Val Walsh

I have a multi-disciplinary background: starting with the visual arts, working my way through sociology, philosophy* (all in London); art education* (MA, in Birmingham: mainly sociology, aesthetics, creativity); and women’s studies* at the University of Liverpool. I am a qualified teacher.

My career has been in education: mainly higher education – visual arts and culture;communication studies; women’s studies -and I have worked with people of all ages (5-70) and many different backgrounds and nationalities in a variety of settings (formal and informal). Parallel to my academic work was activism and policy making around participatory democracy and equality issues in the workplace.

I currently provide study skills support at two universities, to students assessed with dyslexia and/or dyspraxia and/or dyscalculia. Their educational experiences are a reminder of both how bad things still are and how transforming good educational experience can be, however late. They are an inspiration. Social class as a differential factor in early assessment and subsequent good quality educational support is evident.

I know at first hand how creative education can transform lives and aspirations; in particular, creative work (art, writing, performance), and work on gender / women’s studies.

Creative education and experiential learning give people courage, make them stronger, more confident, personally and socially; more imaginative; develop personal, social and political awareness. I believe these experiences make women less vulnerable, providing a measure of safety in society.

I teach creative writing courses, ‘Writing by Women for Women: Auto/biography, Crisis, Creativity’ in the Continuing Education Department at the University of Liverpool. Student responses include: a graduate student in her twenties wanting to know why the reading she had just done in preparation for week 2 had not been included in her undergraduate degree; and other, older students seeking out and devouring the work of particular women writers and declaring the experience an epiphany, life-changing.

Since 1994, my freelance work with people in business and industry and the NHS has been delivered via ECOE (English, Communication, Organisation, Equality): providing professional development and consultancy with specific reference to communication and equality issues. I have worked with many nationalities and backgrounds, often in the context of challenge or crisis in the workplace.

I have been a published writer (in academic journals and edited collections) for twenty years, including co-editing three women’s studies collections; a journalist and poet (performing regularly in the city-region since 2004, and in 2008, responsible for organising three women’s poetry events, open to anyone). Conference organisation includes a national conference on art / education and equality issues in 1988; and inter/national feminist conferences and seminars over several years (for the Women’s Studies Network [ UK] and WHEN [Women in Higher Education Network]). I have given many conference presentations, in the UK and Europe, and have acted as a referee for four UK academic journals. I act as friend and/or mentor to women as required, in relation to their creative work and career paths.

I am a longstanding member of the BSA Study Group on Auto/Biography and have been a regular presenter at its conferences. In 2007 I broke the mould by reading several poems, instead of presenting a conference paper.

Research interests and writing focus on:

• the conjunction of gender / social class / education / feminism in women’s lives
• organisational cultures, equality issues and new managerialism in higher education
• the conditions for and obstacles to health, well-being, creativity, with specific reference to class and gender issues
• narrative process and mental health
• gender issues, mental health, creativity
• the art element in lives and creative process.

Voluntary work , in addition to my role as Chair of the Duncan Society since 2006, includes:

• working with the editorial team of Liverpool’s NERVE magazine since 2006
• joining the Board of the Dead Good PoetsSociety in 2008
• I am a longstanding, active member of Liverpool Friends of the Earth
• I have also been involved in other campaigning groups in the City
• I was a founding member of Monday Women, a city centre women’s network
• I am a founding member of Liverpool’s International Women’s Day team, set up in 2007 in preparation for a week of events in the City in March 2008 and beyond.

My interests, in addition to the above, include theatre, music, performance, reading, inter/national politics, walking / nature, cooking for friends and family, eating out with same, tending plants, home-making, chilling out in rural France (in no particular order of priority).

It’s all about the conditions for creative agency, participatory democracy, social creativity, co-creativity: fostering alliances which constitute the conditions for survival and thriving at both personal and social levels.