Manchester Museum - South Asian Collective.
Building resilience amongst volunteers.
“I've always felt that it is impossible to engage properly with a place or a person without engaging with all of the stories of that place and that person. The consequence of the single story is this: It robs people of dignity. It makes our recognition of our equal humanity difficult. It emphasizes how we are different rather than how we are similar.”
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The Re-Balance Approach
Recognise.
The South Asia Gallery will be an exceptional new space (350 m2) creating the first permanent gallery in the country dedicated to exploring the stories, experiences, cultures and contributions of South Asian diaspora communities in the UK.
Presenting a dynamic, contemporary take on South Asian and British Asian culture, it will bring world-class material from the British Museum to Manchester, to be displayed alongside the very best of Manchester Museum’s own South Asian collections and those of some of our partners across the city.
The South Asia Gallery will have significance far beyond Manchester. It is an unprecedented opportunity to work with communities of South Asian heritage – regionally, nationally and internationally.
Review.
By telling stories, the South Asia Collective helped Manchester Museum co-curate the gallery with volunteers from the South Asian community.
Revisiting traumatic and difficult experiences was triggering for members of the collective.
The need to address the emotional support required by members of the collective was identified.
Manchester Museum and Re-Balance set out to build resilience and confidence amongst the collective through the delivery of The Power of Us Programme.
Respond.
The Power of Us was delivered as a six week programme, consisting of six 90-minute sessions. The sessions were designed to introduce, develop and celebrate our stories and peer support.
Session include: Developing Self-Awareness Skills & the Power of Insight, The Power of Self-Compassion, The Power of Identity, Belonging & Culture, and Celebrating our stories and the power of continued peer support.
Ultimately, participants built their awareness about Mental Health and Well-being, whilst increasing people’s confidence to talk about their own Mental Health and supporting others to do the same.
Feelings and Strengths Identified
What People Are Saying
“Listening to stories helped reflect on my life and given me a new focus.”
“Helped me make progress in embracing who I am.”
“Feeling more comfortable with myself and helped remove barriers.”
“Really enjoyed the sessions and inspiring to listen to everyone’s journeys and stories.”
Interested in running Power of Us in your organisation?
We know that each group is unique. Unique in it’s experiences, diversity and needs; some of which comes to the surface during delivery. This is why we take a very intimate approach to our work.
Our tried and tested step by step approach has proven to give us the best results:
Initial contact
Needs assessments with key contact and participants
Delivery of programme begins
Adaptation to content throughout based on emerging themes
Iterative feedback between Re-Balance, Partners, participants and lead programme contact
Handover of end report, resources and any next steps
We would love to hear from you if you would like to discuss how we might be able to create something bespoke to help your staff, volunteers or community
Project Team
Jessica Agudelo
Maria Pattinson
Poppy Jaman
Emma Gunn
Jaan Madan