Writing

Research for clients

Much of my time is spent doing research for clients through Flow Associates or Climate Museum UK. For example, research on Sustainable Food & museums, or the Listening Project on how cultural learning can respond to young people’s concerns about the Earth crisis.

Writing for myself

I use Medium as my priority place for blogging, including on the publications Stories of Extraction and Extreme Weather Stories.

Some ‘go to’ recent pieces are: ‘We need powerful stories’ and ’70 years: have we learned from the Great Flood?’

The Learning Planet has been my main blog for thinking through questions about culture, learning and the environment. (I will be migrating all the content away from this soon.)

Writing academically & for publications

I write articles for journals or books on museums, digital culture and creative education. For example, I’ve written for Museums Journal, Code: Words, Museumsetc, engage review, Journal of Museum Studies, and more. I’ve written book or volume chapters such as:

  • Four more book chapters are due out soon and later this year, one for a book on the Goldsmiths ‘Ecologies in Practice’ project that we’ve partnered on.

Mission and message

At the heart of everything I write is calling for a shift towards more ecological ways of knowing. How we learn is at the heart of this. I think that learning is accelerated when people collaborate to solve real problems in real contexts, seeking the means to thrive, fully powered by imaginative play and tapping into cultural knowledge. It almost goes without saying that I think the real problems, on micro or macro scale, concrete or abstract in nature, are all rooted in the human relationship with the biosphere, the flaw in which has led to our actions breaching several planetary boundaries.

I’m especially interested in the role of cultural organisations and creative practitioners in articulating and solving these problems. I believe that ‘Cultural’ opportunities help people, places and planet thrive, and that in turn, a thriving world allows rich and diverse ‘cultures’ to grow. By ‘cultural opportunities’ I mean a very broad set of things – having freedom and resources to learn and enquire, to cherish our shared heritage, to express feelings, be imaginative, make things and innovate for the future. This contributes to wellbeing in the wider ‘culture’ – in all the ways we communicate, celebrate, critique and create as a society. I’ve written a toolkit on how Culture Takes Action to support a culture-led shift to a sustainable world.

Speaking

Speaking and writing go hand in hand. I also speak at many conferences and events, offer training workshops and toolkits about these topics, so please contact me on bridget.mckenzie@flowassociates.com if you are interested.