At Their Fingertips: The First International Day of Intangible Cultural Heritage

Research Stream: Social Lives

Author: Eva Sophie Krolla, Research Assistant, Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity in EU Law: Exploring New Paths (DANCING)

On 17^th October 2003, exactly 21 years ago, the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) adopted the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (hereinafter: the 2003 Convention). The 2003 Convention represents a milestone in recognising immaterial cultural heritage and complements UNESCO’s efforts under the Convention Concerning the Protection of World Cultural and Natural Heritage of 1972 with its well-known World Heritage List. In honour of this, the General Conference of UNESCO declared 17 October the ‘International Day of Intangible Cultural Heritage’ at its 20^th anniversary in 2023, which will be celebrated for the first time this year. To date, 183 States Parties have acceded to the 2003 Convention including all 27 European Union (EU) Member States, with Malta being the last one to ratify it in 2017.

My Experience as Project Manager of DANCING… Some Personal Reflections on the First Four Years

Research Stream: Social Lives

Author: Hilary Hooks, Project Manager, Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity in EU Law: Exploring New Paths (DANCING) Project

As the Project Manager for the ERC-funded DANCING Project, led by PI, Prof. Delia Ferri, my role has been to manage the project’s administrative and operational aspects and supporting the PI in ensuring that the project stayed on track with its key milestones.

I have endeavoured to create a robust project management framework. This involved developing a suite of tools, including a spreadsheet to track finances, another to track project activities and deliverables and another to record meetings—ensuring that we met all milestones efficiently. With a project of this scale, managing a €2 million budget requires close attention, and by working closely with other university offices, I ensured compliance with all relevant regulations. The administrative side of the project is complex and involves coordinating with multiple university offices, as well as external entities like graphic designers, filmmakers, and dance companies, the latter two through a tendering process. By managing these details, I freed up our researchers to focus on their work without worrying about the operational hurdles.

Can Lifestyle Changes Inform New Human-Rights Based Approaches to Dementia Management, Treatment and Care?

Research Stream: Social Lives

Authors: Maria Gialama, PhD scholar and Graduate Teaching Assistant at Maynooth University’s Department of Psychology, Joanne McVeigh, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Maynooth University, Mac MacLachlan, Professor of Psychology & Social Inclusion, and Co-Director of the ALL Institute, Maynooth University and Georgios Hadjigeorgiou, Professor of Neurology, Medical School, University of Cyprus.

Dementia is an extremely common, progressive neurodegenerative condition which affects almost 55 million people worldwide. Every year, almost 10 million new cases are reported (WHO, 2024). Today, dementia is the seventh leading cause of death and a major cause of disability and dependency among the elderly. Unsurprisingly, the World Health Organization (WHO, 2019), declared dementia a public health priority, not only because of its global prevalence, but also due to its significant impact on families and health service providers. In Ireland, there are 55,000 ‘people living with dementia’ (PwD) and almost 60,000 people who provide care for someone diagnosed with the condition. Long before COVID-19, dementia emerged as a pandemic due to ageing populations and the relationship between age and the incidence of the condition (Fox & Petersen, 2013).

Creating an Accessible Survey for the DANCING Project

Research Stream: Social Lives

Author: Hilary Hooks, Project Manager, Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity in EU Law: Exploring New Paths (DANCING) Project

The DANCING project, led by Principal Investigator (PI) Professor Delia Ferri, aims to investigate participation in culture by persons with disabilities. Access is a critical issue in all areas of life for people with disabilities. This includes the area of culture, and concerns people with disabilities who are (or who wish to be) involved at all levels, including as artists, arts-professionals, and audiences.

The DANCING Mid-Term Academic Conference: Taking Stock of the First Three Years and Reflecting on the Challenges of Interdisciplinarity

Social Lives

Author: Eva Krolla, Research Assistant in the ERC-funded DANCING Project at the School of Law and Criminology and Assisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, Maynooth University

*DANCING Mid-Term Academic Conference speakers*

The European Research Council (ERC) funded research project ‘Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity in EU Law: Exploring New Paths – DANCING’ based at the ALL Institute and the School of Law and Criminology under the lead of Principal Investigator Prof. Delia Ferri marked its halfway point by hosting the DANCING Mid-Term Academic Conference on Monday, 4 September 2023 at Maynooth University.

Oppenheimer on the Responsibilities of Psychologists

Social Lives

Author: Rachel Brown is a PhD candidate at the Department of Psychology, Maynooth University and a Research Assistant with the ALL Institute’s SHAPES project

Like many of you, I recently watched Christopher Nolan’s biographic film documenting theoretical psychist Robert Oppenheimer’s involvement in the Manhattan Project and the creation of the first nuclear weapons. Although I enjoyed the film, I was left with a strange sense of unease about scientific knowledge and the power that knowledge has to change the world, and not always for the better. As I drove home, I considered my own responsibilities regarding the knowledge my research will produce. Needless to say, the 20-minute car journey home from the cinema felt very long that day.

Shortly after seeing the film, I came across Oppenheimer’s 1956 address to the American Psychological Association (APA) entitled Analogy in Science. It was an engaging and eloquently written speech and I assure you it is well worth the read. Intriguingly, he gives a stern warning to the field of psychology, while given at the height of behaviourism with widespread fear of mind control over individuals and society, 68 years on Oppenheimer’s warning seems just as relevant now as it did then.

PatentsInHumans Public Launch Event: An Overview

Social Lives

Authors: Professor Aisling McMahon, Principal Investigator (PI) & Sinéad Masterson, Project Manager, PatentsInHumans

Professor Aisling McMahon presenting to attendees — Professor Aisling McMahon

On 20^th April 2023, the PatentsInHumans team were delighted to host the public launch event for the European Research Council (ERC) funded PatentsInHumans project in Maynooth University. The event was attended by over 45 individuals, including, members of the public, students and academics working in a range of disciplines (including law, biology, political science and business), practising lawyers, and technology transfer specialists.

The PatentsInHumans project, based in the School of Law and Criminology and ALL Institute at Maynooth University, commenced on the 1^st November 2022 and is a large interdisciplinary five-year project. It is funded by a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant and led by Professor Aisling McMahon. Alongside Professor McMahon, the PatentsInHumans team includes project manager, Sinéad Masterson, and postdoctoral researcher, Dr Opeyemi Kolawole. As the project develops, we will be recruiting more researchers to join the team in the coming months and years ahead.

‘Lived Fiction’ – First sharing of Inclusive Contemporary Dance Choreography within the DANCING Project

Social Lives

Authors: Ann Leahy, Post-doctoral Researcher, and Delia Ferri, Professor of Law, ERC Project DANCING, Assisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, School of Law and Criminology, Maynooth University

DANCING: Researching Disability and Diversity in Culture

The Project “Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity through European Union Law: Exploring New Paths (DANCING)”, based at the ALL Institute, reached an important milestone at the end of February 2023. The initial work on an inclusive and accessible piece of contemporary dance created by Lucy Bennett and Stopgap Dance Company for DANCING was performed in Dublin in front of an invited audience. The work will be fully ready next year, and we are already looking forward to the world premiere in Dublin in early 2024.

The image shows Stopgap Dance company during the choreography. The image shows dancers from different ethnical backgrounds some of whom on a wheelchair.

On 24^th February 2023, Stopgap shared their work-in-progress in a pre-staging fashion, and without costumes or lighting at DanceHouse in a dedicated event organised in collaboration with Dance Ireland. ‘Lived Fiction’ – the title of the work being created by Lucy Bennett and collaborators from Stopgap – is an original piece of choreography that is performed by a group of disabled and non-disabled dancers and endeavours to be accessible to all. Stopgap’s devising process is based on key inclusive methods that the company has collectively developed and is a living example of how society should and could be, valuing the richness that comes from diversity. Experimenting and working on accessibility for both dancers and audience allows for a deep understanding of what accessibility really means. However, this choreographic work is also meant to be a “tool for change” by raising awareness on inclusive cultural participation.

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Research Stream: Social Lives

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Author : Eamon Callan is a second-year psychological studies student (Maynooth University) and was a SPUR intern on the GoGreenRoutes project during the Summer of 2023.

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