Conversations about how violence affects young people often focus on statistics, trends and immediate responses. Less often do we stop to consider how young people themselves want to have these conversations, or whether conventional ways of asking questions always create the right conditions for sharing experiences and co-producing the solutions young people themselves want to see.
Over recent months, the Binks Hub has been supporting a collaborative project exploring exactly these questions.
Thinking Creatively About Violence Affecting Young People in Scotland forms part of a wider programme of work for Safe Horizons, bringing together partners including Public Health Scotland, Police Scotland, the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit, the Scottish Prevention Hub and YouthLink Scotland to respond collectively to violence affecting young people across Scotland. The Binks Hub contribution emerged through our interest in community-led and creative research, and the role creative methods might play in generating different kinds of conversations.
Working with creative partners at Braw Talent and Police Scotland’s Youth Engagement team over several months a group of young people supported by the Good Shepherd Centre explored whether arts-informed approaches could support young people to think and communicate differently about violence and the conditions needed to prevent it.
Whilst insightful, understanding young people’s views was not the only key aspect of the project, but to explore boarder questions:
- Can creative methods provide different ways for young people to share and tell their stories?
- Do creative outputs open up different conversations among practitioners, policy makers and other stakeholders?
The young people involved in the project reviewed previous violence prevention materials – including campaigns, videos and posters – and also examined how violence involving young people is portrayed in the media. They felt there was an absence of resources that put those with lived experience at the centre and wanted to provide an honest reflection of the consequences, realities and impacts of violence through making two films under the title ‘Everyone Has A Story’.
One film, aimed at adults, offers insight into what young people are facing through spoken word with accompanying posters they designed using screen-printing techniques and Photoshop. The second film is intended for children and young people to help them understand the impact violence could have on their future.
The production of these films was further supported by Youth Justice Voices – a group of young people with care and justice experience – who helped with filming and acting to bring experiences to life.
Throughout, important questions have been raised about what it means to create spaces where young people can contribute in ways that feel meaningful and authentic to them. At this stage we are preparing for the launch of the films by first showing them to the young people involved in the project, with a wider roll-out of events, social media campaigns, and lesson resources for schools, scheduled in the near future.
We are looking forward to sharing more soon.
Find out more about the wider work of:
- Safe Horizons
- Youth Justice Voices | Staf (Scottish Throughcare and Aftercare Forum)
- Braw Talent | Teachers of creativity through the arts
- Home – Good Shepherd Centre
- Young people and violence prevention – Violence prevention – Equity and justice – Social and economic impacts on health – Population health – Public Health Scotland
