Anthropology Communicates

A VIRTUAL SEMINAR SERIES ORGANISED BY THE RAI'S ANTHROPOLOGY OF POLICY AND PRACTICE COMMITTEE

Monday 24 April 2023, 1.00 -2.30pm (BST)

Register for the Zoom event here: 
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZErc-igpjwpGNw3sIIqPaMk-wGyWEhtXNva 

Anthropology Communicates with Local Government 

This Anthropology Communicates will consider approaches to productive connection and collaboration between anthropological research and local government.  

Speakers

Kelly Fagan Robinson (Leverhulme ECR Fellow, University of Cambridge)
Hayley Sims (Head of Strategy and Engagement at Islington Council, Clore Social Emerging Leader 2023)
Imogen Resnick (Policy and Innovation Officer at Islington Council)

Fostering field research relationships and effective knowledge exchange between academic researchers and local government is a contingent process which relies on an alchemy of networks, persistence, of being at the right place at right time, and of sharing a common interest in particular kinds of research evidence. This discussion will look at the particular case of the collaboration between anthropologist, Kelly Fagan Robinson (Leverhulme ECR Fellow, University of Cambridge), Hayley Sims (Head of Strategy and Engagement at Islington Council, Clore Social Emerging Leader 2023), and Imogen Resnick (Policy and Innovation Officer at Islington Council).

In this seminar, Robinson, Sims, and Resnick will discuss the work conducted so far during their collaboration since 2021. They will address the ways in which they have approached alignment of their (sometimes disparate) priorities in terms of the objectives of research, what shape research evidence and metrics should take, and priorities for both sides of the partnership. The three will discuss how Robinson’s work and creative ethnographic approaches aligned with the aims and ambitions of the research agenda already underway in Islington Council at that time, and the ways that Islington supported Robinson in terms of access and an open door to contribute to the council’s wider research programme which throughout 2021-22 focused on inequalities within the borough. In exchange, the three will show the ways that Robinson has contributed anthropological upskilling and insight through development of the Anthropology By Children (ABC) initiative in Islington Primary and Secondary Schools. They will also talk about the ways in which the ABC pilots have yielded key insights into the lives of some of the least heard-from members of the UK population: children, and how the programme is developing and growing having now been written into the Islington strategy plan through 2030 (initial case study blog post about work in schools can be read here: https://www.cape.ac.uk/2022/10/31/anthropology-by-children-case-study/ ). Throughout the discussion, the aim is to commence conversation about collaboration between anthropologists and local government, considering the tensions and opportunities created by differences in academic timelines versus those of policymakers at the local government level, how this has been/can be mutually navigated, and how these differences can be productive to both sides, leading to effective co-construction of data insights.

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