(Re)inspiring Narratives of Resistance: COVID-19, Racisms and Narratives of Hope

In 2020, COVID-19 took many people by surprise, as did the intercontinental waves of protest triggered by the casual racist murder of George Floyd by a US policeman. The years of 2020 and 2021 will undoubtedly be remembered for massive, unexpected disruptions that require new social normalities to be negotiated. These social disruptions were triggered by unexpected viral pandemics and viral video footage. Yet they built on already existing, entrenched inequities marked by the intersections of racialisation/ethnicisation, social class and gender. It was common, in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, for politicians and commentators to espouse a narrative that COVID-19 'does not discriminate';. This is, of course, true. However, the research analyses that followed showed that both COVID-19, and the measures taken to arrest it, exacerbated already existing social inequalities. This paper draws on two narratives of the racialized impact of COVID-19 to examine the ways in which the authors mobilise intertextual narratives to protest against racism and call for resistance to the racisms they identify. The paper argues that, while the authors do not overtly position themselves as calling for change, their narratives are crafted in ways that resist current constructions of their racialized or religious groups.

Open science communication: The first year of the UK's Independent Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies.

The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a light on the complex relationship between science and policy. Policymakers have had to make decisions at speed in conditions of uncertainty, implementing policies that have had profound consequences for people's lives. Yet this process has sometimes been characterised by fragmentation, opacity and a disconnect between evidence and policy. In the United Kingdom, concerns about the secrecy that initially surrounded this process led to the creation of Independent SAGE, an unofficial group of scientists from different disciplines that came together to ask policy-relevant questions, review the evolving evidence, and make evidence-based recommendations. The group took a public health approach with a population perspective, worked in a holistic transdisciplinary way, and were committed to public engagement. In this paper, we review the lessons learned during its first year. These include the importance of learning from local expertise, the value of learning from other countries, the role of civil society as a critical friend to government, finding appropriate relationships between science and policy, and recognising the necessity of viewing issues through an equity lens.

Humanizing racialization: Social psychology in a time of unexpected transformational conjunctions.

The unexpected transformations produced by the conjunction of COVID-19, the murder of George Floyd and the resurgence of Black Lives Matter highlight the importance of social psychological understandings and the need for a step change in theorization of the social. This paper focuses on racialization. It considers issues that social psychology needs to address in order to reduce inequalities and promote social justice. It draws on theoretical resources of intersectionality and hauntology to illuminate the ways in which social psychological research frequently makes black people visible in ways that exclude them from normative constructions. The final main part of the paper presents an analysis of an interview with the racing driver Lewis Hamilton to illustrate possible ways of humanizing racialization by giving recognition to the multiplicity and historical location of racialized positioning. The paper argues that, while social psychology has made vital contributions to the understanding of group processes and of racisms, there remains a need to humanize racialization by conducting holistic analyses of black people's (and others') intersectional identities.

World of Change: Reflections within an educational and health care perspective in a time with COVID-19.

BACKGROUND: Besides handling the physical impacts of COVID-19 there is more than ever a need to understand what can help when mental health is challenged. Within this context our practical wisdom - our ability to understand and recognise when 'the other', for example the patient, is feeling lonely or anxious is particularly important. AIM: This article aims to contribute to the understanding of how the competence of health professionals may be advanced by helping them develop the self-understanding essential to being wise practitioners. METHOD: The article is based on a discussion informed by reflections (written in Danish and translated into English) by Masters students (and registered nurses) participating in a university programme "Patient and user focused nursing". FINDINGS: The first part of the article considers a student nurse's reflection on understanding herself and one of her patients. The second part considers reflections on the contemporary world of change from a student nurse trying to engage with a world she experiences as falling apart. The third part addresses the impact of resonant places and encounters on developing self/other understandings; encounters that may also be produced through songs and lyrics. The final part draws conclusions on how it is possible to reach understandings of oneself and others as student health practitioners in time of a pandemic. CONCLUSION: In the process of developing understanding and recognition, competence built on self-understanding is central for helping form health professionals into 'wise practitioners'. It is concluded that the existential implications of the COVID-19 pandemic, paradoxically, may direct many people's awareness to a more sensitive, resonant, attitude towards the other. For some, this may produce a more humanized world and perception of others. Within this perspective the arts may help us develop self-understanding and recognition of 'the other'.