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Meet the Team: Hannah Smith, Associate Lecturer in Criminology
Making that choice…
As semester two is now upon us, I thought it would be a nice time to introduce myself to you all.
My name is Hannah Smith and I started at UoN in 2015, although I began my degree in Criminology in 2014. I completed my first year at Sheffield Hallam University and then transferred to UoN to complete my final two years and graduated in 2017.
To be honest, when I graduated, I was not ready to give up studying. I enjoyed reading, analysing topics, and debating for hours in seminars. I really enjoyed Criminology as it gave me the passion to ask why and look deeper into issues. Because of this, I carried on my studies and completed a Master’s degree in International Criminal Law and Security at UoN, as I wanted to learn more about the legal aspects of certain areas such as migration and I felt this was a sensible step with my knowledge from Criminology.
Since graduating from my Master’s degree, I began an internship at a local anti-poverty charity where I learned lots about voluntary sector working, governance, as well as working on some of the matters we talked about a lot in Criminology. After a year, I decided to take a leap into the world of migration and began working for a regional organisation who works in partnership with the Home Office and local authorities. I spend my days challenging practices, influencing policy, and working to try and help people who experience isolation, victimisation, discrimination and much more resettle and integrate into the UK. I also joined the UoN Criminology team at the end of 2020 and support the team as an Associate Lecturer.
One thing I have learnt along my short career journey so far is that it is not always about having the bit of paper that counts. Don’t get me wrong, it helps to have it written down on your CV, but it ultimately is about what you do with it and what you do with the skills you develop along the way. I never thought that a Criminology degree would lead me to a career in migration, but each and every day I use the skills I gained. Being analytical, being able to have the confidence to have a debate, working on my own to deadlines, working in groups, presenting to professionals and lots more.
So, if there is any advice I could give to you, it would be to focus on what you want to get from your degree rather than where you want to be. I remember being asked ‘what do you want to do when you leave university’, which was so much pressure as I just didn’t know! But there is no harm in not knowing. I would say enjoy and embrace the moment you are in and also get stuck in. Try new things, challenge yourself and enjoy learning all the new concepts and ideas that come your way. Keep using those the skills that feel natural to you as these will just strengthen and challenge yourself with the ones that need some extra attention! Because one day it will help out and pay off. You won’t know when that will be until a time of reflection in a few years’, similar to my time of reflection right now.
& When that happens – I would love to see a blog from you on this page!
Look forward to seeing you all on campus this semester!
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Auschwitz – secrets of the ground
Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always a friend to the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor – never his victim
Elie Wiesel
I have been fortunate enough in my life to have been able to live and travel abroad, a luxury you should never take for granted. Having traveled in every continent there are plenty of things I will never forget, mostly good but one thing that will stay with me will be Auschwitz. It is hard to get excited about visiting Auschwitz, but it is also hard to not get excited about visiting Auschwitz. The day I visited Auschwitz, on the journey there a flurry of strange thoughts went through my head, perhaps ones you would only have when attending a funeral where you are supposed to be in grief. What do you wear, should I smile, what do you talk about, essentially you are creating a rule book inside your head of how not to be offensive. It’s a strange thought process and perhaps completely irrational, one of which I will probably never go through again. If I had to describe Auschwitz in one word, that word would be haunting and I could write for hours about Auschwitz without ever being able to get across the feeling of visiting it, but instead, I am going to share with you a poem I wrote on the journey back from Auschwitz, this poem has never seen the light of day and has been in my diary for over a decade, until now, but it feels like a perfect time to finally share, it’s called secrets of the ground.
Dark skies and tearful eyes,
only God knows the secrets this ground hides.
The flowers mask the crimes of old,
the walls are chipped by bullet holes.
Haunting sounds drowned out by hymns,
the shoes of children too scared to blink.
A cold wind howls in these Polish fields,
one million people how can this be real.
A train stands alone on the blackened track,
barb wire fences to hold them back.
The secrets out, the grounds have spoken,
we must never forget the lives that were taken.
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Holocaust Memorial Day: 27th January
The 27th January marks an important event, Holocaust Memorial Day. This is a day to remember those who were murdered by the cruel Nazi regime, including 6 million Jews. These people were subject to the worst treatment that the modern world has ever seen. The Holocaust reminds us of how dangerous humankind can be to one another. These Nazi men went to work each morning knowing what they were doing and going home to their family at the end of their day of murders. This is something that I cannot comprehend, people that were so truly evil to degrade a whole group of people just because of who they are.
As someone who has had the opportunity to visit Auschwitz on an education trip while at school, I can say that the place is like nothing I could have ever imagined. The vast size and scale of both camps was inconceivable. To be in a place where so many people suffered their worst pains and lost their lives, it was a harrowing experience. From the hair to the scratch marks on the gas chamber walls, the place felt like no other. There was an uncomfortable feeling when you enter the gates of Arbeit macht frei, meaning, work will set you free. To know that so many walked under these gates not knowing what their fate held. And all of this for the Jews was because of their religion and the threat Hitler perceived them to have on Germany.
This is a topic that has always interested me, questioning why the Jewish community? My dissertation research so far has shown how the Jews were scapegoated by the Nazis for their successful businesses in and around Germany. Many Jewish families owned banks, jewellers and local businesses. The Nazis used this peaceful group of people and turned them into the enemy of the Nazi regime. The Jewish community was seen as a financial threat to the Nazis and needed to be eradicated for Nazi German to be successful. The hatred of the Jews developed, bringing in more dated views of the Jewish community. Within Nazi Germany, they were treated like filth and seen as subhuman because of their ‘impure’ genetics. Anyone seen to be from Jewish decent was seen as dirty and an unwanted member of society.
The stereotypes that the Jews are rich continued even after the war and still to this day, along with the stereotypes that Jews are the evil of society. Since March 2020, there have been conspiracy theories circulating on social media that the Jewish community was behind the COVID 19 pandemic. Many are suggesting that the Jewish people are trying to gain financially from the pandemic and destroy the economy. This is not something that is new, the Jewish community has faced these prejudices for as long as time.
My dissertation incorporates a study on social media and archival research. This project has taken me to the Searchlight Archives, located at the University of Northampton. The information held here shows how Britain’s far right movements carried on their anti-Semitic hate after the end of WWII. It’s very interesting to find that antisemitism never went away and still has not. Recently, the Texas Synagogue hostage crisis has show how much anti-Semitic hate is still in society. Three days after the Texas crisis, there was no longer headline news about it and those tweeting about it were part of the Jewish community.
Does this suggest that social media is anti-Semitic? Or is anti-Semitic hate not shared on social media because it is not of interest to people? Either way, Jews are still treated horribly in society and seen as a subhuman by many. This is the sad truth of antisemitism today, and this needs to change.
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Rule makers, rule breakers and the rest of us
There are plenty of theories about why rules are broken, arguments about who make the rules and about how we deal with rule breakers. We can discuss victimology and penology, navigating our way around these, decrying how victims and offenders are poorly treated within our criminal justice systems. We think about social justice, but it seems ignore the injustice perpetrated by some because we can somehow find an excuse for their rule breaking or point out some good deed somewhere along the line. And we lament at how some get away with rule breaking because of their status or power. But what is to be done about people that break the rules and in doing so cause or may cause considerable harm to others; to the rest of us?
Recently, Greece imposed a new penalty system upon those over 60 that are not vaccinated against Covid. Pensioners who have had real reductions in their pensions are now to be hit with a fine, a rolling fine at that, if they do not get vaccinated. This is against a backdrop of poor vaccination rates which seem to have improved significantly since the announcement of what many see as draconian measures by a right-wing government. There are those that argue that vaccination ought to be a choice, and this has been brought into focus by the requirements for health workers and those in the care profession to be vaccinated in this country. And we’ve heard arguments from industry against vaccination passports which would allow people to get into large venues and a consistent drip-drip effect of how damaging the covid rules are to the leisure industry and aviation, as well as the young people in society.
So, would it have been far more acceptable to have no rules at all around Covid? Should we have simply carried on and hoped that eventually herd immunity would kick in? Let’s not forget of course that the health service would have been so overwhelmed that many people will have died from illnesses other than Covid (they undoubtedly have to some extent anyway). The fittest will have survived and of course, the richest or most resourceful. Businesses will have been on their knees as workers failed to turn up for work, either because they were too ill or have moved on from this life and few customers will have thought about quaffing pints, clubbing, or venturing off to some faraway sunny place (not that they’d be particularly welcome there coming from plague island). It would have felt more like some Darwinian evolutionary experiment than civilised society.
It seems that making some rules for the good of society is necessary. Of course, there will be those that break the rules and as a society, we struggle to determine what is to be done with them. Fines are too harsh, inappropriate, draconian. Being caring, educating, works for some but let’s be honest, there are those that will break the rules regardless. Whilst we can argue about what should be done with those that break the rules, about the impact they have on society, about victims and crimes, perhaps the most pressing argument is about equality of justice. The rest of us, those that didn’t break the rules, might question how draconian the rules were (are) and we might question the punishments meted out to those that broke the rules. But what really hurts, where we really feel hard done by, let down, angry is to see that those that made the rules, broke the rules and for them we don’t get to consider whether the punishment is draconian or too soft. There are no consequences for the rule makers even when they are rule breakers. It seems a lamentable fact that we have a system of governance, be that situated in politics or business, that advocates a ‘do as I say’ rather than ‘do as I do’ mentality. The moral compass of those in power seems to be seriously misaligned. As the MP David Davis calls for the resignation of Boris Johnson and says that he has to go, he should look around and he might realise, they all need to go. This is not a case of one rotten apple, the whole crop is off, and it stinks to high heaven.
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Black History Month: A Final Thought
As we come to the end of Black History Month it is important to shine a light on the Black Lives Matters Movement and highlight the historical significance to the problematic discourse of racialisation.
Black history month is an opportunity for people from the various pockets of the Black community to learn about our own history and educate those who are not from the Black community, in order to decolonise our institutions and our society. As Black people we have our own history formed by systemic oppressions and great triumphs. While it is easy (and lazy) for institutions to use terms such as BAME and People of Colour (POC) these problematic uses of language oppress blackness. We are not a monolith of coloured people. Different racialised groups have and will experience, and uphold difference, harms and achievements within society. Furthermore, it would be naïve to ignore the narrative of anti-blackness that people from racialised groups uphold. Therefore, it is important for us and people that look like us, to continue to have the space to talk about our history and our experiences.
For many people in the UK and indeed around the world BLM became a mainstream topic for discussion and debate following the murder of George Floyd. While the term BLACK LIVES MATTER is provocative and creates a need for debate, it signifies the historical ideology that black lives haven’t mattered in historical and in many ways, contemporary terms.
While it is easy to fall into the trap of describing the Black experience as an experience of victimhood, Black history months allows us to look deep at all our history and understand why and where we are as a society.
The UK is one of the most diverse places in the world, yet we continue to fall prey to the Eurocentric ideology of history. And while it is important to always remember our history, the negativity of only understanding black history from the perspective of enslavement needs to be questioned. Furthermore, the history of enslavement is not just about the history of Black people, we need to acknowledge that this was the history of the most affluent within our society. Of course, to glaze over the triangle trade is problematic as it allows us to understand how and why our institutions are problematic, but it is redundant to only look at Black history from a place of oppression. There are many great Black historical figures that have contributed to the rich history of Britain, we should be introducing our youth to John Edmonstone, Stuart Hall, Mary Prince and Olive Morris (to name a few). We should also be celebrating prominent Black figures that still grace this earth to encourage the youth of today to embrace positive Black role models.
Black history for us, is not just about the 1st-31st of October. We are all here because of history we need to start integrating all our history into our institutions, to empower, educate and to essentially make sense of our society.
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And still the message is the same…
Following on from last week’s blog entry from @5teveh, @jesjames50 explores further dimensions of Sarah Everard’s murder.
Recently we saw the sentencing of Sarah Everard’s kidnapper, rapist and murderer. He has received a whole life sentence. As a woman within society I welcome this sentence. As a criminologist I am at a loss. There is a lot to unpick here in terms of ‘justice’ and whether this has been served. It is pertinent to question the use of a whole life order on a violent, misogynistic, kidnapper, rapist and murderer; who cooperated after arrest, who pleaded guilty and expected the full force of the law. But I shall leave that to another day, as the media’s portrayal of the sentencing and aftermath is what is currently fuelling my anger. The message remains the same, women can and should do more to prevent their victimisation.
The sentence given is at odds with the coverage which has followed. Handing down the most severe sentence available in England and Wales represents the seriousness of the offence, and the damage it has caused to those directly involved and those further afield. The possibility that the offender was in a position of trust, has violated this trust and committed abhorrent acts appears to justify the whole life order. The comparison to terrorism, something which violence against women has been linked to before within academia, is also very telling. But what is the focus? The focus is on how women can go about feeling safe in society and make lines of inquiry if they have doubts about a police officer’s conduct! Here the onus is on women acting in a manner of keeping themselves safe. The message remains the same: women should prevent their victimisation. Excellent I’ll add this nugget of information to my bag of ‘top tips for walking alone at night’.
Why aren’t the media building on this platform to challenge misogynist attitudes? Why are they not raising awareness of violence against women? Sarah’s kidnapping, rape and murder is horrific: but what about the women who undergo daily violence at the hands of their partners, family, friends? These individuals are also in a position of trust and abuse this position to cause harm to women! Here the media could raise awareness about how deep-rooted the issue of violence against women is, but instead they reinforce the idea that women can prevent their victimisation, and that violence occurs at night, by a stranger, and will have the offender brought to justice. This is not the reality for the vast majority of women. It is an extreme and exceptional case (no doubt something True Crime will encapsulate in years to come) and this is further reinforced by the sentence given. Yet violence against women is not exceptional, or rare: it is an everyday reality! Something the media has failed to draw attention to. And by failing to cement Sarah’s kidnapping, rape and murder in the wider context of violence against women, it raises the potential to set a standard of violence against women. Those everyday cases which do not fit the same circumstances are not considered an issue.
My intentions are in no way to take away from the abhorrent crimes committed against Sarah. The crimes sit in the context of violence against women which is still a fundament issue overlooked within society, and has been overlooked once again. And the rhetoric which has followed, yet again, is around how women can protect themselves in the future. The message remains the same…
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The crime of war
a depiction of Troy
Recently after yet another military campaign coming to an end, social media lit all over with opinions about what should and should not have been done as military and civilians are moving out. Who was at fault, and where lies the responsibility with. There are those who see the problem as a matter of logistics something here and now and those who explore the history of conflict and try to explain it. Either side however does not note perhaps the most significant issue; that the continuation of wars and the maintenance of conflict around the world is not a failure of politics, but an international crime that is largely neglected. For context, lets explore this conflict’s origin; 20 years ago one of the wealthiest countries on the planet declared war to one of the poorest; the military operations carried the code name “Enduring Freedom”! perhaps irony is lost on those in positions of power. The war was declared as part of a wider foreign policy by the wealthy country (and its allies) on what was called the “war on terror”. It ostensibly aimed to curtail, and eventually defeat, extremist groups around the world from using violence and oppressing people. Yes, that is right, they used war in order to stop others from using violence.
In criminology, when we talk about violence we have a number of different ways of exploring it; institutional vs interpersonal or from instrumental to reactive. In all situations we anticipate that violence facilitates more violence, and in that way, those experiencing it become trapped in a loop, that when repeated becomes an inescapable reality. War is the king of violence. It uses both proactive and emotional responses that keep combatants locked in a continuous struggle until one of them surrenders. The victory attached to war and the incumbent heroism that it breeds make the violence more destructive. After all through a millennia of warfare humans have perfected the art of war. Who would have thought that Sun Tzu’s principles on using chariots and secret agents would be replaced with stealth bombers and satellites? Clearly war has evolved but not its destructive nature. The aftermath of a war carries numerous challenges. The most significant is the recognition that in all disputes violence has the last word. As we have seen from endless conflicts around the world the transition from war to peace is not as simple as the signing of a treaty. People take longer to adjust, and they carry the effects of war with them even in peace time.
In a war the causes and the motives of a war are different and anyone who studied history at school can attest to these differences. It is a useful tool in the study of war because it breaks down what has been claimed, what was expected, and what was the real reason people engaged in bloody conflict. The violence of war is different kind of violence one that takes individual disputes out and turns people into tribes. When a country prepares for war the patriotic rhetoric is promoted, the army becomes heroic and their engagement with the war an act of duty. This will keep the soldiers engaged and willing to use their weapons even on people that they do not know or have any personal disputes with. Among wealthy countries that can declare wars thousands of miles away this patriotic fervour becomes even more significant because you have to justify to your troops why they have to go so far away to fight. In the service of the war effort, language becomes an accomplice. For example they refrain from using words like murder (which is the unlawful killing of a person) to casualties; instead of talking about people it is replaced with combatants and non-combatants, excessive violence (or even torture) is renamed as an escalation of the situation. Maybe the worst of all is the way the aftermath of the war is reflected. In the US after the war in Vietnam there was a general opposition to war. Even some of the media claimed “never again” but 10 year after its end Hollywood was making movies glorifying the war and retelling a different rendition of events.
Of course the obvious criminological question to be asked is “why is war still permitted to happen”? The end of the second world war saw the formation of the United Nations and principles on Human Rights that should block any attempt for individual countries to go to war. This however has not happened. There are several reasons for that; the industry of war. Almost all developed countries in the world have a military industry that produces weapons. As an industry it is one of the highest grossing; Selling and buying arms is definitely big business. The UK for example spends more for its defence than it spends for the environment or for education. War is binary there is a victor and the defeated. If a politician banks their political fortunes on being victorious, engaging with wars will ensure their name to be carved in statues around cities and towns. During the war people do not question the social issues; during the first world war for example the suffragettes movement went on a pause and even (partly) threw itself behind the war effort.
What about the people who fight or live under war? There lies the biggest crime of all. The victimisation of thousands or even millions of people. The civilian population becomes accustomed to one of the most extreme forms of violence. I remember my grandmother’s tales from the Nazi occupation; seeing dead people floating in the nearby river on her way to collect coal in the morning. The absorption of this kind of violence can increase people’s tolerance for other forms of violence. In fact, in some parts of the world where young people were born and raised in war find it difficult to accept any peaceful resolution. Simply put they have not got the skills for peace. For societies inflicted with war, violence becomes currency and an instrument ready to be used. Seeing drawings of refugee children about their home, family and travel, it is very clear the imprint war leaves behind. A torched house in a child’s painting is what is etched in their mind, a trauma that will be with them for ever. Unfortunately no child’s painting will become a marble statue or receive the honours, the politicians and field marshals will. In 9/11 we witnessed people jumping from buildings because a place crashed into them; in the airport in Kabul we saw people falling from the planes because they were afraid to stay in the country. Seems this crime has come full circle.
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Do we have to care?
In recently published The end-to-end rape review report on findings and actions the responsible minister admitted that “victims of rape [are] being failed”. This stark admission is based on data that indicates that the current situation on dealing with rape is far worst than 5 years ago. The ministers are “ashamed” of the data but luckily in their report they offer some suggestions on how to improve things; what to do to bring the conviction rates to the 2016 level and to move more cases forward for trial, leading to successful convictions. At that point, the report presents the Criminal Justice System [CJS] as a singular entity that needs to address the issue collectively. This, in part, is a fair assessment although it ignores the cultural differences of the constituent parts of the system. Nonetheless, the government has identified a problem, commissioned a report and has a clear “ambitious” plan of how to address it.
The report indeed presents some interesting findings and I urge people to review it whenever they can (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/end-to-end-rape-review-report-on-findings-and-actions). We know for example already that the number of cases that went into prosecution were low; in the last years this has become even lower. That despite the prevalence rate remaining more or less the same. Victims report that they are treated poorly, not believed arguing that the investigative model needs changing. No wonder the ministers appear apologetic of the situation. A headline crime category that is likely to cause an uproar and whilst thinking of the political fallout they come out in support of the victims! Who wouldn’t? Supporting a victim of crime, any crime is one of the main objectives of the CJS; once they have handed out retribution and prioritised on making an example of specific crimes and focusing on particular criminals, then their focus is on the victims! The findings were expected, but even so when reading about the higher vulnerability of disabled women to rape and sexual abuse, underscores the systemic failure to deal with this crime. It does not read like care!
If I was an agitator, I would say that a criminal committing rape has less chance (statistically) to be convicted than someone who commits theft; but then I will be making a criminological cardinal sin; conflating criminalities and confusing the data. In our profession we deal with data all the time. Many of them come in the form of metrics looking at the way different crimes are reported, recorded etc. We also know that context gives a perspective to these data. Numbers may look the same, but that is arguably part of the problem. It does not take into account the source of the data and their circumstances. Not all numbers are the same and most importantly they do not measure similar trends. The way the success rates are to be measured is not dissimilar from before and without owning a magic ball, it can be foreseen that rape will remain as is. Of course, the metrics may change colour to signal improvement, but that will not alter the fundamental issues.
On the day, one may have their car broken into, to report the incident can be a requirement from their insurance if they are to cover the cost. On the day, the said person got raped by a current/former partner the matter is not about insurance. These acts are not similar and to treat criminality as a singularity draws up uneven comparisons. In this case we have a list of recommendations trying to ameliorate the bad metrics. What are the recommendations? The focus is again on the police and the Crime Prosecution Service [CPS] and the court experience the victims will have. Again, indicates that these institutions have been criticised before for similar failings. The change of practices in the police does not go as far as exploring the institutional culture. The CPS’s requirement to do more is tied with the successful cases they will prosecute. The need for the two organisations to work together more closely has been a discussion point for the last 20 years; as for the better experience in courts, it is definitely welcomed but in recent years, Victim Support as an organisation was stripped bare, the additional services cut and the domestic violence shelters disappearing. The call for more services was continuously met with the offer of voluntary organisations stepping in, into such a complex area to provide help and support. One may think that if we are to prioritise on victim experience these services may need to become professional and even expand the current ones.
Lastly in this document the tone is clear; the focus yet again is reactionary. We have some bad data that we need to change somehow; we have got some clear action plans and we can measure them (as the report intimates) at regular times. This approach is the main problem on dealing with rape! It does not offer any interventions prior to the crime. There is nothing to deal say with rape culture, the degradation of women, the inequality and the rape myths that women are still subjected to. Interestingly there are mention of empathy toward the rape victim but there is not a plan to instil empathy for people more widely. No plan to engage the educational system with respect for the other (whoever the other is; a woman, a person of colour, disability, different origin) regarding sexual behaviours. The report tenuously mentions consent (or lack of understanding it) instead of making plans how it can be understood across. Unfortunately, this crime reveals the challenges we face in the discipline but also the challenges we face as a society that has traded care for metrics and the tyranny of managerialism.
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Vaccine day
I had my first Covid-19 vaccine recently and the day was emotional, to say the least. I am 99% compliant with Covid-19 restrictions, partly because it is the law but primarily because I believe it is the right thing to do to protect others. In fact, there have been many times over the last 15 months where I have avoided the news for my own sanity so half the time, I do not exactly know what the latest rules are. I am guided by my own risk assessments and am probably more restrictive than the law in most scenarios. Up until vaccine day I thought that I wasn’t scared of contracting Covid-19, that I was complying as an act of altruism and that I would not be able to live with myself if I unwittingly passed the virus on to somebody vulnerable to severe illness and death.
Back in March 2020 when infections then the death toll started to rise, and the NHS became increasingly overwhelmed I would watch what my daughter and I called ‘the Boris show’ where the Prime Minister and the scientists would recall the daily death data, hospitalisations and cases. Each ‘next slide please’ bringing more bad news. Each day I would think about the families of every single one of those people who had died. It was quite overwhelming, and I eventually had to limit the information I ingested, living in both a physical and informational bubble. I recall the death toll announcements were met with responses from the covid-deniers, ‘but they’re old or ill anyway’, and ‘but they could have been hit by a bus and still counted as a covid death’. As a victimologist, this infuriated me. Who were these people to flippantly dismiss right to life based on age or health? It frustrated me that people with no knowledge of statistics, medicine or science were making assumptions based on anecdotal evidence from Bob on Facebook. But then again perhaps these are the tales people told themselves to get through. If they deny it, they have nothing to fear.
A few months later in June 2020, my somebody close to me contracted Covid-19. I was told they were doing well and seemed to be recovering from the virus. They died more than 28 days after having first being diagnosed with Covid-19, but it was Covid-19 that killed them. I know because I saw them to say goodbye a couple of hours before they died. This person who was always so full of life, love and who saw the good in everyone and everything, was now fading away. But what haunts me to this day was the sound of their lungs. The sound I’d heard people talk about on the news. Crisp packet lungs. And it was that sound that was like an earworm in my head on my way to the vaccination centre.
I’ve been looking forward to getting vaccinated since vaccines were on the horizon so I was excited when I received the text invitation. I booked to attend the Greater Manchester vaccination centre at the Etihad stadium, the home of Manchester City Football Club. It was well organised, despite the large numbers of people coming through. First, I was required to check in and was allocated the Moderna vaccine and a green sticker which ensured staff could direct me to the correct queue. Then I checked in at another desk where I was given some information, asked some health questions and, most importantly, I was asked, ‘do you want the vaccine?’. Those who have sat one of the research methods modules I have taught this year will have heard me discuss the importance of informed consent and this also applies to real life situations such as this. After this I joined another queue and finally reached the vaccination point, had the jab, waited for 15 minutes and left. Just like that. The whole thing took about an hour and given the volume of people being vaccinated (the site is a mass vaccination hub for a large area), I found it to be incredibly efficient. Every staff member I met was informative and did what they could to put people at ease.
From the moment I left home to go to the vaccination centre, to the moment my head hit the pillow that evening, I couldn’t help reflecting on the last 15 months. I felt a wave of emotions. I felt extreme sadness and sorrow at all the lives lost and all the families and friends left behind. It has been a traumatic time for so many of us. Getting the vaccine, I felt some sort of release from this, like it was nearly over. I have worked from home throughout and have had little social interaction, except when the gyms have been open or I have undertaken caring responsibilities for various friends and family. There were also a few weeks towards the end of lockdown 1 where my sister came to stay after returning from India. Overall, I have been alone with a teenager at a desk in my living room. It’s been awful. I’m tired and I need a break. I am well overdue a mum-cation. I felt some hope that sometime soon I might be able to get a parenting break and that my daughter can also get a break from me. I said earlier how I believed I had not feared contracting covid but having the vaccine and the relief I felt made me realise that I was more scared than I would care to admit. I am young(ish) and extremely healthy and I would probably be at low risk of developing serious symptoms but what if I was an unlucky one?
Aside from my personal experiences, I felt a collective relief. The global pandemic has created global trauma. There are still countries being ravished by the virus without the resources to operate mass vaccination of entire populations. I worry for the world and wonder what borders will look like after, if there ever is an after but I’ll ponder this further in another blog later. Getting vaccinated and being part of a mass vaccination programme made me feel cautiously optimistic. However, a few weeks on and we are now in a situation where the Delta variant is spreading like wildfire. Deaths have risen by 42.5% in the last week and hospital admissions by 44.7%. The numbers are still incredibly low in comparison to the first and second wave but every one of those deaths and hospitalisations matter. They are not a number on a presentation slide. They are people who have families and friends, who are cared for by the NHS. Every one of the deaths is a loss to these people, and has a butterfly effect in terms of the impact each death has.
Restrictions are set to lift imminently I believe (still avoiding the news) and it makes me feel uneasy to say the least. I’ve seen experts whom I trust argue on both sides of the fence. Some say this is dangerous, others suggest summer is the best opportunity to lift restrictions. It sometimes feels like we are living in some kind of twisted experiment. Regardless, I will continue to assess and manage the risk to myself and those around me. I’ll probably wear masks way after it is legal to do so and expect I will still be cautious about who I am physically close to and how I socialise. There’s things that I love and miss such as the theatre, cinema and the occasional gig but I don’t feel ready. I have a feeling this pandemic is far from over.
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Refugee Week 2021
This year’s refugee week begins today, 14th June 2021 with the theme ‘we cannot walk alone’. The aim is to encourage all of us to reach out and help someone new. This week is close to my heart as border criminology is one of my key research interests. I am strongly committed to impactful research, activism and contributing my time and resources to helping refugees and making those fleeing persecution feel welcome in the UK’s hostile environment. As the resident border criminologist, I want to introduce Refugee Week activities at the University of Northampton but also to suggest how we can help ensure nobody walks alone.
The University of Northampton is hosting a week of talks in conjunction with Northampton Town of Sanctuary. Beginning on Monday at 2pm we welcome Gulwali Passarlay who fled Afghanistan at the age of 12, travelling alone through 8 countries to the UK where he was eventually granted asylum. Having spent the last few years interviewing, supporting and advocating for refugees I have heard many stories of survival. No two have been the same but each shares such painful paths that I cannot imagine. Each time I hear a refugee speak about the situations they fled I feel humbled, and grateful that despite its array of flaws, the UK is safe. In our Outsiders module, students were recently asked to challenge assumptions of minority groups. Hearing the stories of refugees from the mouths of refugees is enough to shatter any assumptions, rhetoric and media narratives about those fleeing persecution so for those who have undertaken or will sit the module next year this is a must!
On Tuesday 15th June at 2pm there will be an introduction and update to the City of Sanctuary movement. Being a City (or Town) of Sanctuary means committing to becoming a place which welcomes those seeking safety. The movement extends to universities, many of which offer Sanctuary Scholarships to asylum seekers and refugees. The Northampton Town of Sanctuary movement wants the University of Northampton to become a University of Sanctuary. Dependents of asylum applicants who arrive in the UK as children, go to school and college here, make friends, speak English, and have GCSEs and A-levels, are then unable to continue in their education as they would be liable to pay international student fees. Asylum seekers currently receive £39.63 per week from the government and are prohibited from seeking employment. They are not entitled to student finance. They are at the end of the road, forced to sit quietly and wait for the letter to come through their door with a decision.
In my own research, many of the asylum seekers I interviewed had been in the asylum process for years. For those who arrived as children and attended school here, once they left college and all their friends were going to university, they were left behind with nothing to do. This had enormous impact on their mental health and their sense of identity. They hid their asylum-seeking identity from their friends in fear of judgement, creating false narratives about who they were. This was often due to past experience of xenophobic abuse after disclosing their immigration status at school. Upon leaving school they would further advance these false narratives, making up stories about why they were not working or going to university. Just one of the people I interviewed managed to secure a Sanctuary Scholarship, despite many of them submitting applications. Having seen the impacts of exclusion from higher education, I want to see every university being a University of Sanctuary, but let’s start with the University of Northampton.
The third talk of the week is delivered by Emma Harrison from IMIX, an organisation which delivers valuable work in changing the conversation around migration and refugees. We’ve all seen the headlines and media reports of ‘illegal immigrants’ (the term ‘illegal immigrant’ infuriates me but that’s another future blog). We’ve heard Priti Patel’s plans to overhaul the ‘broken’ immigration system. The plans include further criminalisation of people seeking safety, avoiding death, rape, persecution, war; and extreme sentencing rules for those who help them reach a place of safety. The media and political rhetoric are relentless and a change in the conversation is desperately needed. I often feel hopeless about my work, that the work of myself and other border criminologists falls on deaf ears. I was at a conference a few weeks ago where the keynote was discussing the abolition of immigration detention. Immigration detention is pointless and harmful and research outputs have been good at pointing out the harms but perhaps we need to tell them what they want to hear: immigration detention is a pointless waste of money. I am looking forward to listening and hope I can pick up some tips to alter the way I communicate findings to different audiences. This talk is on Wednesday 16th June at 2pm.
The final talk of the week is delivered by a representative from the British Red Cross on Friday 18th June at 11am. The British Red Cross do a range of invaluable work from practical support such as supplying clothing and food, to finding missing family members of people seeking sanctuary. The talk will be focussed on the work the organisation does in Northamptonshire and Leicestershire during the pandemic. One of the first things I intend to do when I move to Northampton is to familiarise myself with the local service provision for refugees and asylum seekers and get involved so for me this will be a good place to start.
I encourage all our students to attend at least one of these events. They are all virtual so you could even listen while you sunbathe in the park. To attend, please email Nick who will forward a link. For our students who are interested in supporting refugees, we have a Student Action for Refugees branch at the university who coordinate student efforts to help refugees. There are many other ways we can all contribute to making sure people do not ‘walk alone’. We can read books such as Behrouz Boochani’s No Friend but the Mountains or The Good Immigrant edited by Nikesh Shukla, or watch one of the films free on the British Film Institute’s Refugee Week event. We can have conversations with others and try to think about what refugees might be going through. Next time you see a news report about a conflict talk about what you would do in that situation, what belongings you would take, which of your family would you leave behind? Having conversations such as these helps to build empathy and compassion. We can go further to challenge racist and xenophobic assumptions. I often ask, ‘what is your fear?’ to which I can invariably rationally explain why whatever they disclose will not materialise. Do one, all or some of these things. But I implore you to do SOMETHING to contribute not only to Refugee Week but to making the UK a more welcoming place.
Thoughts from the criminology team 