You are invited to explore ideas about the higher education and creative research landscape.

What constitutes a sense of belonging within the higher education community of learning? If knowledge studies and research are unbounded, how might we better understand the myriad of perspectives on: power dynamics in research; the relative obsolescence of existing structures; and the heightened joy and curiosity of nurturing inclusive research relationships?

This Mini Assembly follows on from previous TCCE led creative writing session where black and mixed ethnic female academics, professors, PhD researchers and creative practitioners explored imaginative writing voices that emerged through a fictional research proposition. How does such practice relate to a recent understanding of diversity within the UK research environment? https://www.ukri.org/news/ukri-publishes-ethnicity-analysis-of-funding-applicants-and-awardees/

Guest speakers including Pauline Rutter, Nike Jonah, Sadhvi Dar, Deborah Brewis and Erinma Ochu will be providing their insights into these and other themes highlighted through the earlier creative writing session. This will then lead us into a space to co-develop the shape and creative approaches of new research. The proposals imagined through this participatory event will perhaps light up a pathway towards the equitable utopian research future that inspires the work of so many within the academy.