Social justice: community land, energy and forestry event SCIS @ENGAGE

A Social Justice Approach to Community Land, Energy and Forestry
 Monday, 29th April 2019, 10:00 am – 12:30 pm

Book here: https://www.engage.strath.ac.uk/event/597

Registration from 9:30 am
Venue: The Technology and Innovation Centre, University of Strathclyde

This event aims to evaluate the current policy and practice of land reform in line with aspirations of social justice and with particular focus on forestry and energy. Bringing together experienced land reform researchers, journalists and public representatives, with community organisations and energy, labour and law academics.

There will be talks from Andy Wightman, MSP, Lesley Riddoch, author; Peter Peacock, former MSP and land reform campaigner;  and  Angela Williams from the Knoydart Foundation and Director of Community Land Scotland.  Followed by panel and audience discussion with contributions from Tiffany Kane, Operations Manager, organiser and campaigner for Common Weal and Kathryn A. Burnett, School of Media, Culture and Society, University of the West of Scotland is Co-Director of the Scottish Centre for Island Studies<https://scotcis.wordpress.com/about/>.

The event is supported by Scottish Universities Insight Institute and is dedicated to the memory of John Booth of the Isle of Eigg renewable energy system. We are delighted to be joined by representatives from the island at the event

Who should attend?
We encourage all with an interest in land reform, community energy, forestry and tackling social inequality to attend.

This is an event that is open to the public.

Benefits of attending
This events brings together some of the most respected voices in Scottish Land reform along with community representatives and researchers who have been focusing on localised energy and forestry projects. This promises to be a provocative session that places the idea of social justice firmly at the centre the debate designed to inform future policy and practice.

Brian Garvey
Department of Work, Employment & Organisation
University of Strathclyde, Glasgow

Tel: 0141 548 3999
email: brian.garvey@strath.ac.uk

Mapping Small Island Communicative Ecologies Seminar SCIS@UWS

Invitation to Research Seminar Creativity and Culture HUB,

School of Media, Culture and Society  

Wednesday 17^th January 2018

14:00- 15:00 UWS Ayr Campus  GT 45

A/Prof. Evangelia Papoutsaki, UNITEC, New Zealand

Mapping Small Island Communicative Ecologies

Islands have a unique micro-communicative ecology makeup and distinctiv geographical and socio-cultural identities. This research seminar introduces the concept of island communicative ecology illustrated with examples from research conducted in several islands in the Pacific region.

The communicative ecology approach refers to the various forms, resources, activities, channels and flows of communication and information used by an island or group of islands or communities within islands. Mapping as a methodology enables a broader comprehension of the complexity of specific island communities and allows for the exploration of the various types of communication activity island people are engaged in (locally, trans-locally, intra-island, inter-island, trans-peripheral, national etc.), the resources available and the understanding of how these can be used in sustaining island communities.

In this seminar, several borrowed concepts, theories, terms and approaches from communication studies will be explored within an island context: communicative ecology, and communicative ecology layers (social, technological, discursive), communication infrastructure theory, communication action, storytelling network and storytelling agents, rhizomas and community media.

The presenter explores how the communicative environment forms part of existing island communities’ structures; identifies key communicative practices that contribute to sustaining islands sociocultural cohesion; explores the role of media, in particular community radio, in localized information flows unique to the islands; and identifies future areas of research of value to the field of Islands Studies especially through the application of the communicative ecology mapping approach.

We are delighted to welcome Dr Evangelia Papoutsaki to Ayr campus for this research seminar. This seminar is open to all UWS staff and students and all are very welcome. Please email Lesley-Anne (lesley-anne.niven@uws.ac.uk) or myself (kathryn.burnett@uws.ac.uk) for any further information you may require.  Evangelia will be delighted to speak with colleagues on any aspect of her global work on media and communication in a range of key sectors and international settings (including diaspora and migrant identities, HIV/Aids, Climate Change, and participatory methods for community engagement). There is time set aside after the seminar for colleagues to meet with Evangelia further.

For further information on Evangelia’s extensive global experience and expertise in media, communication and community research and policy please refer here:

http://www.unitec.ac.nz/about-us/contact-us/staff-directory/dr-evangelia-papoutsaki

https://www.epapoutsaki.com/

Communicative Ecologies Research Seminar Jan 2018

UWS SAGES Funded PhD Studentship:deadline 26th Jan 2018

Funded PhD Studentship

Vulnerability and adaptation to climate change in island communities: engaging participatory approaches to inform community decision-making

Liniclate, looking to South Uist: Image KA Burnett

Remote islands are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, including sea-level rise, changing weather patterns and their impacts on storminess, coastal erosion, and flooding. Moreover, the particular nuanced contexts of remote rural settings can compound this physical vulnerability, a layer of vulnerability that is not considered in the typical climate change impact studies. This is the case in Scotland, where most climate change impact studies have tended towards a top-down approach, rather than engaging the communities and decision-makers impacted by climate change in the analysis of vulnerabilities. For an effective adaptation policy, local circumstances and characteristics need to be taken into account. An assessment following an integrated perspective on vulnerability, incorporating both top-down and bottom-up components is a mean for capturing this knowledge for decision-making. Moreover, research on policy discourse framings of climate change in remote island settings has value in terms of offering a basis for a critical analysis of dominant representations and narratives and of other competing accounts, as climate change in rural areas occurs in the context of other social, economic and land use and ownership trends.

The aim for this studentship is to develop a climate change adaptation assessment framework suited to participation, integration and collaboration in the context of rural island communities. Rural populations are particularly sensitive to environmental change given their dependence on natural resources. The study offers an opportunity to assess the risks, vulnerabilities and opportunities of climate change through the co-production of knowledge with stakeholders, and to initiate dialogue on climate adaptation. Baseline assessments of climate change vulnerability will be performed to inform the adaptation discourse using an integrated socio-environmental vulnerability assessment methodology in a number of island case study sites in Scotland.

Methodologically the study will build on the established partnerships between the supervisory team and communities in the selected island locations in order to elucidate their perspectives on climate vulnerability and adaptation options. Qualitative data collection and analysis of interviews and other stakeholder-focussed activities are envisaged as being a key part of this. Community engagement work will also be informed by analysis of existing climatic records and of climate change projection.

This studentship will be co-supervised by Dr Alexandre Gagnon and Dr Kathryn A. Burnett, University of the West of Scotland (UWS) and Dr Alistair Geddes, University of Dundee. Dr Massimo Bollasina, Edinburgh University, will also play an advisory role.

This studentship is funded by the Scottish Association for Geosciences, Environment, and Society (SAGES) and UWS and is available from October 2018. Students will receive an annual stipend at the RCUK rate (currently £14,553 per annum) and payment of tuition fees.

Apply using the following link: https://www.uws.ac.uk/study/research-degrees/admissions-application/postgraduate-research-application-guide/ by deadline of January 26 2018.

For further information about the project, please contact Dr Gagnon: Alexandre.Gagnon@uws.ac.uk or tel: +44 (0)141 848 3270.

Place apart: Scotland’s north as a cultural industry of margins

A new book chapter “Place apart: Scotland’s north as a cultural industry of margins” by Kathryn A. Burnett is published in the latest Relate North (2017) collection of essays edited by Timo  Jokela and Glen Coutts:  Relate North: University of Lapland Press present a new collection of essays.

The chapter explores themes of culture, community and communication of island arts and cultural representation enterprise with examples drawn from across Scotland’s islands and highland ‘north’ communities.

“This discussion explores artistic imagining of Scotland’s highlands and islands as a place both ‘north’ and ‘on the margin’.  Cultural representation of Scotland’s highlands and islands and processes of communicating these representations are subject to ongoing interrogation and debate. What and how remote communities, cultures and places are represented through art is undoubtedly informed by debates on survival, sustainability and responses to marginal status. The account presented here examines some of these themes from a Scottish perspective, including how art informs cultural production and creative economies in and of Scotland’s remote communities.”

To access the chapter via UWS research portal link here: http://research-portal.uws.ac.uk/portal/en/publications/place-apart(140d65a4-6e3a-4714-923f-60e5162a4cad).html

Relate North: University of Lapland Press present a new collection of essays.

Professor Timo Jokela and Professor Glen Coutts of the University of Lapland bring together artists, art educators and researchers from across the Arctic Sustainable Arts and Design (ASAD) network in this edited collection of essays examining themes of culture, community and communication and the book details are provided below including links to where it can be accessed in digital and print form.

For more information of the work and activities of the ASAD network  see link here: http://www.asadnetwork.org/

Relate North. Culture, Community and Communication

18.5.2017

Drawing on projects and studies from northern countries, Relate North: Culture, Community and Communication explores contemporary practices in arts-based research and knowledge exchange in the fields of art and design. This anthology contains contributions from Canada, England, Finland, Norway, Russia and Scotland.

The interrelated themes of ‘culture’, ‘community’ and ‘communication’ formed the basis of the call that was issued to researchers, artists and designers. The chapters and visual essays in the book interpret the terms ‘arts’ and ‘design’ broadly to include, for example, crafts, indigenous making, media and product design. Aspects of culture and community are explored through the lens of contemporary arts and design. The contributing authors provide thought-provoking accounts of current practice in art, design and education.

Relate North brings together the work of leading scholars to explore issues of contemporary art, design, and arts-based research. The book will be of interest to a wide audience including, for example, practice-based researchers, artists, designers, anthropologists, geographers and social scientists in addition to those with a general interest in Northern and Arctic issues.

Relate North Verkkokauppa Juveneksessa
Relate North on Juvenes online bookstore

Contents:

Timo Jokela & Glen Coutts
Preface

Iain Biggs
Re-visioning “North” as an ecosophical context for creative practices

Annamari Manninen & Mirja Hiltunen
Dealing with complexity – Pupils’ representations of place in the era of Arctic urbanization

Kathryn A. Burnett
Place apart: Scotland’s north as a cultural industry of margins

Irina V. Zemtsova & Valery Sharapov
“Tradition that does not exist”: Wood painting of Komi-ziryans

Essi Kuure, Heidi Pietarinen & Hannu Vanhanen
Experimenting with arctic social phenomena. A multicultural workshop model

Marlene Ivey
Designing for Nova Scotia Gaelic cultural revitalization: Collaborating, designing & transmitting cultural meaning

Anne Bevan & Jane Downes
Wilder Being: Destruction and creation in the littoral zone

Laila Kolostyák
A Tundra Project: Melting ice as an artistic material

 

 

Lapland University Press is a university publisher established in 2005. Its mission is to increase awareness of Northern and Arctic issues and culture in the scientific community and it has cooperated with the ASDA research network and published three earlier Relate North issues.
Relate North. Culture, Community and Communication you can buy from Juvenes Bookstore  or download it from Lauda-database 

Contact information:
Anne Koivula
Acting Head of Publications

Lapland University Press
Po box 8123
FI-96101 Rovaniemi
www.ulapland.fi/LUP
https://www.facebook.com/laplanduniversitypress/
lup(at)ulapland.fi

 

Source link: https://www.ulapland.fi/news/Relate-North-Culture,-Community-and-Communication/bsmds2o3/5eae33bb-0879-41fc-8ec5-e61ab7278899

New Research Network on Community Assets

New Research Network Launched!

Research Network Title: Regional Studies Association Research Network: Acquiring Community Assets, the Role of Social Capital and the Establishment of Alternative Energy Resources

The research network will investigate the issues which arise when ‘communities’ have been given the opportunity to manage and/or purchase resources for ‘development’ purposes. The resources can be anything from land and physical structures, such as a particular building, to institutional resources, such as organisations, joint / community ownership / community commons and community stewardship to safeguard or promote development. The ‘development’ may consist of socio-economic development, sustainable development or for the pursuit of sport and recreational usage.

If you wish to be involved in this network please contact any of the organisers below:

Geoff Whittam

Business School

University of the West of Scotland

Paisley PA12BE

Geoffrey.whittam@uws.ac.uk

0044 (0) 1418483368

Max Munday

Cardiff Business School

Welsh Economy Research Unit

Cardiff Business School

Colum Dr

Cardiff CF103EU

mundaymc@Cardiff.ac.uk

0044 (0) 2920875089