My blogs

Creative Writing and Mental Health, University of Warwick, 16 June 2026 Standing in front of the screen in the Radcliffe Conference Centre, looking up at my slides about our AHRC-funded Creative Writing Together project, I suddenly found myself thinking less about the talk I was about to give than about another journey to Warwick. Thirty-six years earlier, in the spring term of 1990, I had…

In the latest episode of the Mindful Learning Podcast, I spoke with English teacher and researcher Sabina Miah about GCSE English, oracy, workload, creativity, and what is happening inside English classrooms today. Sabina trained on the PGCE English programme at Goldsmiths and is now researching the impact of GCSE English Language reforms on teachers’ pedagogy and classroom practice. Our…

We are delighted to be recruiting an Interim Head of Initial Teacher Education at Goldsmiths, University of London. This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced teacher educator and educational leader to join a thriving and highly respected team at one of the UK’s most distinctive universities. Goldsmiths has a long and proud tradition of preparing outstanding teachers. Our Initial…

Metal sculptures of this sort dot towns and cities in China; here the paper making process is illustrated from medieval times in the historic centre of Fuzhou Recently, in April 2026, I spent over a week in southeastern China visiting universities in Fuzhou and Xiamen, meeting academics and students, promoting Goldsmiths, and exploring possibilities for future collaboration. Both cities are in…

On some level Inter Alia cleverly echoes Victorian melodrama; it is about the shattering of a stable looking wealthy family as dark secrets come to light… I came out of Inter Alia at the National Theatre feeling shaken, saddened and oddly recognised. Suzie Miller’s play is ostensibly about a judge whose son is accused of rape, but it is really about something wider and more disturbing: the…

An interactive guide to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-GlassBy Francis Gilbert This lively and accessible study guide edition of Lewis Carroll’s Alice novels combines the complete texts of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass with commentary, teaching ideas, discussion questions and creative activities. Designed for students, teachers and…

We are currently advertising for a new Head of Initial Teacher Education at Goldsmiths, University of London, and I genuinely believe it is one of the most exciting leadership opportunities in teacher education at the moment. The closing date is next week, so if you are interested, do apply soon. The job advert is…

Left to right: Samia Rahman, Tom Dobson, Dan Ingram-Brown, Paige Davis, Sam Clarke, Jane Collins, Francis Gilbert This week in May 2026, the AHRC-funded Creative Writing Together project officially began. It felt genuinely exciting to travel to York St John University with our newly appointed Research Assistant, Samia Rahman, for our first major kickoff meeting with the wider project team. York…

Warning: this piece contains plot spoilers. Preface The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny (2025) by Kiran Desai begins, disarmingly, like a comedy of manners. The inciting incident is simple and rather funny: Sonia’s parents, worried that their talented, independent daughter is not married, write to suggest a match with Sunny, a young man they know of through family connections. The story of the…

My digital imagining of Tobias in the imaginary Underground, a haunted space where he walked with deep observation and compassion. I did not know Tobias Hill well, but I knew him a little, enough to remember his friendliness, his sharpness, and his sense of literary adventure. When his first novel, Underground (Hill, 1999), came out, I interviewed him for The Times. He led me to the entrance of…

I am delighted to announce two new roles connected to our AHRC funded Creative Writing Together project based at Goldsmiths, University of London. Creative Writing Together is a major research and community engagement initiative exploring how creative writing can deepen reflective thinking, strengthen relationships, and support wellbeing across different generations. The project brings together…

During a rather bleak early evening in February 2026, Debbie Bogard and I co-led an online session, hosted by British Library Learning and Skills Research Network(LSRN), on research methods and data collection. I began by joking that it might not be “the most fascinating of topics”, then immediately contradicted myself, because it is fascinating, if you care about learners, teaching, and what…

Contains major plot spoilers. Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice is the kind of film that makes you laugh, then makes you wonder what the laugh did to you. It has his trademark control, that uncanny glide from the ordinary into the grotesque, that sense that the world is perfectly arranged and therefore deeply wrong. It is also, for all its violence, a family film. A film about a man who loves…

This post introduces Ecologies in Practice and Learning: Arts Interventions in the Earth Crisis, an edited collection that brings together arts educators, practice researchers, curators and artists to explore ecological approaches to learning in a time of accelerating environmental crisis. The book is concerned with how learning happens in, with and through ecological crisis. Rather than…

I’m feeling quietly proud, and also rather fired up, because an article I co‑authored with Anna Stewart of i2Media has just been accepted into the Goldsmiths research repository and is a chapter in a new book Ecologies in Practice and Learning, Arts Interventions in the Earth Crisis, edited by the creative and multitalented academic, Dr Miranda Matthews, who is a colleague of mine in Education at…

From left to right: Elizabeth, Priyanka, Sophie, Tim Hewitt, and a volunteer in front of St Mary’s A few years ago St Mary’s Church, Walthamstow, in north east London was carefully and beautifully restored. Today it is an extraordinary community hub, with a welcoming cafe, an active programme of events, and award winning gardens, named Best London Churchyard in Bloom 2023. It is full of creative…