Covid in Cartoons: Empowering a thick narrative of the crisis by promoting cultural literacy and diversity skills amongst vulnerable young people
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Leicester
Department Name: College of Soc Scien, Arts & Humanities
Abstract
Covid19 poses specific challenges for young people from vulnerable or minority groups, who may feel particularly disempowered by the pandemic (Wilton 2020). In order to restore their sense of agency and belonging, schools will not only need to remedy curriculum and attainment gaps, but also to create an inclusive framework that recognises the differential impact and lived experiences of the crisis, with a view to rebuilding social cohesion. Research shows that engagement with minority narratives is key to ensuring a cohesive processing of traumatic experiences and to avoiding competing memories that might underpin long-term divides and dynamics of victimisation. The project hence aims to foster a 'thick' cultural narrative, including diverse, contextualised views of the crisis and the future.
We will do this by promoting processes of meaning-making amongst 15 to 18 year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds, as this group faces challenging educational transitions. An online minicourse, delivered in collaboration with Shout Out UK, an award-winning educational platform, and Cartooning for Peace, an international network of cartoonists, will use political cartooning on the pandemic to engage participants with representational strategies, varying critical perspectives and humour to build their cultural literacy and diversity skills. By helping them to come to terms with their own as well as other experiences, the project will generate increased criticality, ownership and pathways of resilience.
Academic publications will map processes of cultural meaning-making and strategies for an inclusive social response and curriculum. An online anthology and end-of-project film and report will ensure broad dissemination of results.
We will do this by promoting processes of meaning-making amongst 15 to 18 year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds, as this group faces challenging educational transitions. An online minicourse, delivered in collaboration with Shout Out UK, an award-winning educational platform, and Cartooning for Peace, an international network of cartoonists, will use political cartooning on the pandemic to engage participants with representational strategies, varying critical perspectives and humour to build their cultural literacy and diversity skills. By helping them to come to terms with their own as well as other experiences, the project will generate increased criticality, ownership and pathways of resilience.
Academic publications will map processes of cultural meaning-making and strategies for an inclusive social response and curriculum. An online anthology and end-of-project film and report will ensure broad dissemination of results.
Publications
Weidman S
(2023)
The role of multisystemic resilience in fostering critical agency: UK adolescents during the COVID-19 Pandemic
in Current Psychology
Weidman, S
The role of multisystemic resilience in fostering critical agency: UK adolescents during the Covid-19 pandemic
in Current Psychology
Title | Cartoonathon videos |
Description | Short videos by professional cartoonists were commissioned for the ESRC Festival of Social Science Cartoonathon. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2021 |
Impact | The videos underpinned reach and participation in the Cartoonathon competition. |
URL | https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLJVIW3P1Ob5ld6_fTWy4ZP3u9RHqaBlL |
Title | Covid in Cartoons art installation |
Description | In partnership with Vehicle Arts, an organisation that promotes emerging artists, mixed-media artist Rebecca Harvey-Hobbs developed an installation dedicated to the creative outputs from the Covid in Cartoons project. The installation was exhibited at the Forum for Global Challenges in May 2022, at Pint of Science in May 2022 and at the Cartoon Museum in London in June 2022. |
Type Of Art | Artwork |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Impact | Public engagement, including visitor feedback; collaborative talk and blog post. |
Title | Digital animations (minicourse) |
Description | Several digital animations were developed to be incorporated into the Covid in Cartoons minicourse. They will be made open access. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2021 |
Impact | Pedagogical tool. |
Title | Livedrawing by professional cartoonists and participants |
Description | The project has developed a minicourse as research tool, and the final session of this tool includes livedrawing for participants with a professional cartoonists. |
Type Of Art | Artefact (including digital) |
Year Produced | 2021 |
Impact | The livedrawing gives insight into (1) young people's experiences of and perspectives on the pandemic (2) evolving themes during the pandemic. They drawings will be incorporated into an art installation and project anthology. |
Description | Key findings include: 1. There is a complex but important relationship between critical agency (that is, the ways in young people are able to be critical about their environment and play a role in improving it) and resilience (that is, the ways in which young people cope well during times of high adversity). 2. Peer interactions and support systems were important to young people's resilience during the pandemic; we need to find new ways as practitioners and families to understand, articulate, and support healthy relationships and interactions between young people. 3. Agency and belonging are even more important in systems where chronic structural inequality has led to circumstances where agency is not well-understood or valued. 2. For some participants, there was an inherent tension between the narratives of solidarity/sense of community during the pandemic, and ambivalent or critical feelings about the social effects, and management, of the pandemic. 3. Most participants drew on humour to manage their emotions during the pandemic. |
Exploitation Route | Findings are relevant to stakeholders and practitioners working with young people. |
Sectors | Education |
Description | Our project has helped young people make meaning of their pandemic experience and to build their criticality, sense of agency, and belonging. Covid-19 poses specific challenges for young people - particularly those in seldom-heard and/or under-represented groups - who may feel especially disempowered by the pandemic. Our findings have fed into teaching practices and have also changed public perception. |
First Year Of Impact | 2022 |
Sector | Education |
Impact Types | Societal |
Description | Educational benefits |
Geographic Reach | National |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to new or improved professional practice |
Impact | Students have been described as performing better in certain subject areas and in having undergone positive changes as part of their participation in the project. Evidence from teachers has been collected by an external impact consultant. |
Description | CSSAH College Enhancing Research Culture Fund |
Amount | £1,600 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Leicester |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 03/2022 |
End | 07/2022 |
Description | CSSAH College Investment Fund Application |
Amount | £1,400 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Leicester |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 02/2022 |
End | 07/2022 |
Description | ESRC Festival of Social Science (institutional funding) |
Amount | £5,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | Economic and Social Research Council |
Department | ESRC CDRC |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 11/2021 |
End | 12/2021 |
Description | University of Leicester student intern |
Amount | £1,400 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Leicester |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 06/2021 |
End | 07/2021 |
Title | Covid in Cartoons - focus group protocol |
Description | Protocol for focus groups |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Monitoring |
URL | https://figshare.le.ac.uk/articles/presentation/CIC_Instruments_Focus_Group_Protocol/19852807?backTo... |
Title | Covid in Cartoons - minicourse |
Description | Minicourse structure and materials used to deliver impact |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2023 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Currently monitoring (now available for free on the Shout Out UK e-portal) |
URL | https://education.shoutoutuk.org/ |
Title | Covid in Cartoons - workbook |
Description | Workbook used by all participants |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | None as yet, although the workbook has now become available via CI ShoutOutUK's portal. |
URL | https://figshare.le.ac.uk/articles/dataset/CIC_Datasets_Workbooks/19886707?backTo=/collections/Covid... |
Title | Survey tool |
Description | Survey tool combining resilience, diversity and critical agency measurements. Draws on a range of existing, validated measures. Due to be published by end of funding. |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Provided To Others? | No |
Impact | New correlations between concepts, exploration of critical consciousness/agency in a UK audience of young people. |
Title | Covid in Cartoons |
Description | All outputs from the Covid in Cartoons project: - Focus group data - Survey data - Workbook data - Cartoons drawn by participants (Also contains records of instruments, blog posts, multiple videos) |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | None as yet (as the collection only went live late in 2022) |
URL | https://figshare.le.ac.uk/collections/Covid_in_Cartoons/6079419 |
Description | ESRC Festival of Social Science |
Organisation | Economic and Social Research Council |
Department | ESRC CDRC |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Organisation of an online Cartoonathon as part of the Festival of Social Science |
Collaborator Contribution | Funding via the ESRC institutional IAA budget; promotion of the event. |
Impact | Online Cartoonathon run via the Shout Out UK instagram account. With video and judging contributions from professional international cartoonists and speakers from The Cartoon Museum. The initiative is based on a multidipsclinary project, including Modern Languages, Sociology, Anthrpology and Pschology. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Forum for Global Challenges |
Organisation | University of Birmingham |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | As part of the project, we organised a roundtable event at the Forum for Global Challenges in May 2022. The event included project participants, researchers, and representation from our co-investigators Cartooning for Peace and Shout Out UK. There was live-drawing by a professional cartoonist. We will also exhibited a project-based commissioned arts installation at the forum, supported through an ESRC IAA grant. |
Collaborator Contribution | The event will include representation from Co-Is from Shout Out UK and Cartooning for Peace, and project participants, alsongside a collaboration with Arts Vehicle for the artwork installation funded through ESRC IAA. The live-drawing is financed by the Forum for Global Challenges as match-funding. |
Impact | Outputs include: - roundtable (recording available from Forum for Global Challenges) - arts installation (with visitor feedback) These are based on a multidisciplinary project, with researchers in Modern Languages, Sociology, Anthropolgy, Psychology. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | The Cartoon Museum |
Organisation | Cartoon Museum |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
PI Contribution | We have invited a speaker from the museum to a roundtable as part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science in November 2021. We hosted a roundtable at the Cartoon Museum in June 2022, aimed at policy makers. |
Collaborator Contribution | The partners take part in events and have provided a letter of support, with relevant match-funding, for our ESRC IAA project. They hosted a roundtable at the Museum in June 2022. |
Impact | - Policy round-table and arts exhibit, with an audience of practitioners and stakeholders (including British Academy). The collaboration is based on a multi-disciplinary project, including Modern Languages, Sociology, Anthropology and Psychology. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Pint of Science |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Joint presentation Fransiska Louwagie and project artist Rebecca Harvey-Hobbs, accompanied by art exhibition and discussion with audience, who reported change in their perception of the impact of Covid on young people, via feedback cards |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://pintofscience.co.uk/event/societal-crises-management |
Description | Round table and exhibit at Forum for Global Challenges |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Round table with Shout Out UK, a professional cartoonist from Cartooning for Peace (Tayo - Nigeria), and project participants from a school in Hull. Artist exhibit showcasing creative project outputs for 3 days during the Forum, which visitor feedback collected via feedback cards and a selfie stand. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | http://www.forumforglobalchallenges.com/programme/programme-overview/ |
Description | Round table at Cartoon Museum London |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Round table event with project partners from Shout Out UK and Cartooning for Peace, in collaboration with Cartoon Museum London. The event took place in Westminster and was attended by practitioners as well as political and policy delegates (including British Academy), and followed by further exchanges with attendees. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |