Issue 24 | September 2024
ISSUE 24 | September 2024
Welcome to the September 2024 edition of The Miaaw Monthly which provides a few pointers to things you might like to explore, including (but not limited to) our podcasts.
This constitutes our second anniversary issue of Miaaw Monthly, and next month we will explain some of what we have planned for the third year. We intend to go back to the future, and we will explain what that means in approximately thirty days time.
In the meanwhile, if you have anything that you want to include in The Miaaw Monthly, or discuss in the podcasts, then please email us at monthly@miaaw.net and we will be happy to collaborate.
TODAY'S PODCAST
Today we have a fifth Friday in August and that means an episode of Friday Number 5. This year we are playing podcasts from other people that relate to our overall mission, and today we return to the Bees of Bensham, to listen to an episode in which Mattie talks with the lead artist on the project, Barbara Keating.
THE SEPTEMBER PODCASTS
Every Friday a podcast appears at approximately 12:12 Helsinki time (which you may like to think of as 10:12 UTC).
Sometimes we get so eager that they appear an hour or two early to allow for any lag across the internet. Mostly they arrive on time. With that in mind, here are the podcasts that will arrive in June.
Friday September 6: Meanwhile in an Abandoned Warehouse | Episode 75
We are very happy to announce that we have partnered with Take A Part and the Gulbenkian Foundation to produce a limited edition podcast series based around TAP’s Social Making symposium in Bristol on October 10 and 11.
To kick this off Sophie Hope and Hannah Kemp-Welch talk with Kim Wide, TAP’s artistic director and CEO, about what she and we can expect from the symposium.
Friday September 13: Ways of Listening | Episode 11
Hannah Kemp-Welch discusses creative strategies to facilitate listening with Paul Crook, head of education at South London Gallery, and a practising community artist.
Friday September 20: A Culture of Possibility | Episode 44
In episode 44 of A Culture of Possibility, Arlene Goldbard and François Matarasso talk with William Frode de la Foret, Art Director of Cork Community Art Link in Ireland for the past 30 years. They talk about his work in community street performance such as parades and street theatre; about building strong long-term relationships around community identity and collective pride; and about engaging people both as participants and spectators in public spaces through community art projects.
Friday September 27: Common Practice | Episode 38
Sophie Hope makes another attempt to talk with creative collective Spit Game UK about their current exhibition My Kind of Black at Science Gallery,
LISTENING
All our podcasts are available from Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, Overcast, RadioPublic, Soundcloud, Spotify, and Stitcher.
You can also listen to them at the miaaw.net website where you will find additional links, notes, and references accompanying each episode.
You will also find a full archive of all the previous podcasts there.
OFF SITE
François has a new blog
François Matarasso has started a new blog to accompany the two books that he is working on now.
He says that “I don’t have a clue where it’s going but it is an attempt to recreate the early days of the internet - text only, no downloads, short regular posts, without explanation. It’s at www.regularmarvels.fr
Altruistic care
We found an article in The Guardian interesting this month. It pointed out that “the city of Geel in Belgium has a foster care system for people dealing with mental health issues. These foster families sometimes host their boarders for decades, making them an integral part of the nuclear family. The families see the care they provide as normal, because many know it from their parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. This system is within the DNA of Geel”.
You can read the article here.
Drifts: a nomadic festival
In keeping with our desire to bring things to your attention that you might otherwise never know about, we present Drifts, which “is a nomadic art platform that organizes transcultural art festivals annually in various regions of Helsinki, Finland. The Drifts Festival aims to contribute to cultural plurality by engaging with diverse neighborhoods and communities. It fosters a fluid space that transcends cultural, geographical, and disciplinary boundaries, seeking dynamic social engagements and critical dialogues through performative, audiovisual, and discursive practices”.
“The fourth edition of the Drifts Festival will take place at Levyhalli and the Nordic Culture Point in the Suomenlinna region of Helsinki from August 31 to September 8, 2024. This year's theme, Precarious Lives, focuses on the vulnerability of life in the face of violence and hatred that cross borders.” The festival will collaborate with 44 local and international art practitioners, presenting audiovisual performances, film screenings, lectures, and exhibitions.
Our world in data
What do we need to know to make the world a better place?
To make progress against the pressing problems the world faces, we need to be informed by the best research and data. Our World in Data makes this knowledge accessible and understandable, to empower those working to build a better world.
You can see the website at ourworldindata.org They aim to provide facts that counter pessimism, while making sure that the data has primary sources.
Facts like these:
> The number of primary school-age children who are not in school declined from over 100 million in the 1990s to 60 million.
> The share of the world living in democracies increased from 35% in 1980 to 54% today.
> The share of the world’s adults who can read and write increased from 56% in 1980 to 87% today.
If you subscribe to The Miaaw Monthly you will get a short, sharp newsletter in your email in-box at breakfast time on the last Friday of every month. You can then find out what’s in the podcasts for the following month, as well as some things available in the wider world.
We won’t sell you email address, or use it for anything else except mailing you a copy of The Miaaw Monthly every four or five weeks.
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