Orian Brook | Culture is bad for you

Event details

Speaker: Orian Brook (University of Edinburgh)

Date: Thursday 3 November 2022

Time: 5.15 - 6.45pm.  

Venue: Alison House, Atrium (G10)

Abstract

Dr Orian Brook Chancellor’s Fellow in Social Policy at the University of Edinburgh will talk about some of the findings from 2020’s CULTURE IS BAD FOR YOU book, which she co-authored with fellow researchers Dave O'Brien and Mark Taylor.  

Culture will keep you fit and healthy. Culture will bring communities together. Culture will improve your education”. This is the message from governments and arts organisations across the country; however, this book explains why we need to be cautious about these ideas. Offering a powerful call to transform the cultural and creative industries, Culture is Bad for You examines the intersections between race, class, and gender in the mechanisms of exclusion in cultural occupations. Exclusion from culture begins at an early age, the authors argue, and despite claims by cultural institutions and businesses to hire talented and hardworking individuals, women, people of colour, and those from working class backgrounds are systematically disbarred. From misrecognition of a middle class upbringing, to hiring as cultural matching and gentlemanly discourses of “luck” explaining success, we will look at some of the issues contributing to these exclusions. While the inequalities that characterise both workforce and audience remain unaddressed, the positive contribution culture makes to society can never be fully realised.

Biography

Orian Brook's profile page