RIGAN: Resisting Inequalities through a Global Arts Network: Online and offline barriers to and facilitators of connection and impact.
2025-03-10
This research-practitioner project is a partnership between Samata Arts Collective and researchers from the London School of Economics (LSE) International Inequalities Institute and Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity (AFSEE). It is a recipient of the Atlantic Equity Challenge Award.
The research will explore digital inequalities and connective action with Prof. Ellen Helsper, Prof. Bart Cammaerts and Dr Lisa Derand, and provide a space to bring together practice and research to improve the impact of global networks that try to resist inequalities through creative arts and community-based initiatives. It will also develop a research agenda that has so far paid little attention to non-western and digital dimensions of creative activism and the role digitisation plays in this.
The project will pilot the development of an international network of arts and community organisations which use the arts to challenge hierarchies and structures of inequalities in their local contexts. We will develop a series of participatory arts productions and collaborations, accessible online & hybrid platforms for remote collaboration, live performance events within communities, and in-person exchanges. Through this process, we will study the ways in which digital networks can facilitate or hinder these initiatives and bring their work to a broader audience of both citizens and stakeholders.