'Drama classes help GPs handle difficult patients' c/o BBC

'Hull Truck Theatre has just won the Innovation prize at the Stage Awards for their new training scheme for GPs. Associate Director Tom Saunders and GP Dr Eman Shamsaee discuss why drama classes are helping doctors treat patients.' 

BBC Radio 4 'Front Row' https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002q2jz (15 mins ...)

◇

Holly Phillips, East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire and Ian Youngs, Culture Reporter

Published - 21 January 2026

'A theatre company is using drama training to help doctors deal with challenging patients.

Hull Truck Theatre's classes feature actors performing difficult GP consultations, with GPs giving feedback before taking over the consultation themselves.

The theatre recently won the Innovation Award at the Stage Awards for the programme.

Dr Eman Shamsaee, who has taken part in the training scheme, described it as a "really creative way of doing GP training".'

BBC News:  Drama classes help GPs handle difficult patients

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The training programme has completed its pilot stage and is now in the delivery phase

A reminder of co-working to deliver STORM training with a Clinical Psychologist colleague. 

See also: 'communication' : 'primary care' : 'GP' : 'drama'

Theatre - the best way to learn ...

Pardon me, while I stay local - in Liverpool . . . 

I've always been interested in drama since school days (aged 13-14) and playing Francis Nurse in Arthur Miller's Crucible. Recent reading (inc. Theatre of the Absurd, The Shifting Point), see 'drama' - with more to follow) encouraged me to find out more. As a community mental health nurse on a visit, I've sometimes thought of this script being written as we engage with each other. Framed within  interpersonal skills and the society 'outside', there's a sense in which a screenplay is also writ large. 

The fact of whether the session is therapeutic, progressive, person-centred, structured, ethical, purposeful, has tea and custard creams ... is the drama of course.

In a way the creators of formal psychotherapies are playwrights - directors:

After all, they keep producing 'original' therapy manuals, don't they?

In the new year I noticed a community message about a theatre group Valley Theatre Group, planning a 'Living Newspaper' for a drama festival that took place last month. There is another performance next month in Liverpool, as per the edited message below:

People have been asking what’s going on and when for our Hope Street performances June 6-8^th. So here’s the details.

We start each evening with the play about a 1930s Socialist Theatre group, “Unity”. (Cast: Peter Merrill, Ted Grant, Steve Donegan, Meggan Pye, Day Sheehan and Donna Lauder)

Then, on Friday 6 June, in the second half, we have our first Living Newspaper. This is the one that has most of the sketches submitted by outside writers and developed at the workshops. Then on Saturday 7th, second half, we have the Leverhulme group (The one that won the award at the festival) with their Living Newspaper. Finally, on Sunday 8^th, in the second half, we have the last of the Living Newspapers, the one with slightly longer pieces like Scouse Man. This final one also has an original sketch from a 1930s Living Newspaper, the Munich Pact.

Tickets are on sale at the Hope Street Theatre website (link below) and from Ticket Quarter. Please come along and try to get other people along as well.  It'll be a good night's theatre! 

Thanks for all your support. The WTM team

Ticket link:  www.hopestreettheatre.com

Phone: 0344 561 0622

'Recall Me Maybe' | FT Drama

Stephen Fry and Gemma Whelan star in a new FT drama written by David Baddiel, exploring AI, memory and truth. Fry plays a grandfather with dementia who uses AI to fill in gaps in his memory. While reviewing the archive of his life his family makes a shocking discovery. Which memories are really true? And how AI is defining who we are?

See also: FT Standpoint unveils David Baddiel digital-first drama about AI and dementia -https://www.dropmedia.co.uk/ft-standpoint-unveils-david-baddiel-digital-first-drama-about-ai-and-dementia/

My source: Times Radio. Dom Joly in for Ayesha Hazarika. 1300-1600 BST From 1405-21.
https://www.thetimes.com/radio/show/20250919-32052/2025-09-19

I still need to catch up with last weekend's FT.
https://www.ft.com/video/a4d2ba19-051e-47c5-98ae-c27c59f1b3f0

International Nurses' Day 2013: "The drama of it All"

There is a new nursing drama series starting on BBC TV next week - Frankie:

District nurse Frankie Maddox is a saint. At least she would be if it weren’t for her fondness for red wine, loud music, ghastly singing and fast cars.

Whether it’s an elderly man with dementia, a pregnant woman whose husband is on duty in Afghanistan or a sickly young child who’s never at school, nothing is too much trouble for this caring, smiley character. “Why do you always insist there’s something we can do, when sometimes there isn’t?” snaps Dr Evans (Jemma Redgrave). Because “the world is my patient,” Frankie explains, although she has the grace to grimace after delivering such a clunking line (from Radio Times).

That line may be clunking as a piece of dramatic prose, but there is a need to make some noise that extends beyond nursing's one-to-one encounters.

We are well aware of the challenges that the NHS faces, the themes are well known and read like a script that is increasingly played out on wards, the media and in parliament. The latest playwright is Francis. This is the drama we cannot ignore locally.

What of nursing globally on IND 2013?

The nursing communities within the various nations must also listen to the world. We can make a difference as individuals by challenging our often parochial perspectives; by trying to travel, seeking to engage with others electronically and learn what global nursing organizations are doing on our behalf.

Best wishes to nurses everywhere.

International Council of Nursing

Global Alliance for Nursing and Midwifery Communities of Practice (GANM)

Global Health Network

HIFA[2015] ‘Healthcare Information For All by 2015

Global Health Workforce Alliance

Dramatherapy i - thresholds, liminality and wounded healers

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A personal journey The 'wounded healer' - Halifax (1982) ".. it is the experience of our own wounding that will enable us to engage with our clients in a healing process". p.15.

"Therefore we can begin to understand that rather than the drama being the chaos, the drama is both the container of the chaos and the means of exploring it. Accompanying our groups through such dangerous territory may seem too frightening for the dramatherapist to contemplate, let alone the client". p.15.

"The attributes of liminality or of liminal personae (threshold people) are necessarily ambiguous, since this condition and these people elude or slip through the network of classifications that normally locate places and position in cultural space. Liminal entities are neither here nor there: they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention and ceremonial. As such their ambiguous and indeterminate attributes are expressed by a rich variety of symbols in the many societies that ritualise social and cultural transitions. This liminality is likened frequently to - death, being in the womb, to invisibility, to darkness, to bisexuality, to the wilderness and to an eclipse of the sun or the moon". p.14.

"The 'illness/treatment' model has by its nature to emphasise what the patient cannot do rather than what he might be able to do; to emphasise that what requires to be done is carried out by others rather than what the patient might do for him/herself". p.262. Power as exercised (degrees of freedom?) through the therapeutic turn: the history of therapies; social, industrial, occupational, physical, drama, psychotherapy et al. ...

Turner, V. (1969) The Ritual Process. Structure and Anti-Structure. Routledge, London. cited in Jennings, S. (1987) Dramatherapy and Groups, Chap. 1. pp.1-18. In Jennings, S. (Ed.), (1987) Dramatherapy. Theory and Practice for Teachers and Clinicians. Routledge, London. p.14.

Mitchell, R. (1987) Dramatherapy in In-patient Psychiatric Settings, Chap. 12. pp.257-276. In Jennings, S. (Ed.), (1987) Dramatherapy. Theory and Practice for Teachers and Clinicians. Routledge, London. p.14.

In theoretical terms, Mitchell also describes the creative model, the learning model and the therapeutic model (p.265).

Halifax, J. (1982) Shaman: the wounded healer. Thames and Hudson, London [England].

Previously: theatre , threshold , liminal

ii "Nye" | Full Show [now ended] | National Theatre at Home

Watching yesterday on YouTube, I enjoyed NYE and was challenged by it personally and as a grandfather, son, nurse and tax-payer.

It wasn't all sweetness and light regards Aneurin "Nye" Bevin's character. Politically, he clearly pushed boundaries in response to the values he carried on his sleeve. As the family's of many health care professionals may recognise, needs outside the family can be prioritised at the family's cost. The theory-practice gap is expressed in so many ways. 

Whether by intent, or accident, the play points to the timeless challenge of social care and women's role in delivery of this care. This strikes home in the drama not just as care of the elderly, but being confronted (alone) with the slow, painful dying of a loved-one; and the reality of occupational diseases - 'black lung'. Women are exploited as carers, their hearts and feet may as well be bound; in the same way the mine owners exploited the workers. There was a stark reminder for me, of how continuity of care is often lacking today.

Nye becomes personal, as even up to 1970s working class parents would have worried, did worry about the prospect of their (invariably male - with some exceptions?) offspring going down the pit, especially in Lancashire and Yorkshire. Watching and listening to this you can appreciate how education was seen a passport to alternative white-collar work. My paternal grandfather worked in a slate quarry. I recall many invites to punch him in the 'stomach': a slate wall. He walked quite a few miles to work and wasn't that old when he died; although he (soon) followed grandma J.

For quite a while I've been drawn to the theatre. Aged 15 I was Francis Nurse - yes, the irony - in the school play, Arthur Miller's, The Crucible. It was Miss Smith, a drama teacher who first brought my attention to the idea of 'social awareness'. I recall Miss Clayton too who was a student teacher. On visits to London I've been struck by the relevance of Ibsen today. 

If there were to be a play in me, perhaps 'Axes and Crosses' must be-up-there as a working title? For  my father the 11+ exam was the icon to ward off the evil that was work down a mine; or lying under a an excavator / crane at 0400 to get the machine fixed for the shift due to start. The 11+ and need to pass this has provided its own anxiety, burden, and it must be said - motivation not just for me, but many more senior adults. I can see this now. So thank you Tim Price, National Theatre and Nye (2025!) for many further insights into stagecraft. 

See also:
https://www.bohs.org/media-resources/press-releases/detail/deadly-lung-disease-in-uk-kitchen-worktop-workers-is-avoidable/

September 2024: 'The Lightest Element'
https://www.hampsteadtheatre.com/whats-on/2024/the-lightest-element/

Previously:
What wright to care?

drama (theatre), arts

Interactive Radio Drama Training - Theatre for a Change - Online

From: Ryan Borcherding

Learn how to produce Interactive Radio Drama (IRD) for a wide range of gender, SRHR, SGBV and COVID-19 behaviour change and advocacy objectives.

IRD is a unique social and behaviour change communication tool from Theatre for a Change. It has been used in multiple countries since 2010 to improve the sexual and reproductive health and rights of marginalised and vulnerable women and girls, with documented results.

IRD enables audiences to call in to the radio station and replace the main character in the radio drama, to show what they could do differently to change the story for the better. It enables behaviour change and advocacy to happen on a large scale. In Malawi, we reach over 550,000 listeners through interactive broadcasts each week.

We are now offering online training in our IRD approach to enable other organisations to use IRD in their gender, SRHR, SGBV and COVID-19 behaviour change and advocacy work.

To view the full course outline, including eligibility requirements, please see www.tfacafrica.com/online-training

For more information, please contact Ryan Borcherding on ryan.borcherding AT tfacafrica.com

Ryan Borcherding

My source:

The Communication Initiative Network

What wright to care?

At senior school I had the challenge and pleasure of appearing in Arthur Miller's The Crucible at the age of 15. My part was of course that of Francis Nurse. I can still remember most of my lines [as I didn't have many ;-)]. I have always been interested in drama, but even more so - dialogue, which helps as a member of this family and a mental health care professional.

Over several years, the above plus studies in literature and philosophy prompted me to dabble with dialogues of my own. One from way back when concerned nurse training and virtual environments; while another was set in Athens addressing the impact of informatics upon nursing.

The professionals of dialogue - playwrights - feature on BBC R4 Start The Week and this made me think of another dialogue as I recognised that my colleagues and I are in fact carewrights.

Now though with long term medical conditions, self-care, recovery, personalised care, individualised budgets and other policy permutations we are not just concerned with the words we say. With patients and carers seen and heard as experts no longer are we just putting words into their mouths - they are putting words in ours.

So together -
lets literally go taste the health and social care culture and break a leg!

Image sources:
book cover Amazon
Drama mask image: Saskatchewan Drama Association

Additional links:

Top 30 languages of the world

Top 20 countries by number of languages

International Mother Language Day 21 February

I note there are several instances of 'carewright' as a surname, trade / commercial name - my use and the context should be clear.

In search of socio-political logics

'The logic of appropriateness refers to actions which members of an institution take to conform to its norms. For example, a head of state will perform ceremonial duties because it is an official obligation. By contrast, the logic of consequences denotes behaviour directed at achieving an individual goal such as promotion or re-election.' p.87.

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'Institutions are far more than the theatre within which the political drama unfolds; they also shape the script (Peters, 1999). This emphasis within the institutional framework on the symbolic or ritual aspect of political behaviour contrasts with the view of politicians and bureaucrats as rational, instrumental actors who define their own goals independently of the organization they represent.' p.87.

'Further, institutions bring forth activity which takes place simply because it is expected, not because it has any deeper political motive. When a legislative committee holds hearings on a topic, it may be more concerned to be seen to be doing its job than to probe the topic itself. Much political action is best understood by reference to this logic of appropriateness rather than a logic of consequences. For instance, when a president visits an area devastated by floods, he is not necessarily seeking to direct relief operations or to achieve any purpose other than to be seen to be performing his duty of showing concern. In itself, the tour achieves the goal of meeting expectations arising from the actor's institutional position. "Don't just do something, stand there", said Ronald Reagan, a president with a fine grasp of the logic of appropriateness.' pp.86-87.

    

See also: 'drama' : 'bridges'

Hague, R., & Harrop, M. (2007). Comparative Government and Politics (7th ed.). New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

Peters, B. Guy. (1999). Institutional theory in political science: the new institutionalism. London: Pinter.

See, hear, feel... Drama still has a role to play

Mr Bates vs The Post Office

4 Episodes

The first part of a four-part drama.

Mysterious financial losses lead the

Post Office to sack and prosecute village

sub-postmasters who have no way

 to prove their innocence.


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personal ethics? listen - listening Well, this hasn't happened to anyone else! Losing control of one's horizons ...	socio-technical methods software testing verification - validation life-cycle management data/information standards human-factors - (need a chance to breathe?) ... !?
	politics law justice Establishment Institutions Public services group think lack of whistleblowers?

Sometimes* political and legal action -::- needs a social nudge.

*All the time?

My sources:
Quality press and BBC Radio 4 The Great Post Office Trial

Syria's Trojan women

The Syria Trojan Women project began by creating drama workshops in Amman, Jordan in autumn 2013, and put on a theatrical production of Euripides’ anti-war tragedy, 'The Trojan Women' in December with a cast and crew of Syrian refugees. The first performances were a great success, and we hope to stage further performances in and around Amman, and a tour of Jordan and the region. http://www.syriatrojanwomen.org/

My source: Charlotte Eagar, Syria's Trojan women. FT Weekend, Life&Arts, 4 - 5 January 2014. pp.1-2.

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES
humanistic ------------------------------------------- mechanistic
SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

individual

"personal	parallels" p.2.
drama therapy	conflict

group - population

http://hodges-model.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Jordan

In Theatre, Silence is a genre, and therapeutic ally

'As a playwright it may be your intention to build a vehicle to take us to the stars. But do make sure you have people aboard.' (p.9).^
Alan Ayckbourn in The Crafty Art of Playmaking.

Sound of silence in activism

Quite fitting in the two decades since publication, given the rise of AI and the impact upon the arts, specifically human imagination, creativity, and livelihoods. Meaning: silence as a tool for protest, and activism is also a genre and a can be a therapuetic ally. 

Going backwards - Sir Alan writes: 'Theatre for me has always been, in a way, a reflection of life writ somewhat smaller'. p.10.

While the point concerns the faith and trust placed in theatre directors by the company, there is an analogue in healthcare. The belief of the patient, in their doctor and the medical team. Or, at least the knowledge and skills they should, and appear to possess. For Ayckbourn '... the director looked as if he knew.' (p.10).

Obvious rule no. 4: 'Use the minimum number of characters that you need' (p.13).

What can I say? Society, has peeled back the patient - doctor (substitute health profession as needed) to the person whose monologue seeks confirmation of illness x,y, or z. Apparently here in the UK 1 in 4 adults have a mental health condition. The debate is ongoing as to what is going on. But the subject of Hodges' model as a possible crucible for a work of drama can certainly keep to character count down.

Not only that, but is this a book on counselling - interpersonal skills?

'An audience that doesn't care stops listening in the end. '. p.14. 

As part of -

'Obvious Rule no. 5: They need to care about your characters. (So you should too.)'

So, for both playwrights and carewrights, there is a duty of care (for all of course - despite the actions of so many governments).

In health the patient is the character study. There is, should be, must be - a plan of  care, a care plan. As a 'play', Hodges' model begins as a template of at least five acts [Spiritual (Four domains) ]. That is whether or not they are all 'written'. The attitude though should be unconditional positive regard.

There's no Waiting for Godot here, unless the character is social care?

Could it be that as organisational hierarchies have been flattened, the notion of character has been under siege? The onion that is our identity, personality, persona unpicked, skin-by-skin by social media, social change, and policy affecting education. Character building used to be a thing didn't it? No longer needed now is it?

Sir Alan, supports this hypothesis in his 'Obvious Rule No. 28:

People in general are reluctant to reveal themselves.' (p.65).

I still wonder about the potential of Hodges' model in secondary level education. More than ever, with all the talk about resilience, recovery, mental health issues, the rising UK welfare bill, may beg the question: What is character today? But, it is not defined by a stiff upper lip.

Not to sound 'ableist', but the 'crafty' in Ayckbourn's title, can be read in health terms; the disciplines drawing on science and the arts. Plus, they involve craft - use of the self, empathy and rapport. Not limited to, but in mental health care, it could be 'crafty' in the exercise of power, so frequently a theme central in drama and the human condition.

^A nice reminder too, of a Poul Anderson's SF classic Tau Zero (and a previous post).

The Crafty Art of Playmaking by Alan Ayckbourn. Faber, 2004, softcover, ISBN 0571215106.

https://www.concordtheatricals.co.uk/s/45898/the-crafty-art-of-playmaking

https://www.isthiswhatwewant.com/

Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b0/Is_This_What_We_Want%3F.jpg/250px-Is_This_What_We_Want%3F.jpg

https://www.amazon.com/Zero-Coronet-Books-Poul-Anderson/dp/0340163364

Reflecting on The Times Education Commission 2022

"At the Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California, Susan Prescott, vice-president of enterprise and education marketing, argued that economic prosperity depended on human ingenuity. “Creativity doesn’t mean ‘Have a music and an arts class’. Creativity means across disciplines, how can you bring in ways for kids to engage in the material differently? How do you bring in opportunities for kids to reflect their learning in new ways? How do you use it to get a different, broader view rather than the fact-based stuff?" p.58. (with my emphasis and below)

Included in the 12-point plan for education:

1 A British Baccalaureate

It would offer broader academic and vocational qualifications at 18, with parity in funding per pupil in both routes, and a slimmed-down set of exams at 16 to bring out the best in every child.

2 ‘Electives premium’

This should be offered for all schools to be spent on activities including drama, music, dance and sport and a National Citizen Service experience for every pupil, with volunteering and outdoor pursuits expeditions to ensure that the co-curricular activities enjoyed by the most advantaged become available to all.

3 New cadre of Career Academies

These would be elite technical and vocational sixth forms with close links to industry, mirroring the academic sixth forms that are being established and a new focus on creativity and entrepreneurialism in education to unleash the economic potential of Britain.

4 Significant boost to early years funding

The extra funding should be targeted at the most vulnerable. A unique pupil number would be given to every child from birth, to level the playing field before they get to school. Every primary school should have a library.

5 Army of undergraduate tutors

The students would earn credit towards their degrees by helping pupils who fall behind to catch up.

6 Making the most of tech

A laptop or tablet for every child, greater use of artificial intelligence in schools, colleges and universities to personalise learning, reduce teacher workload and prepare young people better for future employment.

7 Wellbeing at the heart of education

A counsellor should be placed in every school and an annual wellbeing survey of pupils carried out to encourage schools to actively build resilience rather than just support students once problems have arisen.

8 Bring out the best in teaching

The profession’s status and appeal would be increased with better career development, revalidation every five years and a new category of consultant teachers, promoted within the classroom, as well as a new teaching apprenticeship.

9 A reformed Ofsted

Ofsted should work collaboratively with schools to secure sustained improvement, rather than operating through fear, and a new “school report card” with a wider range of metrics including wellbeing, school culture, inclusion and attendance to unleash the potential of schools.

10 Better training

Teachers should be trained to identify children who have special educational needs, a greater focus should be placed on inclusion and a duty put on schools to remain accountable for the pupils they exclude to draw out the talent in every child.

11 New university campuses

New campuses should be created in 50 higher education “cold spots”, including satellite wings in further education colleges. In addition, pay and conditions in the FE sector should be improved and a transferrable credit system between universities and colleges created to boost stalled British productivity.

12 A 15-year strategy for education

The strategy should be drawn up in consultation with business leaders, scientists, local mayors, civic leaders and cultural figures, putting education above short-term party politics and bringing out the best in our schools, colleges and universities.

Obviously idealised but mapped here to Hodges' model the long-term - policy, strategic, funding, resource and workforce emphasis is apparent.

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7 Wellbeing at the heart of education reflection critical thinking, communication and creativity	2 ‘Electives premium’ (outdoors) ... 6 Making the most of tech 7 Wellbeing at the heart of education
2 ‘Electives premium’ (drama, music, dance) ...	1 A British Baccalaureate 2 ‘Electives premium’ (National Citizen Service experience) 3 New cadre of Career Academies 4 Significant boost to early years funding 5 Army of undergraduate tutors 8 Bring out the best in teaching 9 A reformed Ofsted 10 Better training 11 New university campuses 12 A 15-year strategy for education

What, if anything, is missing?

With its recommendations, the Commission is not intended to be prescriptive, specifying educational methods, methodologies and resources. But the aims and mapping above, point to the need to link education and health as per #7 Wellbeing at the heart of education. 

There is surely an avenue here - via the sustainable development goals, which the UK must also 'achieve'. Consider the following too:

"The system doesn’t measure creativity; it measures what you can remember of other people’s facts.” p.11.

"A British Baccalaureate at 18, an equally rigorous but broader qualification than A-levels with academic and vocational options under the same umbrella. Pupils studying for the academic Diploma Programme would take six subjects — three major, three minor — covering humanities and sciences as well as units on critical thinking, communication and creativity. Those on the Career-related Programme would combine learning (which could include BTecs or a T-level) with work experience. There would be the option for students to “mix and match” elements of both programmes to create the qualification that best suited them. All pupils would do an extended project, community service and some literacy and numeracy through to 18. Digital skills would be woven through the whole curriculum." p.95.

What is missing is understandably the aforementioned tools to facilitate creativity, but let state this as follows and join the dots with wellbeing.

• We need to respect, support and encourage students to be and become curators of their lifelong learning and life chances. 
• The reference p.11 to students being measured on what they can "remember of other people’s facts" is a key statement. As a curator, students should be the marshal of their own 'memory palace' pushing the boundaries, their envelope as the lifelong learning (constant test-pilot) of what we hope is a long career - and not just while in 'work'.
  
• In the above mapping, we can see what is recognised in 'wellbeing'. Pupils need a foundation, they need the confidence and self-esteem to explore, express and explain any difficulties commensurate with their unique situation and identity. The importance of security (nationally, locally and personally) as the basis to address the social determinants of health are essential to integrate short and long-term policy aims and objectives, individual and collective success.

This is identified in the findings:

"Lee Elliot Major, a professor of social mobility at the University of Exeter, said there were 'bold and compelling reform' in the commission’s findings.

He welcomed the adoption of his recommendations for undergraduate tutors to help poorer pupils, adding: 'We need to consider radical reset to ensure that the education system fulfils the potential of all children.'”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/times-education-commission-report-welcomed-by-tony-blair-john-major-qwc3b7ktx

The Times Education Commission 2022, 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/society/education/education-commission

'Health career' - 'life chances'

Laughter and Medicine Conference

Manon, Laughing Gas, 2019, installation, Kunsthaus Zürich
photographer: Franca Candrian, 2022.

British Academy/Wellcome Trust Conferences bring together scholars and specialists from around the world to explore themes related to health and wellbeing.

'Connecting knowledge across the disciplines, this conference will put practicing doctors in direct dialogue with researchers in the humanities – especially scholars of literature, cinema and cultural history. Together, they will seek to understand the social, diagnostic, therapeutic and physiological implications of laughter, inside and outside the clinic. Laughter is not always the 'best medicine', nor is it linked only to comedy and enjoyment. 'Healing laughter' differs markedly from pathological laughter, hysterical laughter, forced or bitter laughter, laughter aimed at mitigating awkwardness in unsuccessful communication, laughter intended to deceive, or laughter signifying fear, discomfort or aggression. Irony and other double-coded signifiers that abound in comic and parodic representations of medical practitioners and their patients often reveal medicine’s paradoxical place in various cultural imaginaries and in individual and collective experience.

This conference will study the diverse forms of laughter occurring around medicine in particular eras and cultural environments alongside comparative analysis of patterns and problematics over the long history of Western medicine and its representations.'

         https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/events/british-academy-conferences/laughter-and-medicine/

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

I don't find this funny!	I laughed so much it hurt!
"All the world's a stage"	Politics is a running joke - that's never funny. The human epic of triumph and tragedy.

Previously (with overlap):

arts :: drama :: poetry :: literature :: narrative

MEMO TO: New College of Humanities and London Interdisciplinary School

Re. "Introduction to Lifelong Learning 101"

Since 1998, when I first went 'online' I've always been conscious of etiquette and note how this has changed - developed - over the years. The email associated with the former website domain p-jones.demon.co.uk saw a lot of emails to quite a diverse range of mail lists. Should I? Should I not? These questions remain a key consideration in trying to spread the thought and word on Hodges' model.

Stepping on toes a couple of times, someone also asked about links to blog posts on LinkedIn. Not had those queries recently so I think readers understand the 2x2 table is critical to the post in representing the model. Twitter presents its own challenges [ #WasteOfTime ]. So please pardon my shouting, but there's an important message here about an important resource.

I've lapsed again with no progress on the new site - maybe it is not just vapourware but a dream.

The creation of new education institutions: 

the New College of Humanities and London Interdisciplinary School

- is encouraging for the work here:

"The London Interdisciplinary School wants its students to be problem solvers with a wide range of academic interests."
(Nicola Woolcock, Polymaths plan to teach universities a thing or two. The Times, October 2, 2021. p.17.)

Does it, really - and by implication the NCH, plus New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering (NMITE) and others?

The Times Education Commission with proposals for reform due in June, adds further impetus and evidence ...

I read this evidence as supporting the argument that education and health are and always will be 'legacy issues', that is in need of change, investment, policy. All disciplines of study and knowledge are always dynamic and should be challenging, personally and collectively.

If institutions can distract themselves from fiscal incentive of the bums on seats for a few moments and policy makers look up from the dotting of  I's and crossing of T's then student's learning can be energised by Hodges' model: a generic bootstrap for lifelong learning.

Just to be clear. This model is NOT about boxes, it is about being aware of boundaries and being prepared to cross and use these journeys.

In the 21st century we are humbled by what now constitutes the pantology - the system of all knowledge. No individual can take in - apprehend and master it all, but we should have a means to at least conceptually touch this incredible gift.

INDIVIDUAL

|

 INTERPERSONAL    :     SCIENCES               

HUMANISTIC --------------------------------------  MECHANISTIC      

SOCIOLOGY  :   POLITICAL 

|

GROUP

Education Philosophy (Ethics, Logic) Psychology: (Applied, Child, Clinical, Criminal - Forensic, Occupational, Artificial Intelligence ... Cognitive Sciences Theology Arts Creativity and Design Eco-Anxiety Happiness - Metrics ...	Sciences: Biology, Physics, Chemistry* Health: (Medicine, Nursing ...) Occupational Professions Computer Science, Information Mathematics [macro - nano] Engineering Architecture Design and Creativity Environmental Studies Hydrology Land use: Forestry ...
Arts (Music, Dance, Drama ...) Literature Anthropology, Archaelogy Languages Ancient-History, History Future Studies Social Work Sociology (Culture, Ethnography ...) Anthropology Gender Studies Philanthropy ...	Politics, Government Security Law & Crime - Fraud/Corruption Policing - Law Enforcement News and Media studies Political Science - Citizenry Economics Socio-Economics International Development Peace Studies Administration Leadership and Management War and Conflict ...

I am pleased to see that the post re. Nicholas Maxwell's work is popular here:

"How Universities Have Betrayed Reason and Humanity—And What's to Be Done About It" c/o Nicholas Maxwell 

*So many sub-disciplines: Climate studies, Epidemiology, Marine biology, Quantum Computing / Physics, Exobiology, Astronomy, Materials, Demographics, Geology, Genomics, Cybernetics, Systems, Epigenetics, Exobiology, Neuroscience, Public (Mental) Health, Allied Health Professions ...

'Oh Thomasina!' Such a drama in a diagram

Arcadia

Last evening I really enjoyed a performance of Tom Stoppard's Arcadia at the Duke of York's, or soon to be - The Tom Stoppard Theatre:

Act I, Scene 2  

'Septimus ... You should no more grieve for the rest than for a buckle lost from your first shoe, or for your lesson book which will be lost when you are old. We shed as we pick up, like travellers who must carry everything in their arms, and what we let fall will be picked up by those behind. The procession is very long and life is very short. We die on the march. But there is nothing outside the march so nothing can be lost to it. The missing plays of Sophocles will turn up piece by piece, or be written again in another language. Ancient cures for diseases will reveal themselves once more. Mathematical discoveries glimpsed and lost to view will have their time again. You do not suppose, my lady, that if all of Archimedes had been hiding in the great library of Alexandria, we would be at a loss for a corkscrew? ...'^ p.20.

 Act II, Scene 3

'Lady Croom We are intruding here - this will not do, Mr Hodge. Evidently, nothing is being learned. (To Noakes) Come along, sir! 

Thomasina Mr Noakes - bad news from Paris! 

Noakes Is it the Emperor Napoleon? 

Thomasina No. (She tears the page off her drawing block, with her "diagram" on it) It concerns your heat engine. Improve it as you will, you can never get out of it what you put in. It repays eleven pence in the shilling at most. The penny is for this author's thoughts. 

She gives the diagram to Septimus who looks at it.' p.74
...
Now Septimus retrieves his book from Thomasina. He turns the pages, and also continues to study Thomasina's diagram. ... 

Septimus Why does it mean Mr Noakes's engine pays eleven pence in the shilling? Where does he say it? 

Thomasina Nowhere. I noticed it by the way. I cannot remember now. 

Septimus Nor is he interested by determinism -------

Thomasina Oh... yes. Newton's equations go forwards and backwards, they do not care which way. But the heat equation cares very much, it goes only one way. That is the reason Mr Noakes's engine cannot give the power to drive Mr Noakes's engine. 

Septimus Everybody knows that. 

Thomasina Yes, Septimus, they know it about engines! 

Pause. He looks at his watch 

Septimus A quarter to twelve. For your essay this week, explicate your diagram. 

Thomasina I cannot. I do not know the mathematics. 

Septimus Without mathematics, then.' p.75.

 
Tom Stoppard, (1993) Arcadia (Playscript), Faber & Faber, pb. ISBN 9780571169344.
https://www.faber.co.uk/product/9780571169344-arcadia/

My text source:
https://collegearts.yale.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/arcadia_by_tom_stoppard.pdf 

^ n.b. This was therapeutic, but I still mourn the losses from Alexandria and other libraries ... today.

Five Fever Tales: Fact-based dramas about malaria, one of the oldest human diseases

The following radio broadcasts may be of interest:

Five Fever Tales by Lavinia Greenlaw

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03yzlhk

Five Fever Tales by Lavinia Greenlaw

These brief plays are very interesting as they present history in a docu-drama approach. The science behind the discovery of what the 'fever' was/is and the challenge for those who first saw new 'living' things through the microscope and then convincing the scientific establishment is quite fascinating.




The economic incentives to solving the 'fever' are also salutary and give pause for thought in considering global health today (and tomorrow - global warning) as is recognition of resistance and current genetic research programmes.

I believe these programmes are freely accessible worldwide, for a limited time period.

Also posted on HIFA2015 c/o the moderator.

'Best Interests' - Audio Drama by Sasha Hails

by Sasha Hails

Peter Polycarpou (Read by), Gerard McDermott (Read by), Jonathan Forbes (Read by), James Lailey (Read by), Alex Tregear (Read by), Susie Riddell (Read by), Elaine Caxton (Read by)


A BBC Radio 4 dramatisation

'Two new dramas which get inside the emotional realities of dealing with ethical dilemmas. When a confused young man with no I.D. and a Doctor Who fixation is brought into hospital, the staff have clear rules about how decisions can be made on his behalf. But when he starts to make his own wishes clear, are they right to listen?

Starring Gunnar Cauthery, Clare Perkins, Simon Bubb, and Carl Prekopp. With Peter Polycarpou, Gerard McDermott, Jonathan Forbes, James Lailey, Alex Tregear, Susie Riddell and Elaine Claxton. Script Consultant: Jim Blair, St George's Healthcare NHS Trust. Produced and directed by Jonquil Panting.'

My source: 

Jim Blair @jimgblair - https://x.com/jimgblair/status/1906993515038429252

Michel Serres in "A planetary art beyond the human"

Individual
|

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------------------ mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

|

Group

"In the mid- 1990s, Michel Serres was already registering the devastating impact of ‘dense tectonic plates of humanity’ on a hitherto ‘mute world’.1 Our excesses, he writes, have awoken the ‘mute, passive, obscure things’ around us that had ‘obediently slumbered’, but will now respond to us with violence.2 In such discourse we recognize the now common tropes of thresholds and tipping points, often deployed by climate scientists and echoed by scholars who assert that humans are now truly ‘geological agents’ in their impact on the planet.3 ...

... Getting to grips with the consequences of human activity for the Earth’s systems is unarguably an essential step in forging policies to mitigate the damage. But in the political urgency that shapes many debates about climate change, there is a risk, as Dipesh Chakrabarty points out, that ‘humans emerge as the subject of the drama of the Anthropocene’ while geological time fades from view.4 An emphasis on human agency may simply lead us full circle, back to the anthropocentric conception of a docile Earth made up of inert matter, only stirred by our own excesses, and waiting to be saved or destroyed by its human inhabitants." p.31.

 

Page, J. (2021). A planetary art beyond the human. In Decolonizing Science in Latin American Art (pp. 31–65). UCL Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv18kc0mw.6

 

Joanna Page is Reader in Latin American Literature and Visual Culture at the University of Cambridge. 

See also:

Jones, P. (2008) Exploring Serres’ Atlas, Hodges’ Knowledge Domains and the Fusion of Informatics and Cultural Horizons, IN Kidd, T., Chen, I. (Eds.) Social Information Technology Connecting Society and Cultural Issues, Idea Group Publishing, Inc. Chap. 7, pp. 96-109.

Michel Serres on W2tQ

Consider also - 'deep' within Hodges' model:

DEEP space, time, ecology, links, design ... DEEP CARE.

  

UK Higher Education Research Excellence Framework - Disciplines

The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is a national assessment of the quality of UK higher education research in all disciplines.

34 subject-based Units of Assessment (UOAs)

INDIVIDUAL

|

     INTERPERSONAL    :     SCIENCES               

HUMANISTIC --------------------------------------  MECHANISTIC      

SOCIOLOGY  :   POLITICAL 

|

GROUP

Psychology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience Archaeology Theology and Religious Studies Philosophy [Mathematics & Logic] ^Communication  as Intra- Interpersonal (Skills) Neurodiversity hence an individual's sense-making

Clinical Medicine (Neuroscience) Public Health, Health Services and Primary Care Allied Health Professions, Dentistry, Nursing and Pharmacy Biological sciences  Agriculture, Food and Veterinary Sciences Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences Chemistry Physics Mathematical Sciences Computer Science and Informatics Engineering Architecture, Built Environment and Planning Geography and Environmental Studies Archaeology Area Studies Sport and Exercise Sciences,

Archaeology Social Work and Social Policy Sociology Anthropology and Development Studies area studies Education Modern Languages and Linguistics English Language and Literature History Classics Communication^, Cultural and Media Studies, Library and Information Management Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies

Leisure and Tourism Archaeology Economics and Econometrics Business and Management Studies Law area studies Politics and International Studies

As ever, you see the idealised nature of conceptual (and other) models. I have repeated archaeology, and area studies, added mathematics and logic to the intra- interpersonal (our reasoning, imaginative ability) which increasingly is being challenged and debated as computer-based proofs 'take-over'. I'm not sure where future studies might sit (or pace anxiously!)?

The REF was mentioned at the Improving University Teaching Conference [IUT] in the past week. I'd been meaning to look at the scope of the framework which is often raised across the media, hence this post. IUT, was well worth the effort of a presentation and attending. A global event spanning Australia-Asia, Europe, and North America - one to follow in the future.