On a bright Tuesday morning a couple of weeks ago, members of the CCSE team found themselves walking briskly about the corridors of UWS’s Paisley campus, counting chairs, tracking down pens, collecting printouts from photocopiers.
Continue reading “#FestivalsConnect and So Do In-Person Launch Events!”
As part of CCSE’s ongoing collaboration with Renfrewshire Council, and relating to their wide ranging Future Paisley Programme, CCSE is committed to developing a suite of resources to assist Council colleagues with their ongoing work and, to contribute to Future’s Paisley‘s legacy.
Continue reading “Measuring Wellbeing: Gauging (Mental) Wellbeing Benefits of Arts & Cultural Participation”
The arts and health sector is being mapped out by potential funders using a tight definition. Creative Scotland (link 1) sees this activity as being led by professional artists, with explicit artistic and health/wellbeing objectives, and designed to improve health and wellbeing.
Continue reading “What Lies Beyond Objectives and Definitions in Arts and Mental Health?”
The hashtag #Shedders is one that is gaining recognition nationally. It denotes the steadily rising Men’s Shed community, a community focussed on supporting men’s mental health and wellbeing.
Continue reading “An Exciting and Growing Community Hub; Paisley Men’s Shed”
Exploring what arts and culture have to offer efforts to prevent loneliness is the focus of my PhD research. Loneliness is a subjective feeling of a gap between the relationships a person wants and what they have.
Continue reading “Arts and Loneliness: Reflections from Lockdown”
A couple of months ago, colleagues from CCSE teamed up with collaborators from STAR Project and Renfrewshire Council to deliver a workshop as part of our UKRI supported, place-based partnership funded work looking at the impact of cultural regeneration on improving prosperity and wellbeing.
Continue reading “Paisley’s Art & Soul: A Short Film 🍿 📽️”
German philosopher and cultural critic Fredrich Nietzsche once said “invisible threads are the strongest ties”. As well as being reminiscent of Paisley’s very own Sma’ Shot, there is the undeniable truth that these invisible threads Nietzsche refers to are what binds our communities together.
Continue reading “Invisible Threads”
I joined Renfrewshire Council in late 2018 in the newly-created post of Paisley Partnership, Strategic Lead for Cultural Regeneration, having previously held culture-related roles with the Scottish Government, Creative Scotland and a variety of other organisations.
Continue reading “Culture, Health and Social Change”
I’m now four months into my PhD in the field of arts and health within the context of cultural regeneration. I have a professional background in economic development consultancy and working as a research assistant at Citizens Advice Scotland.
Continue reading “Doctoral Research: Finding a Way Through the First Phases of Research”