The UK Hub of the UNESCO BRIDGES Coalition at University of Wales Trinity Saint David launched in an event that brought together academia, community projects, art, gaming, and indigenous knowledge.
The launch event, entitled E(e)arth, took place in The Reading Room of the Alex Building in Swansea, Wales on the 2nd of November 2022.
The launch introduced the aims, values and opportunities of the UK Hub by showcasing projects that use the strengths of the Humanities to generate innovation in thinking and action.
The launch was not a passive affair. It was active, informal and required the audience’s engagement. If we are to move into new ways of understanding, we need bold action. The launch responded to that call.
E(e)arth
The projects presented at the launch demonstrate different approaches and methods of knowing the Earth (and earth).
1. Munekan Masha: Reviving Water in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta
The first project was devised and is led, by a group of indigenous people from Colombia who decided to teach conventional environmental scientists their previously unrecorded methods of land regeneration. This project is presented by Prof. Alan Ereira, UWTSD, the Tairona Heritage Trust (THT) and a representative of the Kogi people, Jose Manuel Mamatacan who was trained as emissary by his people to be able to join the launch event.
2. What it is to be there
The second project presented is an interdisciplinary collaboration with a Welsh artist, Helen Acklam, who asks questions about being in the earth and uses the arts to work with the soil and explore relationships with the taken for granted lives underfoot.
3. Serious Gaming: can games save the world?
The third project, presented by GamEngage, demonstrates the imaginative and creative power of playing games to seek solutions to environmental issues. Games encourage positivity and allow players to collaborate to harness tensions and frustrations to untangle complex problems around sustainability and climate solutions.
