Whose Crisis Counts?
Minority Women, Austerity and Solidarity in France and the UK
Tuesday, 11th June 2013
9.30-12.00
The University of Edinburgh
Centre for Education for Racial Equality in Scotland
Moray House School of Education
Paterson’s Land, Room 1.18 – map
This seminar will bring together academics, policy makers, practitioners and local activists to explore and debate the differing ways in which the current economic crisis and austerity are being experienced in France and the UK. Drawing on the findings to date from the ‘Minority Women’s Activism in Tough Times’ project, we will examine the ways in which the third sector in each country is being reshaped by the crisis and consider the impact these transformations are having on those in the most precarious position ? minority and migrant women. Participants will be invited to consider what role third sector organisations can play in responding to austerity and how these agencies can be supported in their work with migrant and minority women.
9.30 Welcome and Opening Remarks
Dr. Rowena Arshad, Head, Moray House School of Education
University of Edinburgh
9.45 Report on Findings from the Minority Women’s Activism in Tough Times’ Project
Dr. Leah Bassel, University of Leicester & Dr. Akwugo Emejulu, University of
Edinburgh – Co-Principal Investigators
10.15 Ethnicity, Austerity and Social Justice: A Critical Analysis
Dr. Gina Netto, Heriot-Watt University
10.30 Plenary Discussion
11.00 Coffee Break
11.15 Looking to the Future: The Third Sector in Uncertain Times
12.00 Close and Lunch
Please note spaces are limited. To book a place and for further information contact:
Dr. Akwugo Emejulu
Lecturer
Co-director, Centre for Education for Racial Equality in Scotland
Moray House School of Education
The University of Edinburgh
+44 131 651 4167
akwugo.emejulu@ed.ac.uk
New CERES Briefing
Between Scylla and Charybdis: Enterprise and Austerity as a Double Hazard for Non-Governmental Organisations in France and the UK
Dr. Akwugo Emejulu, University of Edinburgh Dr. Leah Bassel, University of Leicester
This briefing paper examines the rise of the idea and practices associated with ‘enterprise’ within the third sectors in Scotland, England and France. In our pilot project exploring the challenges facing non-governmental organizations (NGOs) during the current economic crisis and subsequent austerity, we found that the logic of free market relations had penetrated and embedded itself into the rationale and practices of the third sector in these three countries. Principles of competition, the accumulation of assets and the commodification of services and products offered by NGOs had either been imposed onto individual organisations by the local or national state or organisations had actively adopted these ideas in order to survive austerity. Questions remain about what these free market principles embedded within the NGO sector mean for the most marginalised groups in France and the UK—minority women. We suggest that the ability for minority women to articulate and take action on complex social justice claims within the sector is under threat because these claims may well be silenced and/or ignored due to the prevailing enterprise logic of the sector.
Click here to download Briefing No.2
AHRC grant awarded
CERES Associates Professor Peter Hopkins (University of Newcastle), Dr Gurchathen Sanghera (University of St. Andrews) and CERES Co-Director Dr Rowena Arshad have been awarded a substantial AHRC grant to investigate ‘Non-Muslim’ and Muslim youth: religious identities, Islmophobia and everyday geopolitics.
The project will run from March 2013 until February 2016
This novel project has four interrelated aims:
- To explore the issue of Islamophobia in relation to the experiences of ‘non-Muslim’ and Muslim youths (aged 12-25) in Scotland who are targeted because they look Muslim (Alexander, 2004) and to explain how different religious, ethnic and minoritised youth experience and understand Islamophobia, the impact of this on community relations, social cohesion and integration.
- To analyse these experiences within a framework that takes cognisance of the intersectionality of ethnicity with other relevant positionalities such as religion, gender, social class and locality (e.g. Hopkins, 2009; Mohammad 2001; Sanghera and Thapar-Bjorkert 2007).
- To detail how young people understand and negotiate ‘everyday geopolitics’.
- To problematise polarised discourses which see young people as either politically disengaged and apathetic or politically radicalised and extreme.
You can find out more about project the by visiting the website here
CERES Conference 2013
Racism and Anti-Racism through Education and Community Practice: An International Exchange
26th—28th June 2013
Centre for Education for Racial Equality in Scotland, University of Edinburgh, UK
This international conference aims to put ‘race’ back on the agenda in education and community theory and practice.
Over recent years, practitioners and academics interested in the operations of ‘race’, racism and anti-racism have had to negotiate various disabling discourses in policy, politics and practice. From the backlash against ‘failed’ multiculturalism in Europe, to the marginalisation of ‘race’ in inclusive education to a shift in preference for discussing culture and ethnicity rather than racism, it seems that ‘race’ and ‘challenging racism’ has been silenced from broader discussions about educational inclusion and social justice.
This conference aims to bring together academics, policy makers and practitioners from around the globe to critically debate and share practice experiences about ‘race’, racism and anti-racism in different national contexts.
Further details on the conference can be found here