Geeks for Social Change @[email protected]
- Website
- https://gfsc.studio
- https://twitter.com/gfscstudio
- https://www.instagram.com/gfscstudio
- Mailing list
- https://gfsc.studio/mailing-list
Admin
Trans and disabled-led collective building tools and processes for community liberation.
Joined Nov 2022
These quotes are from the UnTechCon 1 discussion 'Radical Pedagogy', which looked at ways knowledge sharing can be a liberatory practice.
The documentation zine is available now: https://penfightdistro.com/shop/untechcon-1-an-untech-unconference-documentation-zine/
“#Accessibility isn’t just about the physical environment. Sometimes it’s about the attitude of the people inside.”
The Trans Dimension Guide to Inclusive Events is an invaluable tool for anyone organising events for trans people who cares about making their space more accessible. Available as a PDF download from the GFSC website or to purchase from https://penfightdistro.com/book-author/gfsc/
#UnTechCon 1 was a one day online un-conference about 'un-tech'. We collaboratively explored technology, society and community in a critical light, while leaving space for possibility and imagining better futures.
The documentation zine is available now, either as a PDF from our website or as a physical copy from https://penfightdistro.com/book-author/gfsc/. We break down the themes we explored during the un-conference, and present key takeaways from each talk or discussion.
Our publications are now listed on Pen Fight!
Go to https://penfightdistro.com/book-author/gfsc/
Head on through to get your hands on the Resistance Lab Taser Report (2020), UnTechCon 1 documentation zine (2023), The Trans Dimension Guide to Inclusive Events (2022) or a snazzy Trans Dimension enamel pin
New blog post! We've added publications to our website: https://gfsc.studio/blog/2023/publications/
What do this chair, David Bowie, the Royal Festival Hall and H. Stain Jewellers have in common?
They all inspired the design of our recent local history project, The Towers: A History of Summervale and Crossbank!
Our recent Design Diary #3 blog post explores all of the intricacies of our design process, and how we chose to display a whole bunch of interesting, yet super different, stories together.
Geeks for Social Change
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national trans care ban, let's get organized
Yo. Republicans are trying to sneak in a ban on transgender care nationwide. For kids and adults. And almost nobody is talking about it! https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/national-anti-trans-bans-loom-will
What the hell do we do? Time to get organized? Who's organizing:
- A national trans walkout. Everywhere, but especially in tech. We make all this shit run after all. Can we use that to lawmakers and even employers to speak out and take a stand?
- A national march on Washington DC
- Getting people to show up *in person* *tomorrow* who live in Washington DC. There's a hearing on it: https://rules.house.gov/bill/118/hr-4368
- Local marches and rallies
Who's organizing if not us? And we are, collectively, more or less the biggest collection of trans folk in tech.
I'm terrible at this stuff, so not volunteering to *run* anything, but I'll cheerlead and point people at things if it helps.
Over the past year, we’ve been working with residents and neighbours of Summervale and Crossbank towers in Oldham, to capture their stories of what it was like to live and work in and around the towers. The result of that work is finally public, and you can explore it by going to https://towersoldham.uk!
#LocalHistory #Oldham #OralHistory #CommunityHistory #WebDesign
“Most of this work we’re doing is work we want to do anyway, that we’re already doing for free, but that makes it perpetually unsustainable.”
Join us as we imagine ways community funding could be done differently, and share the material impacts of the current system of projects, bids, and buzzword bingo.
#CommunityDevelopment #GFSCPodcast #UBI #CommunityFunding #StartWithPeople #SustainableFunding
...but are afraid to tell you because we can't afford to piss you off'
Recorded as part of an NHS #StartWithPeople event in March 2023, this episode explores the practical impacts of relying on project-based funding bids to deliver community development work, and asks if there are better ways of making that work #sustainable.
What happens when those making the #funding decisions don’t actually have any connection to the #community the fund is looking to support?
https://gfsc.studio/blog/2023/everything-we-want-to-tell-you/
In a new episode of the Geeks for Social Change #podcast, Dr Kim Foale and Rachele Evaroa share ‘Everything we want to tell you about your funding scheme...
Geeks for Social Change
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(pls boost) What ideals do you place in the concept of "community"?
It tends to be a positive word, one people put a lot of desire and aspiration into. I'd like to know more about what that means for you
To read the full blog post, head here: https://gfsc.studio/blog/2023/raftt-design-blog-2/. If you'd like to support us in delivering community history projects in future, we'd really appreciate your contributions on Ko-fi! https://ko-fi.com/gfscstudio
It's interesting to consider how differently this project might have unfolded if archival and community history interests were considered from the start. An attitude which considered this kind of storytelling important for the community, might have seen better records kept along the way, and pre-emptive consent gathered from residents of the towers.
The most successful outreach was on-the-ground events in the community, and word-of-mouth about the project from the housing association we partnered with. We did manage to engage some key storytellers, but there were many more potential participants we could identify but just weren't allowed to contact — like those on local history Facebook groups.
We found that data protection legislation made it very difficult to engage with participants! While data existed on people who had been living in the towers, the appropriate permissions weren't gathered at the time, and GDPR restrictions meant weren't allowed to use this contact information to reach former residents.
The aims of the project were to create a digital space that tells the story of two towers (which stood from 1975 to 2021), their residents, and the close surrounding area, and also to involve local residents in the project in ways which would increase and develop their own digital skills.
What makes communities so difficult to reach for digital inclusion and local history projects? In our new blog post, we take a dive into the obstacles we faced when working with a housing association to put together a digital community history project in Oldham.
Link: https://gfsc.studio/blog/2023/raftt-design-blog-2/
#community #digitalInclusion #communityHistory #oldham #localHistory #archives
(We’d strongly encourage you to support their work via a donation on ko-if if you are financially able https://ko-fi.com/transsafetynetwork, and by reading and sharing their articles as a means of countering anti-trans narratives)
Their fact-based journalistic reporting is of an extremely high quality, but their minimal old website didn’t instil first-time visitors with the trust that TSN deserve. They are now much better equipped to claim their position as a trusted source for counter-narratives against the increasingly hostile world of anti-trans organised harm.
- Website
- https://gfsc.studio
- https://twitter.com/gfscstudio
- https://www.instagram.com/gfscstudio
- Mailing list
- https://gfsc.studio/mailing-list
Admin
Trans and disabled-led collective building tools and processes for community liberation.
Joined Nov 2022
