There is an urgent need for new research to inform the design response to overlapping refugee crises and the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) pandemic in countries across Sub Saharan Africa, including Burkina Faso. Burkina Faso is currently experiencing an unexpected escalation of conflicts, human rights abuses, threats to human security and peace building, coupled with unanticipated large scale forced population displacement, and an unprecedented public health emergency. Global disruption to supply chains for electrical and electronic technologies and components as a result of restrictions to transportation and shipping is restricting the distribution of essential humanitarian energy technologies. Against this backdrop the repair and repurposing of old technologies and systems, as well as the continued maintenance of existing humanitarian technologies is an urgent and essential humanitarian task; one that requires the mobilisation of locally situated repair cultures (skills, knowledge and practices) as well as the local sourcing of spare parts and components. In partnership with the UNHCR's Innovation Service and Chatham House this research project sets out to address a significant knowledge gap about the extent, significance and potential role of repair in meeting people's basic needs.

Our Network entitled 'Digital Health for Migrant Mothers' establishes an innovative collaboration between the UN, African and UK-based academics, industry (African-based VR company 'Black Rhino') and midwives to explore how digital tools can be used to enhance maternal care for refugees within camp environments. The UN has noted that despite improving global trends, maternal and neonatal mortality rates remain disproportionately high for women living in humanitarian settings, such as refugee camps. A central component in this challenge is the lack of trained midwifes with Combating these pressing challenges facing women's maternal health care has been strategically identified as part of the SDGs (5 & 3). Our project builds upon previous GCRF-funded research ('Birthing at the Borders' PI Bagelman) and addresses these challenges in one of the worlds' largest and longest-standing refugee camps: Dadaab camps in Kenya which borders Somalia. The Dadaab camps currently host over 400,000 refuges (40% of reproductive age) where maternal morbidity and mortality is notably high (Gee et al, 2019). Our project proposes an innovative Network bringing together a diverse but coherent team to co-design a digital health response to the urgent challenges facing migrant mothers in an environment of protracted displacement. Our project is collaborative in nature, employing agile participatory modes of research rather than imposing models from above. Given the urgent need for midwives to have a more empowered role in the digital provision and education of maternal care our project will develop an engaged Network to explore the possibilities of 'training up' midwives, enhancing their digital literacy through the design of digital 'teaching toolkits' for midwifery education supported by UN. Despite significant international funding spent on reproductive health in Dadaab, maternal and neonatal death rates are disproportionately high as compared to other hardship areas in the region (Gee et al, 2019). Research demonstrates that this discrepancy is due to a systemic disconnect in maternal care within the camp: while most refugee women rely on midwives (as they perceived to provide emotional, culturally-sensitive support) there are only few trained midwives available (Bagelman et al, forthcoming. See CV). Despite the key role that midwives play in supporting refugees in pre to post-natal care, midwifery training remains under-resourced and designed on an ad-hoc basis. While significant resources are earmarked for promoting digital learning and training for biomedical practitioners, midwifery-led health education platforms remain under-supported (WHO, 2016). In particular, digital health tools remain inaccessible to most midwives. For instance, while Virtual Reality (VR) have been well-established within biomedical communities as a productive mechanism for learning and teaching, midwives have little access to such tools. This digital gap is problematic for two main reasons: 1) the absence of digital technology underprivileges women in their ability to provide care 2) and directly impinges upon refugee women in camps who rely - sometimes exclusively - on midwives in receiving care. In sum, our Network places primacy on African digital expertise, is gendered in its approach and centres those often marginalised in digital debates to promote an innovative, and agile response in emergency camp geographies. Reference: Gee, S., Vargas, J. and Foster, A.M., 2019. "exploring the role of sociocultural context and perceptions of care on maternal and newborn health among Somali refugees in UNHCR supported camps in Kenya". Conflict and health, 13(1), p.11.

The proposed network draws together academic partners from different disciplines (arts, humanities and education) along with non-academic partners, to examine and promote the contribution made by children's literature in creating 'safe spaces' for displaced children and their families and for developing relationships between migrants and local communities through arts-based practices. Children's literature (eg traditional tales, picturebooks and poetry) deals with topics such as identity, conflict, resilience and tolerance; in multi-ethnic contexts with fluctuating patterns of migration, these stories and books can become key tools in providing spaces for distraction from anxieties and supporting literacies required by needs and living conditions. In both Egypt and Mexico, the situation regarding displaced children has recently reached critical proportions and spaces for sharing books and learning with displaced children, through children's literature, story- and arts-based activities, have developed in urban and rural areas via government, NGO or volunteer initiatives. Spaces often include different cultures and languages and involve health workers and teachers but also artists, storytellers and musicians. By understanding how these spaces are operating, we can learn about participatory arts-based practices that improve the identification of needs and the implementation of literacies that allow children to participate more fully in more cohesive communities. The proposal was developed through the collaborative partnership between Egypt, Mexico and the UK in order to meet the needs as perceived by the organizations working on the ground, such as the regional sections of IBBY (International Board on Books for Children and Young People), the UNHCR in Cairo and the Mexican Ministry of Culture (Reading promotion programme). It is based on previous national and international research in the UK that approached the needs of migrant children through literacy education, children's literature and integration. CLCCD will also allow participants to identify key areas for future collaboration, research and research training that will address the emotional welfare of the children and inter-community relations, thus aligning with the Middle East and South American regional goals of the UNHCR (2016-2017). The three overlapping phases of activity during the 18 month time-frame focus on relationship-building (through links among academic and non-academic partners); capacity-strengthening (through the development and sharing of best practices and location-specific activities), and international development and outreach (through the production of multimedia resources and KE links with potential partners in other ODA countries). One of the main outcomes will be an overview of current practices and successful strategies involving children's literature along with story and arts-based practices that allows for a comparative perspective. Another outcome will be the creation of strong research links that will form the basis for future exchange and collaboration and which can be expanded, in the first instance, to neighbouring countries (Kenya, Sudan, Yemen, Lebanon, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador). This will include a grounded, ethical and sustainable plan to develop the research capacity of academic staff and students to use arts-based research methods (with children's literature as a base) in ways that are flexible for both researchers and practitioners working in contexts of flux and displacement. By emphasizing a positive and 'hopeful' view of the interplay between literature, art and education, the network seeks to counter negative discourses of migrants that involve stereotypes, racism and educational deficit. The CLCCD network will lay the groundwork for research which is genuinely inter-disciplinary and intercultural and supports and develops the creation of 'safe spaces' for displaced children within more cohesive communities.

Until now, the textile heritage of minorities has often been the object of abusive cultural appropriation practices undertaken by fashion brands or has been systematically obscured or undervalued as 'non-fashion' produced by 'the other'. With the mass displacement of people on the rise (due to global and local political, economic, and environmental issues), it is clear that we need to rethink and address the needs and aspirations of migrant minority communities and find ways to honour their diverse cultures. Furthermore, to avoid the current situation where designers are 'parachuted' into marginalised or disadvantaged communities with the assumption that bringing their knowledge and expertise is the answer, there is a need to 'decolonise' such dominant approaches, liberating design from its legacies of colonial thought, whilst leveraging the values of diversity, inclusivity and sustainability. This research aims to provide an in-depth understanding of decolonised fashion and textile design practices through the lens of cultural sustainability. Besides the three commonly recognised pillars of sustainability (i.e. environmental, economic, and social), this research argues for a need to consider also a cultural dimension, meaning diverse cultural systems, values, behaviours, and norms. Adopting a holistic approach, this research will focus on textile and fashion artisanal practice carried out by communities of 'diverse locals', meaning refugees who, despite their traumatic journeys, retain their culture, customs and faiths, as well as a variety of invaluable craft heritage skills. This research intends to fill a gap in knowledge through its focus on what refugee communities can teach us, in terms of cultural sustainability, community resilience, and social entrepreneurship. Adopting an embedded and situated approach to designing, participatory action research will be undertaken with communities of refugees living in East London. The research participants will be selected from a variety of cultural backgrounds in light of their past experience working in the textile and fashion industry in their home countries, to leverage their untapped skills and knowledge and facilitate their potential integration in the local economy and society. Oral histories will be collected in relation to the communities' material culture, in order to make sense of their cultural heritage, conduct co-creation workshops aimed at developing social entrepreneurship models to enhance the resilience of the refugees, and outline policy recommendations for sustainable regeneration. It is expected that the research will contribute to raising project participants, design practitioners and researchers' awareness of issues of cultural sustainability, promoting decolonised fashion practice, and recognising diverse forms of entrepreneurship that go beyond traditional standards from the Global North. The research will also benefit the participating communities through amplifying their voice and agency, enhancing their fashion and textile making skills as well as entrepreneurial capabilities, and informing the development of sustainable regeneration policies. Moreover, a collection of fashion and textile artefacts embedding the cultural heritage of the participating communities will be co-created and sold in order to raise funding to support on-going community-led fashion-related entrepreneurial activities. Finally, although the field work will be undertaken with communities in east London, findings from the research will inform the development of a framework for designing for cultural sustainability, social entrepreneurship and sustainable regeneration that is apt to have broader applicability and replicability across the UK.

Several African countries have been marred by decades of war, violence and conflict. Despite concerted peacebuilding efforts they have struggled to find stable, durable pathways to peaceful societies. Peace education can play a critical role in engendering the knowledge, values, skills and attitudes required to prevent and reduce conflict but so far it has had limited effects. Part of the problem lies in the pedagogies and curricula that underpin peace education which, much like the wider peacebuilding project, are grounded in Eurocentric and liberal values, principles and methods. There have also been increasingly insistent, even violent, demands to decolonise the wider African curriculum but this has largely remained at the level of critique. New materials generated within local communities and representative of their knowledges and values, including of peace, are yet to be embedded in teaching materials to support those most affected by conflict. This project will address that gap. It addresses the question: What are the different knowledges and values underpinning peace and how can these practices be connected and compared across countries to create curriculum content and mode of delivery in informal and formal, Secondary and Higher Education (HE), in order to decolonise peace education? The project will, for the first time, provide new data based on Arts and Humanities methodologies on how peace is understood within displaced and marginalised communities. Researchers, community workers and communities in conflict will connect to produce a state of the art of existing knowledge. These methods are often dialogic and can reveal long-held community perspectives in unique ways. This data will then be collated, compared and evaluated so as to draw out lessons of existing peace practices and their underlying knowledges and values. Teaching materials will be developed and delivered through 14 weeks of teaching to young people who have had interrupted study due to conflict and are aged 16-35. The peace materials will be embedded in locally desired teaching materials ensuring that the teaching is meaningful. It will be evaluated by the teachers and students. These activities will be done in 4 Proof of Concept projects in Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe as part of Strand 1. In Strand 2 further projects will be undertaken to enhance and expand these initial findings. The values and knowledges of peace will be compared to identify similarities in how they can be approached and understood. They will be synthesised and evaluated as part of Strand 3. A peace education framework will be coproduced collaboratively at a network meeting. Three Open Educational Resources will be hosted in order to provide a freely available that can influence peace education teaching for years to come. The framework will also be embedded in HEI's teacher training with an initial reach of a minimum of 12,000 trainees per year in Strand 1 and a further 8,000 thereafter. Training will also be offered to community-based organisations providing informal learning to ensure that we offer the benefits of the project to those who are vulnerable but hard to reach. The project also seeks to embed these learnings in education policy (as in Zimbabwe) where it will ensure long-term legacy of the key findings. Throughout the project we will adopt a gender-sensitive lens - concepts, methodology and beneficiaries - as women and men are differentially affected by conflict. The project will deliver at least 9 journal articles, 4 co-edited special issues of journals and an interdisciplinary edited book. In addition, the outputs from the arts and humanities methods will be showcased through exhibitions, performances and workshops. The project will also create a visible network of researchers, policy-makers and community organisations that work together to offer new meaningful knowledges, pedagogies and teaching materials for a decolonised peace education