The second phase of this funding has been withdrawn following the UK Government’s revision of its ODA budget.

The project was led by BU Professor Bronwen Thomas, and Jess Ruddock (a PGR from FMC) was appointed as a Research Assistant from January onwards.

The project had to be substantially revised due to the COVID crisis. This meant all project meetings had to be held online but perhaps the biggest impact was on the digital storytelling part of the project. Initially, the plan was for DigiTales, a participatory media company based in the UK and Portugal to deliver a workshop in Nairobi, with 10-12 participants. Instead, we redesigned this part of the project, providing training for three Kenyan based facilitators to deliver the workshops in three different regions of Kenya – Nairobi, Chavakali (close to the Ugandan border) and Loita (home to Maasai tribespeople). Jess Ruddock also took part in the training. Following this we held three workshops in the different locations, producing 13 stories in total. The stories can be viewed on the project website. They represent a wide range of experiences, from Alan’s account of the stigma he suffered as a child in literature classrooms because of his visual impairment, to Faith’s account of the impact that the book Blossoms of the Savannah had on her as a young Maasai girl facing the prospect of female circumcision. In addition to learning how to create and produce digital stories, the participants were also given training on accessibility tools for the iPads that they received

Nalotwesha and Faith on a zoom call in Loita

Blog posts from one of the Nairobi participants, Alan Hebert, and from the Chavakali facilitator can also be found on the website, along with Jess Ruddock’s account of the training.

The Chavakali team

In addition to the digital stories, the project team produced a Toolkit for remote delivery of digital storytelling, co-authored by Kelvin Gwuma, Joseph Odhiambo and Scola Leuka, the three newly-trained facilitators. The Toolkit is available to view or download from the project website here along with video case studies produced by the facilitators. The website also features a preliminary project evaluation reflecting on the main findings and impact of the project so far, and how we managed to meet our objectives despite all the obstacles we faced.

Category / Global engagement

UK-China Workshop on Advancing wearable technology: promoting physical activity and mobility among older adults in China

BU academic interviewed for major Romanian newspaper on her research on Romanian Diaspora and emotions

Dr. Pramod Regmi teaching last weekend

BU researchers launch Olympic and Paralympic analysis report

University of Cape Town hosts International Summit on the SDGs in Africa 13-15 September

Two international midwifery publications by Prof. Vanora Hundley this month

ReSpace Symposium: On Place, Memory and Histories – International Artist Talks

DRIVE project Stories and Toolkit

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