Tag Archives: theatre

Museums as facilitators of health and wellbeing in communities

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GNM Hancock, Newcastle

Great North Museum Hanckock, Copyright Rebecca Jackson

It’s estimated that there are over 2500 museums in the UK, ranging from world-famous collections in major cities to small local ones on niche themes. Over 50% of adults have visited a museum or gallery in the last year and there were an estimated 7.5 million visits by children and young people under the age of 18 to the major museums in England.

As well as their educational and leisure value, and their role as drivers of the tourism economy, there is a growing body of research which is considering the wider societal role of museums and in particular, their potential positive impact on health and wellbeing.

Museums and the rise of social prescribing

Within health and social care, we have seen increasing recognition and interest in the role of psycho-social and socio-economic determinants on health and wellbeing. Treatments now often look at the whole person and their lifestyle, not just at the specific medical condition to be treated. This awareness of the impact of lifestyle has led us to view spaces like museums and theatres in a new way and consider how they can be used as a tool to help people to live well.

March 14th was social prescribing day in the UK. And Museums on Prescription is one of a number of culture-led projects which encourage people to use assets in their local communities such as museums, galleries and theatres to help manage conditions linked to depression and social isolation, in combination with traditional clinical medicine.

Arts-for-health settings can have an impact across a number of different areas, including supporting children who have been exposed to trauma and abuse, helping communities integrate and improve social cohesion through the co-production of exhibitions, and helping support people with mental or cognitive illnesses, as well as those who suffer from dementia and Alzheimer’s.

V&A Dundee

V&A Dundee, Copyright Rebecca Jackson

Helping people feel better

As the number of projects increase so does the evidence of positive benefits. There is a growing body of literature highlighting examples of how cultural experiences are supporting both physical and mental health.

A report from Art Fund looking at the calming impact of museums and galleries found that 63% of people surveyed have (at some point) used a visit to a museum or gallery to ‘de-stress’, however, only 6% visit a museum or gallery regularly (at least once a month). Over two thirds of survey respondents (67%) agreed that taking time out for ourselves and choosing to pursue a leisure activity is good for our personal wellbeing and this is where museums and galleries, along with a whole host of other providers like theatres, music venues, public gardens and parks can step in.

Funding is a challenge

A report (2018) from the English Civic Museums Network highlights that services often deemed  “non-essential” (like museums and libraries) actually encourage and foster personal and communal resilience: they stop the crime, the illness, the loneliness from happening in the first place.

However, despite the significant and positive preventative role that participation in cultural activities can play, over the past five years spending on culture in England and Wales has fallen by over 30%, and this has had an impact on museums and the services they can provide.

Natural History Museum, London

Natural History Museum, London, Copyright Rebecca Jackson

Galleries and museums must keep striving to do more

The growing realisation of the potential of museums and galleries to have a positive impact on the health and wellbeing of communities presents a significant opportunity for them to develop programmes and exhibitions which reflect the diversity of experiences within communities and look to develop new ways to engage new audiences. Ensuring that people feel represented and that exhibitions appeal to a broad base of the community is also important in making sure people feel they are able to visit exhibitions and can feel the benefits of doing so.

In their 2015 report, the National Alliance for Museums, Health and Wellbeing, led by UCL, outlined the priorities of the alliance and showcased some examples of the work being done by partner organisations. In February 2019 it was announced that some schools in London are planning to give pupils “theatre vouchers” which entitles them to one free theatre visit per year. Museums themselves are also trying to do more to help engage members of the community and encourage them to engage with new exhibitions.

Are healthy people more culturally active, or does being culturally active make people healthier?

Museums and galleries have the potential to make an enormous contribution to improving people’s lives and enhancing physical health and mental wellbeing. The body of research around the role cultural activities like attending museums can have on health and wellbeing is growing, but there is still scope to do more, and work is ongoing with a number of high profile museums across the UK to promote the link between cultural activities and health and wellbeing.

The question of which comes first – being well initially which allows you be more culturally active, or cultural activities facilitating wellbeing in their own right – will be discussed and disputed by academics and clinicians. But the existing studies highlight the significant positive impact that engaging with museums and exhibitions has had on study participants, particularly those who suffer from mental ill health or degenerative cognitive diseases like dementia.

Museums and galleries, it is clear, have a far greater communal role to play and can evidence their value far beyond being a source of knowledge transfer or a leisure activity. Museum curators and funders need to recognise this as they prepare and plan for exhibitions and outreach projects in the future and clinicians need to be aware of the potential positive impacts for patients when considering care and treatment plans.

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How to make people with learning disabilities feel more included in society

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Image: Accessible music technology OpenUp Music/Youth Music Network

This guest blog was written by Val Williams, Professor of Disability Studies at the University of Bristol.

People with learning disabilities can often find themselves feeling excluded when it comes to making decisions about their lives. This can range from everything, from shopping to making music or even bringing up a baby. Sometimes this exclusion can be exacerbated by the kind of support that they receive from social services – but it can also be countered by sensitive personal assistance or support.

In a recent research project, which brought together disabled and non-disabled researchers, we looked at ways to improve this – and how to include people with learning disabilities in decisions.

Part of the project found that by taking active roles in the arts, people with learning disabilities can lead the way towards meaningful inclusion. Beth Richards, an actress with learning disabilities, led part of the research about people with learning disabilities on TV. She found that actors with learning disabilities are often limited to roles which depict the “disability”, the tragic or dependent life of the character, or their effect on others around them. A successful actor with learning disabilities, for instance, told her:

“I wish TV makers would think more creatively and give people with learning disabilities any role – romantic, fantasy, comedy, shop assistants, office workers. I’d like to play James Bond, Romeo, Dobby in Harry Potter or a detective or many other roles.”

The Queen’s Birthday Honours in June 2018 include an MBE to the actress with Downs Syndrome, Sarah Gordy, for her “services to the arts and people with disabilities”. As Gordy said upon receiving the award, “diversity is an opportunity, not a problem”. She is good proof of that.

But there is a lack of accessible information. There is no shortage of talented actors and drama companies supporting people with learning disabilities, but the TV industry and its workings are still shrouded in jargon. Processes such as commissioning, auditioning and scriptwriting tend to exclude those who do not have someone to help them navigate all this.

In another part of the research, my colleague Marina Gall looked in detail at how music making can be transformed by the Open Orchestras approach in which young people with multiple and complex needs are enabled to learn musical skills, play in ensembles and become music makers. A new technological instrument – the Clarion – can be played on computers and iPads, using one’s hand, a small sensor on any part of the body, or via a person’s gaze. It can be adapted to suit most students’ physical needs.

One of the co-founders of Open Orchestras, Doug Bott, told our research team, that the approach is “personalised around the individual young person”. But at the same time, it’s trying to ensure that music is an important part of the curriculum for all young people, and has been immensely successful in changing perceptions of people with learning disabilities. This is not therapy, it’s a route to making music and to performance.

Making decisions

People with learning disabilities also face inequalities and problems in the NHS, as well as in a cash-strapped social care system. For instance, since the Mental Capacity Act 2005 came into force, support staff are legally required to support people with learning disabilities to develop their own capacity to make a decision. What we saw in our data was that people with learning disabilities can be proactive in seeking out this support – and we recorded conversations with personal assistants where people wanted to talk about decisions relating to safety, health or simply about future cooking plans. The skills that a personal assistant needs to have are to listen, look out and be responsive to the people they are supporting.

One of the key messages from our project is that health and social care practices sometimes get stuck. We used the word “institutionalised” for those times when professionals stick to a rigid and inflexible way of doing things, leaving the disabled person without the power to have a voice.

These difficult moments were also highlighted by actors with learning disabilities who helped to interpret our data. Our research benefited from a collaboration with the Misfits Theatre Company in Bristol, showing how sensitive interactions between people with learning disabilities and their personal assistants were often the trigger for good decisions, and giving those with disabilities a feeling of control over their own lives.

But quite small comments can create problems, spoiling an empowering relationship. The theatre company made a brilliant video called A Good Match about their own perspectives and experience of managing relationships with a personal assistant. One of the Misfits actors said: “It’s my house … and I don’t want my (personal assistant) telling me what I can and cannot do.”

 

After looking at a range of activities that can exclude or include people with learning disabilities, we concluded that inclusion happens when three things come together. Sometimes people with learning disabilities are included because of changes to technology, as in the Open Orchestras approach. At other times, they are included better because of new ways of doing something, or through new skills that they may learn – as actors, or as TV performers.

The ConversationBut at the heart of all this is a new belief in the equal value of people with learning disabilities. This is why we recommend that social care services need to focus less on what people cannot do, but instead promote a genuine belief in what people with learning disabilities can do – with the right support.

Val Williams is Professor of Disability Studies at the University of Bristol.

This article was originally published on The Conversation website and has been republished with permission under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.