Our Living Encyclopedia is part of our work in creating Living Knowledges. Here you will find community led and scientifically rooted reportings that are in constant progression as injustice is an evolving phenomena.
Living Knowledges is a realm where knowledge finds a sanctuary to flourish, evolve, and expand beyond the confines of conventional repositories. It is a dynamic space dedicated to storing and nurturing knowledge in a manner that allows it to adapt, transform, and grow with the passage of time.
This is a digital ecosystem designed to accommodate the vast array of information amassed by humanity. It goes beyond the static nature of traditional libraries and archives, embracing the concept of living ideas that continuously evolve. Thus, knowledge is envisioned as a living entity that undergoes perpetual enhancement and refinement. Every piece of information is treated as a seed, capable of germinating, branching out, and cross-pollinating with other ideas.
How the Living Encyclopedia works
The Living Encyclopedia is colour coded to help guide people to the right type of content. Here’s a quick guide to what each category means.
ARTICLE
a short form essay-like piece of work
DATA-STUDY
a data led exploration into a topic
DECLARATION
a declaration made by a group of People
DEFINITION
short form copy detailing a specific phenomema
IMAGINATION LAB
a special event to ideate on a specific topic
PAMPHLET
a shareable output from research
AUDIO REPORT
a spoken word conversation and reporting
REPORT
a long form piece of work
Who are Air?
In current conversations about air pollution, we have grown accustomed to perceiving Air as simply the absence of pollutants. However, Air is vastly more than this. We asked Dr Jake Robinson, who is a microbial ecologist to provide an understanding of Air that is more robust, spiritual, and scientific.
Mapping & navigating British systems of power
This working board is for people who are not “professionals” within the legal, policy, or advocacy space (NGOs) but for community-led organisers looking to develop action plans and theory of change models. The MIRO board has a series of instructions after an introduction section that you can refer to at different times.
Right to Pollute Policies and their Epistemological Roots
This project brought together people with knowledges across a variety of policy, organising in healthcare and the criminal justice system, as well as environmental and climate justice.
Non-Western Approaches to Healing
These two essays reflect on non-western healing epistemologies, both as an opportunity for healing and as a response to the harms of the western medical industrial complex.
Ecological Health
The ecological framing of health provides an opportunity for a health justice argument. As our health is so intrinsically tied to the places we live, then it should be a human right to live without contamination and pollution.
An Introduction to Trans Health
Trans Peoples have opened up our minds to another way of imagining our personhood, to have mental and spiritual autonomy over our beingness. Imagination and autonomy are significant and essential elements in our liberation which is rooted in our healing. This report is an introductory look at the different pathways of stress and trauma impacted Trans communities.
From Care to Healing
This report explores how healthcare, like many other systems, is under the hegemony of western society; how the body is conceptualised to how the body is restored are influenced by western norms. It explores how when we are in community, we are able to share resources, tend to each other, nourish each other - this is healing
The Planetary Dysregulation
This report will focus on the pathways that are contributing to planetary dysregulation and their impacts on human health. With the purpose of updating policies that will support the work of environmental and health justice practitioners.
The History of Disease
This audio report discusses three epidemiological transitions and how our modern environments are not suited to our biological architecture. New perspectives such as the ‘ancestral susceptibility hypothesis’ suggests that there is a mismatch between the ancestral environments our bodies have adapted to (at a genetic level) over millennia.
Obesity & Trauma
This report will take an ecological approach, focusing on the bidirectional pathway between trauma and obesity to highlight the disparity between scientific evidence and communication around obesity, as well as the psychosocial factors that contribute to, and maintain, this disparity. This is to ensure health organisations and policies support a holistic and equitable prevention strategy for obesity.
Health as Ecological
This report lays out why there is a need to understand the history behind framing health as “individual choices” or “behaviours” to better appreciate what an ecological health approach looks like and its significance in eradicating health inequities.
Gaslighting Communities
Environmental inequity is the systemic, avoidable, and unjust distribution of ecologically healthy environments (those that are free from pollutants, have high biodiversity, and have a healthy microbiome). It also refers to land being unjustly stolen, polluted, or damaged. In this essay, we will be detailing the pathways of oppression, including the role that science, policy, and city organisers play.
Nature is Healthcare
In this report, we will highlight the major role that Nature plays in our health, going beyond the mere aesthetic value to understanding the nourishing value of Nature. We will highlight that we cannot live healthy lives without healthy Nature and argue that, for healthy People and a healthy Planet, we must stop treating Nature as a service or commodity.
Obesity, Classism and Racism
The latest health campaign adverts from the NHS look perfectly helpful at first glance. They depict an overweight Black woman eating a salad to promote healthier eating habits, especially in the wake of COVID. However, when we look deeper there are three things wrong with this and more insidiously these three factors point to the prevalence of structural racism within the health system.