MAPPING FAITH & PLACE IN LEICESTER CONFERENCE

The Grand Hall in St Martins House is the venue for this conference, concluding the first phase of the University of Leicester's Mapping Faith and Place project. I haven't been in the Grand Hall before, but it's a setting that lives up to its name, one fit for a queen. Literally, in this case, as HM Queen Elizabeth II was served lunch here on her recent visit to Leicester which kicked off her Diamond Jubilee Celebrations. Some of those attending today were guests on that occasion.

Deirdre O'Sullivan (Lecturer in Medieaval Archaeology at the University of Leicester) welcomes attendees and introduces the project. The rest of the day is taken up with a number of presentations:

Heritage and Multi-Faith in Leicester, Canon Dr John Hall, Director, St Philip's Centre for Study andEngagement in a Multi-Faith Society

English Heritage Policy on Faith Buildings, Dr Lind Monckton, English Heritage

History and Interpretation, Surinderpal Rai, Chair, Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara

Leicester Perspective, CllrManjula Sood, Assistant Mayor (and Chair, Leicester Council of Faiths)

Jain Heritage in Leicester, Dr Atul Shah, CEO, Diverse Ethics

The Church of St Mary de Castro: a Document in our Midst, David Lamb, St Mary de Castro

An Archaelogical Approach to Understanding Religious Buildings, Neil Finn, Archaeological Consultant

The Story of Leicester, Sarah Levitt, Leicester City Council Arts and Museums Service

An interesting variety of presentations, to be sure, but it wouldn't be unfair to say that they're something of a mixed bag. Although the conference is sponsored by the University of Leicester, it's not, strictly speaking, an academic occasion, so it would be wrong to hold all the contributions to the kind of rigorous standard. Let's just say that the standards of preparation and delivery vary today.

Mapping Faith and Place in Leicester has been funded by the Art and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) within their funding stream, "Care for the Future: Thinking Forward Through the Past". After the end of this initial period of funding, the project moves into a new phase, focusing on the past, present and future uses of one faith-related site in particular: Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara on East Park Road.

The Council of Faiths has lent a hand at various stages of the Mapping Faith and Place in Leicester project (although if we'd grasped how significant it is, we'd surely have done more to help). I've posted entries about the launch event in October 2011 and the first, second and third seminars for the project in this blog. We borrowed the project's pop-up banners for our display at Highcross during Inter Faith Week 2011, when we also distributed many copies of the Leicester Faith Trail booklet (the second, updated edition of which is published today). Members of staff Deirdre O'Sullivan and Dr Ruth Young (Senior Lecturer in Archaeology and Director of Distance Learning Strategy) and students from the School of Archaeology and Ancient History took part in that exhibition. There are several members of the Council of Faiths here today and, of course, our Chair, Cllr Manjula Sood, is one of the platform speakers. But I can't help wishing we'd been able to make a more formal presentation. There were some questions from the floor about inter-faith issues in Leicester that some of the platform speakers were unable to answer, that would have surely been part of a proper presentation by the Council of Faiths (regarding consultation with the city's decision-making bodies, for example).

I've enjoyed being involved in this project. It's opened some doors for me and introduced me to some good people I might otherwise never have met. I hope that I (and Leicester Council of Faiths) can play an active part in the project's future development and even find new ways to contribute and collaborate.

As I do at the end of all my blog posts referring to St Martins House, I refer any reader wondering about the omission of the possessive apostrophe from the building's name to a letter from Rev. Peter Hobson, Director of St Martins House, published in the Leicester Mercury, 29 March 2011.

CONSIDERING WORSHIP

This article (regarding the conference rounding off the University of Leicester's Mapping Faith and Place project) appears in today's Leicester Mercury:

Considering worship

Places of worship will be the subject of a conference next week.St Martin's House, in Peacock Lane, Leicester, will host the event, which runs from 9.30am to 4pm on Thursday.

There will be guest speakers from faith groups, English Heritage, Leicester City Council and the University of Leicester, and a chance to debate the role of faith buildings.

For more details, call Heather Lomas on 0116 270 0386.

BUILDING SHARED HERITAGES: CULTURAL DIVERSITY IN LEICESTER

At the University of Leicester (Fielding Johnson Building) this morning for an open day: Building Shared Heritages: Cultural Diversity in Leicester.

Building Shared Heritages is a co-sponsored project at the University of Leicester. Along with the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE) and the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), the University of Leicester is assisting local groups to apply for grants of up to £10,000 to explore their local heritage.

The University of Leicester has a wide range of expertise and resources relating to local and community history in Leicester and Leicestershire. It is looking to widen access to these resources. The key areas that it is interested in developing with community groups are as follows:

• Trading heritage in Leicester
• Sport, music and social heritage in Leicester
• Civic and public heritage in Leicester
• Open spaces and the built environment in Leicester
• Memory of community, home, and local area heritage in Leicester

It’s the last of these five categories that offers potential for the Council of Faiths to get involved.

Deirdre O’Sullivan (Lecturer in Medieval Archaeology) gives a half-hour presentation to the audience of 80 or so about the Mapping Faith and Place project and the Leicester Faith Trail. She made several complimentary references to Leicester Council of Faiths during her presentation. she also described the next stage of the project, which is going to change tack from the general and historical to the particular and contemporary. They'll be focusing on one particular place of worship, Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara on East Park Road. They'll keep updating  the Faith Trail, of course, which will include publishing a new version of the booklet.

MAPPING FAITH & PLACE: 3rd SEMINAR

At the University of Leicester, Bennett Building, Department of Geography, this morning for the latest seminar in the University's Mapping Faith and Place project. Mapping Faith and Place is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) within their funding stream, "Care for the Future: Thinking Forward Through the Past".

The core aim of the project is explore the significance of South Asian religions and cultural heritage in Leicester's urban landscape. The wider context for this work, of course, includes the other aspects of religious and cultural identity and life in the city. There's more to the diversity of Leicester in terms of faith and belief than just the South Asian representation - as the project acknowledges, both in these workshops and in its print and online publications.

This is the last of three seminars for this project. You can read earlier blog posts for the launch event (Friday 7 October 2011), first seminar (Tuesday 18 October 2011) and second seminar (Monday 16 January 2012). These seminars will be followed by a final conference in the summer, although it's hoped that the project will continue beyond that period of initial funding.

Leicester Council of Faiths has lent a hand at various stages of this project (although if we'd grasped how significant Mapping Faith and Place is, we'd surely have done more to help). We borrowed the two pop-up banners for our display at Highcross during Inter Faith Week a couple of months ago, when we also distributed many copies of the Leicester Faith Trail booklet. Members of staff (Deirdre O'Sullivan and Dr Ruth Young - both of whom are here today) and students from the School of Archaeology and Ancient History took part in that exhibition.

The first seminar focused on built sacred spaces in a stricter architectural sense: whether new-built or taken over from other, earlier uses, expressing a break from, or continuity with the past. The second concentrated on sense of place: how people construct stories around geographical sites and personal identities. Today we're looking at new media, the transformative nature of digital technology to affect identity and project it into the world.

I was concerned that we’d have an unmanageably small turnout this morning, given torrential rain and the relatively difficult access to the venue. But there are a dozen of us here, which is more than enough to make it work.

First order of business is the uploading, copying or scanning of resources related to places of worship or faith trails that each of us have been asked to bring today. I've brought three digital photographs taken on the Holi Yatra Walk, Saturday 10 March. Others have brought sound clips, video and solid artefacts.

Dr Claire Jarvis, Senior Lecturer in Geographical Information, gives a fascinating PowerPoint presentation, "Representing Faith and Place". She shows and discusses some ancient maps which may be said to tell us more about the people who made them rather than the places they were intended to describe. She speaks of how we are becoming "prosumers" (a hybrid of producer / consumer) in this geospatial digital age; prosumers of a vast quantity of maps, which are being created and used in greater numbers than ever before, and in increasingly imaginative and idiosyncratic ways. Maps are being increasingly used to reflect lived experience, to tell stories about ourselves as individuals and communities. We see some examples of this kind of map too, which say something more nuanced than just where something is located or how to find a place. I'm especially struck by this quotation in her presentation, from Miguel Helft, in the New York Times, 27 July 2007:

With the help of simple tools introduced by Internet companies recently, millions of people are trying their hand at cartography, drawing on digital maps and annotating them with text, images, sound and videos.

In the process, they are reshaping the world of mapmaking and collectively creating a new kind of atlas that is likely to be both richer and messier than any other.

Incidentally, this concept of being a "prosumer" reminds me of the theory and practice of Co-Production, which was the topic of a meeting at County Hall on Monday morning.

Claire leads us through the process of creating our own maps, each of us at a work station, using mscape maker. I get to add my first digital image but no more, as I have to leave early for a Funding Fair at Voluntary Action LeicesterShire. I'm sorry I don't get to stay for the rest of this seminar, as I've found what we've done so far utterly fascinating and would love to learn and practise more. I hope to be able to follow up in my own time.

MAPPING FAITH & PLACE: 2nd SEMINAR

At St Philip's Parish Church, Evington this morning for the latest seminar in the University of Leicester's Mapping Faith and Place project. Mapping Faith and Place is funded by the Art and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) within their funding stream, "Care for the Future: Thinking Forward Through the Past".

The core aim of the project is explore the significance of South Asian religions and cultural heritage in Leicester's urban landscape. The wider context for this work, of course, includes the other aspects of religious and cultural identity and life in the city. There's more to the diversity of Leicester in terms of faith and belief than just the South Asian representation - as the project acknowledges, both in these workshops and in its print and online publications.

This is the second of three seminars for this project. You can read earlier blog posts for the first seminar (which I didn't attend) and the launch event (which I did), both of which took place in October last year. The third seminar will be held at the University of Leicester on a date yet to be decided, followed by a final conference in the summer (although it's hoped that the project will continue beyond that period of initial funding).

Leicester Council of Faiths lent a hand at various stages of this project (although if we'd grasped how significant Mapping Faith and Place is, we'd surely have done more to help). We borrowed the two pop-up banners for our display at Highcross during Inter Faith Week a couple of months ago, when we also distributed many copies of the Leicester Faith Trail booklet. Members of staff (Dr Deirdre O'Sullivan and Dr Ruth Young - both of whom are here today) and students from the School of Archaeology and Ancient History took part in that exhibition. I'm returning the banners today.

Jen Dickson (Lecturer in Geography at the University of Leicester) kicks off the day's proceedings, outlining some key academic ideas relating to this second seminar. Today we're considering how people develop a relationship with a place, a sense of belonging to a place (and of a place belonging to you). This sense of identity is complex and contested. It's no longer tenable to believe in a discreet, fixed, lifelong identity (which leads only to stereotyping). It's not simply a case of having a single identity, made up of different elements, more a case of multiple identities, which change in relation to space and time; not so much about possessing particular characteristics, more about how we perceive ourselves, especially in relation to others.

Our senses and emotions help determine whether we feel included or excluded in a place or a community associated with it, attached to or detached from them (applies to places and/or objects near and/or far). This brings to mind the particular example of RNIB College Loughborough's Faith and Reflection Room (see blog entry, Friday 16 December2011).

We discuss how contemporary politicians are co-opting debates about belonging, inclusion and exclusion, manipulating power and/or processes that permit inclusion or exclusion, in relation to Big Society, volunteering or where it is or isn't acceptable to dress or behave in certain ways (e.g. wearing the burka). We consider how individuals and groups resist such manipulation in modern society (e.g. Occupy movement)

There are 18 attendees here today, of mixed ages, backgrounds, cultures, faiths and traditions (though I'm sorry to note that there's no one from the Jain Centre or the Nagarjuna Kadampa Buddhist Centre, since they're both such prominent faith sites in the city centre). We’ve each been asked to bring an object with us that connects us to somewhere sacred. Now, I’m sure I don’t need to explain here that "sacred" means "set apart". This seminar is about sacred places, but it also helps shows us in what ways all sorts of things could be considered sacred. That can include things more abstract, including ways of being or doing, feeling, speaking and thinking. It could even be a narrative (I like that - it means even my blog could be considered sacred!)

The Leicester Bahá'í community has no public centre or place of worship these days, although I do mention on occasions such as this that the Bahá'ís had their own official meeting place in New Walk for several years from 1957, before there was a single gurdwara, mandir or mosque in Leicester. Despite this present lack (and without mentioning the historical anomaly) the Bahá'í Faith has its own page in the Leicester Faith Trail booklet published as one of the outcomes of this project.

Similarly, Bahá'ís tend to be "artifact-light" (I just made that up, but I'm sure you get my meaning) at least of the kind that fit into the typical resource boxes you might find in schools or museums. There's little to put in display cases in settings such as the St Mungo Museum of Religious Life and Art in Glasgow for example. There's irony here, inasmuch as the Bahá'ís were one of the most enthusiastic and supportive organisations behind the creation of the museum, but once the decision was made to concentrate on artifacts and objects, then it was a foregone conclusion that they'd be virtually excluded from representation in it.

Bahá'ís have always had a very rich historical self-awareness, consciously collecting, deliberately preserving and systematically archiving material items of all sorts. This is done nationally, internationally and locally, as anyone who has visited the International Archives at the Bahá'í World Centre on Mt Carmel, or has seen items from the British Bahá'í community's archives collection, such as those put on display at the National Bahá'í Centre in London during the recent celebration of the centenary of 'Abdu'l-Bahá's first visit Britain (see blog entry, Saturday 17 September 2011) will know.

But these are sacred items, relics, one-offs; they may amaze, inspire or thrill Bahá'ís but may appear trivial or incomprehensible to others. They aren't things used every day, nor are they everyday things that are used by Bahá'ís in their practice, individually or collectively.

So, within the parameters of the Mapping Faith and Place project, in what sense are the Bahá'ís a community when, for the most part, there are no physical centres, no meeting places for collective worship, when they gather in each others' homes or in rented or borrowed venues? I long ago understood (in my own limited capacity) what it means to be a community of common commitment, of ideas, of love for the same Beloved. We can be the exception that proves the rule here.

When I arrive this morning, Revd. John Hall has thoughtfully collected a small number of Bahá'í books and leaflets from the library in the St Philip's Centre next door and laid them out on display, in case I wanted to draw on them today. That's as close to artifacts as Bahá'ís ever get!

The kind of objects people have brought with them today include books, items of clothing, physical artifacts ancient and modern, original or replica, photos etc.

When we're called on to do pairs work about our object, I'm teamed with Surinder Pal Singh, General Secretary of Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara, East Park Road. While he doesn't have any one particular object with him, he describes how the five Ks are the objects of belonging and identity, not attached to any particular place, but which he takes with him everywhere - which make his whole body a sacred site.

We're asked to consider the following questions in relation to the personal object we've brought with us today:

1. How does it represent you?
2. What aspects of your identity in particular does it highlight?
3. What does it say about you personally and as a member of a community?
4. How does it represent your relation to Leicester?
5. How might it represent identity in the past, present and to future generations?
6. If it does not represent past, present or future identities, why not? What object would?

I had no trouble choosing my object for this exercise today. When I asked Clare to guess what it would be, she said, "I bet it's your bloomin' iPhone!" And it is. Here are a few of the reasons why this is the object I've brought to this event today. I'm not expecting anyone else to agree with me (or even to understand my explanations):

• Google Maps. I prefer to walk wherever I can in Leicester. Even if it takes an hour or more, I'd rather walk. I would describe myself as a flaneur. Baudelaire defines the flaneur as "someone who walks the city in order to experience it." This is definitely the case when going to (and often returning from) the 19 Day Feast. Beware any routes described by Google Maps as "beta versions". "Use with caution" indeed. First time I looked up the walking route to one venue for the 19 Day Feast and it sent me one way that took more than 45 minutes. Next time, it showed me a route that took 24!
• Podcasts. I usually listen to podcasts of Astronomy Cast on my iPhone while on my way to the Feast. 'Abdu'l-Bahá instructs us that, "before entering [the Feast] free yourselves from all that you have in your heart, free your thoughts and your minds from all else save God, and speak to your heart". Odd as it may sound to you, faithful reader, listening to my favourite podcast, about the origin, history, present condition and future of the universe helps give me a sense of my place in the scheme of things. I don't see how anyone could attend to such matters and still consider themselves the centre of creation. It's like the Total Perspective Vortex from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (but in a good way!)
• Twitter. I can connect with Bahá'ís in other places, who are similarly anticipating or preparing for their 19 Day Feast, or who may recently have held theirs. It's not just those Bahá'ís whom I follow on Twitter or who follow me; I find the unpredictability, the randomness, not knowing who will see or respond to the hashtags #Bahai or #19dayfeast while on my way to the Feast genuinely intriguing and connecting.

I'd like to think that this will connect with the topic of the next seminar, which will consider how new technologies can be used to represent place.

After lunch, we further explore the articulation of identities, specifically religious identities, through the mind, body and the senses. We ask:

1. How are religious identities articulated in private home spaces through food and fasting; dress; music; dance; ritual practices?
2. How can religious identities or belief systems be articulated though the body in public spaces?
3. How can religious identities or belief systems be articulated through time and place in public and private spaces (e.g. birth; coming of age; marriage; death)?

It seems to be taken for granted by those participating in this part of the seminar that the challenge facing religious people today is that of maintaining practices or traditions exemplified and transmitted in the home and family, against the malign influence of a changing society, maintaining momentum gained over generations. There were fewer thinking of how many people, newly awakened to the religious life (or who switch religious affiliation) are challenged to establish new practices, for oneself and/or one's children, from a standing start. So I challenge that first assumption (in typically courteous fashion, of course).

In the photo above: Dr Chris King (who began the processes that have led to the Mapping Faith and Place project at the University of Leicester, but is now attached to the University of Nottingham); Dr Deirdre O'Sullivan; Jen Dickson; Dr Dr Viv Golden; Dr Ruth Young.

INTER FAITH WEEK 2011, DAY 6: HIGHCROSS EXHIBITION

Day six of our week-long exhibition in Highcross, showcasing the eight communities represented on Leicester Council of Faiths: Bahá'ís, Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jains, Jews, Muslims and Sikhs.

All week long I've been in the process of setting up a visit to the exhibition by Jon Ashworth MP (Labour, Leicester South). Jon's been supportive of the Council of Faiths and our work on several occasions and I was pleased to be asked to set up an informal meeting between him and members of some of our member faith communities. That's Jon in the photo above (3rd from left), with (from left to right) Minou Cortazzi (Bahá'í representative), Gursharan Thandi (Sikh representative), Cllr Manjula Sood (Hindu - and Chair of Leicester Council of Faiths), Cllr Inderjit Gugnani (Sikh representative), Ajay Aggarwal (Co-ordinator at Leicester Council of Faiths), Father John Lally (Christian representative). Jon is able to visit for about an hour. There's enough room within the display area to make a circle of chairs for him to sit and talk with the group there.

Early today, I share a couple of hours on the display with Dr Ruth Young, Senior Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Leicester and one of the principals behind the "Mapping Faith and Place" project which has led to the Faith Trail walking map in Leicester city centre. We've borrowed the pop-up banners and booklets for these, to help smarten up our exhibition here.

Other visitors and volunteers on the exhibition today include Rev. Sally Martin (Lead Chaplain for the Pastoral and Spiritual Care Team at Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust) and Anjala Farmah (to the right and left, respectively of Cllr Manjula Sood in the photo above). We also receive a visit, late this afternoon,  from Cllr Ted Cassidy MBE, Assistant Mayor and Cabinet Lead for Economic Development, Culture and Tourism (in photo below, along with Beverley Farrand, from Leicester Cathedral and Shane Bordoli, from Nagarjuna Kadampa Buddhist Centre). I delivered handwritten invitiations to the exhibition for the Mayor, Deputy Mayor and all Cabinet members to the Town Hall on Tuesday morning; Ted tells me that he only received his through the internal mail this morning!

INTER FAITH WEEK 2011, DAY 1: HIGHCROSS EXHIBITION

First day of our week-long exhibition in Highcross to celebrate Inter Faith Week, showcasing the eight member communities represented on Leicester Council of Faiths.

This is the third consecutive year we've been invited into Highcross to put on this display. This time though, things are refreshingly different. We're in a new location: bigger, more central - and (I'm glad to say) warmer! This time last year, there was snow on the ground and we were rather too close to the outer doors of the West Mall for comfort. The weather is milder this year, but we're also deeper in the heart of Highcross (just over the line that marks the start of the East Mall, for any retail facility anoraks out there). We're at the bottom of the central set of escalators, which makes this spot one of the most highly frequented in the whole building. The loos are just behind us too, which helps make this a popular destination.

We're able to put more into the display this year. We have trestle tables for the first time (three of them) we've borrowed the University of Leicester's "Faiths Trail" and "Mapping Faith and Place" banners (and a box of their guide books for the city centre walking tour of places of worship). Our set of pop-up banners is arranged in a completely new way, back-to-back in pairs. No doubt I'll be messing  around with the arrangement as the week goes on.

Rosemarie Fitton (who has helped bring down all the material from Bishop Street), Gursharan Thandi and Shobha Trivedi are first on duty at the stall today. Shobha's daughter, Natasha, helped out for a couple of hours at this event last year. We're joined by Shobha's friend, Prafulla Raja. They all help with the final stages of setting up so that we're fully operational by 1115.

I leave them to it just before midday, to take a smaller amount of exhibition material by taxi to Beauchamp College for their "Together" event. But no sooner have I arrived there than circumstances compel me to return to Highcross - though not before putting up our old banner and laying out some of our literature, leaving it all in the care of Council of Faiths Secretary Inderjit Gugnani, who is manning a stall for Oadby & Wigston Sikh community. Pity: I'd been looking forward to this one. I have to leave before Bobby's vegetarian restaurant has even started cooking.

I'm back at Highcross just before 1400, in time to relieve Gursharan and spend the next hour or so on the stall with Deirdre O'Sullivan. Deirdre is a Lecturer in Archaeology in the School of Archaeology and Ancient History at the University of Leicester. She's been instrumental in developing their "Mapping Faith and Place" project. The next hour passes quickly (for me, anyway!) with a very interesting chat about the project and related topics.

Just before it's time for Deirdre to go, two Highcross staff members arrive and start taking photos of our display. Jo and Laura (photo above) put together a web page with highlights of each weekend at Highcross, for staff. We'll be in the one they're compiling today, apparently!

In the outside world today, there's a procession between two Sikh gurdwaras, as part of the local celebration of Guru Nanak's birthday. The procession ends at Guru Nanak Gurdwara in Holy Bones, near Highcross. Mid-afternoon, we see a lot of Sikhs coming through Highcross and many of them stop and look at our display.

Since we first had our exhibition at Highcross in 2009, we've kept a "reflective journal", in which we ask our Inter Faith Week volunteers to record something of how they felt about the experience. We're doing so again this year. Here are some comments by some of those who took part on this first day of Inter Faith Week 2011:

"Always a learning experience - right at the start I spoke to a man who raised many questions about faiths - good starter!"

"Very few visitors to the exhibition, those that did were pleased with the information they could take away. Spoke at length to a teacher and passed on the light source / colander example explaining Hindu god(s), which she loved. One person went past muttering that the Christians didn't have a banner - but they had gone before I could catch them. Lovely talking to other volunteers." 

"I have enjoyed being a volunteer for the Interfaith Council. I have learnt a lot by just observing people's reactions when reading quotes from various faiths."

"Although there were many shoppers, very few bothered to look at the displays. Talked to a Christian lady who wanted to find our more about the Faiths Trail and a teacher who took away a lot of leaflets. Many people just waled through the exhibition! It was lovely talking to Rosemary and Gursharan (George was fun too!)" 

"Interesting being right in the middle of Leicester going by. People seem shy about coming in beyond the banners."

I'd say that's the sort of mix of comments I'd expect for the first day, especially when we've had a few people with us who haven't taken part in this event in previous years.

As well as our exhibition, the East Mall features a big promotion for Nintendo this weekend. Visitors are invited to join in the celebration of a host of imaginary characters who inhabit a fantasy realm, where they achieve astonishing feats of magical skill. These characters have millions of followers, brought together by a common devotion that overcomes differences of age, language, nationality and race. Their devotees expend  immeasurable amounts of time on the glorification of their idols and pour unimaginable treasure into the coffers of those who are the guardians of their legacy and the trustees of their future expansion toward global domination. I'm talking about Super Mario Brothers of course. Who did you think I meant, faithful reader?

While on my way to Beauchamp College around lunchtime, I receive a text message from my friend Javid Djalili, who says he's coming up from London later this afternoon, to attend the first screening (Little Buddha) in our Faiths Film Festival at Phoenix Square. I meet Javid off the train just before 1700, in time to dash down to Highcross so he can get a look at the exhibition (photo above). Just as we arrive there, I receive a call from Maureen Sier, who helped out on our very first Inter Faith Week back in 2009. While she and I talk about how the week is shaping up, it strikes me that this is a serendipitous moment; Maureen's daughter, Sonia, is a filmmaker who has worked on inter-faith themes and topics (see my blog entry about her film, Beyond Tolerance) - and she's called me, out of the blue, just when I'm with Javid, who is in the process of setting up Interfaith Focus, an international charitable foundation for inter-faith filmmakers! So I pass the phone to Javid. He and Maureen have never met, but they have what appears to be a convivial and useful conversation, which I am sure is to their mutual benefit.

MAPPING FAITH & PLACE: 1st SEMINAR

Faithful reader, won't you welcome please, guest blogger Rosemarie Fitton:

I attended the first seminar of a project, Mapping Faith and Place, run by Leicester University, "investigating the significance of South Asian religious and cultural heritage in Leicester's urban landscape." This took place at New Walk Museum and Art Gallery. There are two further seminars to run next year followed by a public conference. I was wearing a number of hats, firstly as the creative director of Heterarchy, my interior design practice, based here in Leicester, secondly as an academic from DeMontfort university and thirdly, after George had asked me to write a blog about the seminar, as a member of the Leicester Council of Faiths. 

The seminar was organised by Dr Deirdre O'Sullivan and Dr Ruth Young, both from the School of Archaeology & Ancient History at Leicester University. 

There were a series of talks which were preceded by an introduction to the project by Dr Chris King, who had originally conceived and obtained funding for the research; Dr King, formerly of Leicester University, is now based at Nottingham University.

Dr King outlined the purpose of the project which is for academics and non-academics to work together to share knowledge and insights in order to gain an understanding of Leicester's cultural and religious landscape. In this series of seminars we will be looking at ways to take the project forward and how to best connect with people from the different communities. 

Dr Deirdre O'Sullivan and Dr Ruth Young talked about the work that had already taken place, which has resulted in The Faith Trail, most of the work for which was carried out by students at Leicester university. There is a website and booklet which accompanies this part of the project.

We then had a talk by Linda Monkton of English Heritage, who is head of research policy for places of worship. She spoke about the National Heritage list for England which includes an on-line database of all nationally designated heritage assets and the National Heritage Protection Plan, which is a framework for the key priorities for research over protection issues. She was very interested in finding out ways that English Heritage could foster good relationships with local contacts in the different faith communities. 

I then gave a talk on the work my company had carried out on the interiors for the new Swaminarayan Hindu temple on Gypsy Lane, which opened on the 8th-9th October. Describing how we had become involved in the project and how we set about the design process, to create interiors which reflected the rich cultural heritage of the Swaminarayan faith yet in a more contemporary style.

Rupert Allen, Assistant Church Buildings Development Officer for the Diocese of Coventry and Leicester spoke about the re-use of historically significant buildings and ways in which these could be sympathetically re-ordered to accommodate the new occupants.
In the afternoon we had lively discussions which initially looked at the issue of the Leicester orthodox synagogue which has recently been put up for sale, and the significance of religious buildings and their heritage as "sustainable sacred space".

This was followed by looking at ways to move the project forward and what the major issues were for the different faith communities in terms of buildings and the built environment and other groups who had an interest such as English heritage and academics.

Thanks Rosemarie, your contribution is much appreciated. I look forward to you having future stints as guest blogger.

MAPPING FAITH & PLACE: FAITH TRAIL LAUNCHED

At New Walk Museum and Art Gallery this evening for the launch of the University of Leicester’s Faith Trail. Today’s event marks an important stage in the development of Mapping Faith and Place, a project based in the university's School of Archaeology and Ancient History. Today is the day the project goes public.

Leicester Council of Faiths has lent occasional assistance to this project over the last year or so. Most recently, I’ve had the chance to make some slight amendments to the text of the printed booklet that goes with the Faith Trail and to ensure the use of a decent version of our logo.

Here’s an extract from the address given by Deirdre O’Sullivan, who is project leaders (along with Ruth Young, from Archaeology).

“Mapping Faith and Place has grown out of our shared interests in the archaeology of the great World Religions and the ways in which places of worship are understood, and used, by both members of faith communities and people outside those communities. Be they fellow citizens, tourists and visitors, or archaeologists seeking to understand placed in the past. 

“The study of religious monuments occupies a substantial section of any archaeology curriculum, From the temple complexes and shrines of the ancient civilisations of both the old and new worlds, through the abbeys, churches and cathedrals of Western Christendom, to the beautiful mosques of the Islamic world, archaeologists have recorded an enormous range of buildings that have served faith communities in both the past and the present. Understanding such places, however, requires more than familiarity with architectural terminology, or carefully scaled admiration for the skills and resources of their architects, builders and decorators. The meanings of such places need to be accessed in some way.

“The range of contemporary faith communities in Leicester offers a remarkable  opportunity to do just this. Over 400 different places have been used for worship in the city. Many of these buildings have disappeared; others have changed hands and moved between different faith communities, or in some cases, been adapted for secular use. All of the major contemporary world religions are represented.

“It is an educational axiom that in order to explain something you must first understand it yourself. Although the world seems unfortunately rather full of people trying to explain things that they don’t understand.  Our educational ambition is simply the development of understanding of places of faith in the present, and in the past. Not just the whats and wheres, but they whys and hows of what things mean in Leicester, which is so remarkable as a successful multi-ethnic community in 21^st century Britain. If we are to explain this success, we must first understand how it works.

“The event today focuses on our first concrete outputs from the project, the creation of a Faith Trail by a group of undergraduates in Archaeology and Ancient History and an interactive map of all the places of faith in Leicester alive and dead prepared by Dr Chris Green, which will enable anyone to construct their own maps and trails. Resources from the University’s Knowledge Exchange programme were provided which allowed us to employ an independent heritage consultant, Heather Lomas, to co-ordinate and steer the word over summer and, indeed, organise this launch today,
“These are not just for the purpose of academic enquiry; they are also openly accessible on the web and we hope that we can create useful tools and resources for developing ongoing dialogues within Leicester for a whole range of purposes, not least among faith communities themselves.”

Two of the students take the podium to speak about their work on the project. During this short talk they give a big credit to the Council of Faiths (a bit bigger than I think we deserve, but I’m not going to complain). We do have quite a visible presence at this occasion, with one of our pop-up banners on display at the front and the full range of our leaflets out among the material published by the university.

There’s a very convivial atmosphere among the 50 or so attendees and everyone seems pleased and satisfied with the work so far – as well as being keen and optimistic about future developments.

There’s going to be a series of workshops furthering the Mapping Faith and Place project and the Council of Faiths has been asked to be involved.  I’ll be away in Glasgow when the first of these takes place (Tuesday 18 October) but Rosemarie Fitton will be taking part.

I ask if we could incorporate the exhibition materials on display this evening and the printed Faith Trail booklet into our exhibition at Highcross during Inter Faith Week (20-26 November). The request is met favourably – I think it will be a very good contribution!