8 minute read
Taking a Stand
Across classrooms, soup kitchens, rallies and even Leonardo DiCaprio’s Instagram account, Goldsmiths students are fighting injustice locally and globally.
Daze Aghaji campaigning with Extinction Rebellion
© Neal Megaw
FROM THE CLASSROOM TO THE WORLD STAGE
While studying BA History & Politics, Daze Aghaji has run for the European Parliament election and carried out extensive climate justice activism, including through her work with Extinction Rebellion.
“I ran for the European Parliament during the exam season of my first year of uni – I’d go and do some campaigning, but I’d also have all my textbooks in my bag! I’d joined Extinction Rebellion a few months previously, carrying out activism and helping to organise one of their sites, and this inspired me to run as a Climate and Ecological Emergency Independent to become an MEP.
Things got really big very quickly – a fellow student at Goldsmiths interviewed me for local news website EastLondonLines, and it was picked up by the national press; I remember The Guardian coming to do a photoshoot of me on campus. After that, it did the rounds on social media, with even Leonardo DiCaprio sharing my story!
I started getting invited to speak at international festivals, so I did a grand tour, carrying out lots of talks and workshops. I even went to Davos to attend the World Economic Forum. Activism is very much a job you do in debt, and being a broke student doesn’t help. To make my activism sustainable I would charge the global leaders and big companies to deliver sessions, which meant I could carry out workshops locally with young people for free.
It’s important to me to link the dots between the everyday realities of people of colour and working class people in the UK to the larger issue of the environment. For example, we’re obviously in a cost-of-living crisis. This is not separate to the climate crisis – the same behaviours that mean we don’t care for each other or empathise with each other are at the root of both. A lot of my conversational work is about connecting the ‘end of the day’ with the end of the world. When people can see that fighting for climate action is an act of solidarity with all the other issues, and it’s about coming together to fight things from different angles, that’s when we’re going to get the just transition that we desire.
I was lucky to have awesome lecturers at Goldsmiths and be guided by lots of political thought leaders. It’s quite amazing to be somewhere that fosters your imagination and your activity outside of studying. It was really difficult to juggle everything, but being at university helped anchor me down in normal life, because what was going on outside of that was far from normal for someone of my age. Being able to go from speaking with world leaders to sitting in a classroom and having time to think and develop my own thoughts was so important.”
PUSHING FOR GLOBAL SOCIAL CHANGE
Kristian-Marc Paul is coming to the end of his MA Global Political Economy. While studying he has undertaken gender equality and climate justice activism on a local and global scale, building on his extensive experience in these areas and his longstanding commitment to social change.
Kristian-Marc undertakes gender equality and climate justice activism on a local and global scale
© Neal Megaw
“I’m from Singapore and did my undergrad liberal arts degree there, majoring in anthropology. It had a big part to play in the projects and activism that I’ve been doing ever since. I always knew that I wanted to go back to school and do a Masters, and the Goldsmiths MA allowed me to bring together my academic and external interests in social issues like gender equality and climate justice. I also knew from friends and my own research that Goldsmiths offered a close-knit and artistic community with a rich history of dialogue and activism. As someone who’s always believed that what you experience outside of the classroom is just as important as what you learn in it, it seemed like the perfect place.
As a male I think a lot about my role in pushing gender equality and raising awareness among men, making sure that I’m doing that labour of having those conversations. I’ve written lots of opinion pieces and done interviews and panel discussions focusing on why it’s so important for men to drive social change. I’ve also undertaken gender equity work in Singapore, pushing the government on policy issues and being part of a team that put together a shadow policy brief on behalf of the prominent feminist organisation AWARE in response to a white paper on women’s issues. For my Masters dissertation I’m exploring feminist discourses within Singapore, including the extent to which the military has influenced them and whether it has shaped expressions of how feminism is performed.
I’ve worked at [open-source technology company] Red Hat for nearly three years and for the first two I was their Diversity and Inclusion Programme Coordinator for the Asia Pacific region, developing programmes and looking at strategy and policy work – things like making sure employee benefits were more inclusive to different identities, and being more intentional when it came to diversifying recruitment processes. I’ve now got a global role in a newly established experience and listening team, ensuring that people who’ve historically been sidelined have their voices heard.
I’m also a proud member of climate justice movement SG Climate Rally, and in 2019 we held Singapore’s first ever physical climate rally – a huge achievement that exceeded our expectations. What was really important to us was changing people’s messaging around the climate crisis. In Singapore the narrative had always been focused on individual action, but we wanted the bigger picture structural forces at play to be acknowledged – like the fact that Singapore is still a hub for the petrochemical industry. There have been some positive steps forward: when Singapore held its general elections in 2020, environmental climate policies started being articulated in party manifestos for the first time. There’s a growing realisation that this is something people care about.
As someone who identifies as an activist, the conversations and experiences you have with people are for me where I get the most education. It’s been great to meet like-minded individuals at Goldsmiths and it’s been a very fulfilling experience – intellectually and emotionally.”
A COMMITMENT TO COMMUNITY LOCALLY AND BEYOND
Sarah Adejuwon is in her third year of the Goldsmiths LLB Law degree. Sarah grew up in Peckham and went to college in Lewisham. Her experiences as a local resident and at Goldsmiths have inspired her to make a difference on a larger scale.
“My journey at Goldsmiths has been very reflective – not always easy, but very fun as I have discovered that I am passionate about helping people. Through my studies and work I’ve developed a commitment to helping my community serve the needs of local people, as there is so much that needs to be done to encourage collaboration, diversity and self-investment.
In her role as a Goldsmiths Student Ambassador, Sarah has assisted many prospective students at Open Days and other events
While studying I’ve worked as a Student Ambassador at Goldsmiths, and doing this I’ve been privileged enough to share my experiences with prospective students, particularly my route into university as a care leaver. I’ve strived to involve myself in acts of service to give back to the local community – for example, providing mentoring to people who have spent time in care, and being a Southwark Council Young Inspector and advocating for care leavers that way.
Outside of university I also help supervise the Peckham Soup Kitchen project. It started out as a community initiative that was established during the first Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, to help families respond to growing poverty by providing them with weekly food and toiletries.
My time at Goldsmiths has given me a new perspective on things and made me value higher education even more than I already did. I now plan on doing a law Masters with legal practice and building up my work experience as a paralegal. Eventually I want to qualify as a solicitor. I’m eager to specialise in employment law to protect people in the workplace. Goldsmiths is all about the community and I have seen how a lack of resources can affect people. I hope in the future to be a person who donates a huge amount of funding to pioneer the change I would like to see.”○
