CARE & DESTRUCTION OF A CHILDHOOD
Lemn Sissay, Q&A hosted by Sylvan Baker
Photo credit: Hamish Brown
Presented at:
Wellcome Collection as part of Care and Destruction 2019.
In Care & Destruction of a Childhood, Lemn discusses the care system, drawing on his own childhood and recent Channel 4 documentary Super Kids: Breaking Away From Care, where he helps young people in the care of their council to express their experiences through poetry.
Bios:
Lemn Sissay MBE is a poet, playwright and occasional broadcaster. He has read poetry all over the world and was awarded an MBE for services to literature by The Queen of England. He is the Chancellor of The University of Manchester and was the first poet commissioned to write for the London Olympics. He is a regular contributor to radio and TV and a prolific speaker, inspiring audiences on a daily basis across the globe. Google ‘Lemn Sissay’ and all the returning hits will be about him. There is only one Lemn Sissay in the world.
Sylvan Baker is a researcher, practitioner and Lecturer at Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, with over 30 years experience working with creative arts practice in challenging settings. He worked for five years in Belfast Northern Ireland as artistic director of the largest cross-community youth arts project in the province and has been working since 2006 with the internationally acclaimed from favela-based social project Afroreggae, on whom he based is AHRC doctoral practice research. He is the former Associate Director of Arts and Social Justice research centre, People’s Palace projects and an Education fellow for the RSA.
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