Message Space
Challenge: Inspire and support people locally and then across the world to create unique messages that can travel into space, shared with astronauts and published on Earth.
Working pattern:
Part-time over one year, remote.
Who we’re looking for:
Someone with skills in delivering and documenting creative writing/arts projects. You will have creative abilities as well as demonstrable skills in planning, execution, strategy, social media and facilitating collaborations. Further experience in building and expanding on existing initiatives would be a bonus.
Start date:
Story Associates will join the scheme in early September. They will start by taking part in a Deep Story Training Camp and will then move on to their Host projects and placements.
How:
Investigate how local community workshops and/or social media can encourage participation in the Message Space project. Build on prior writing projects – such as The Writer’s Cycle, Dare to Write? and the International Alliance of Youth Writing Centres – to encourage public participation. Document the process, and ensure that it is repeatable so that Winged Chariot can scale the project from a local to a global audience while ensuring a range of local sensitivities are heeded, and strategic partners can be put in place.
Award:
£37,099, pro rata, point 30 on National Spinal Point, or equivalent value fellowship grant (paid on supplier contract basis).
The scene is set…
The year is 2283. A small group of people have been chosen to take part in a mission to Mars. The mission is the beginning of a long and extensive search for a complementary space alongside Earth to live in.
Back on our planet in the present, and thinking of these future generations, what messages, stories or tales of Earth today might we want to leave for them now to help them on their journey? Whether they’re journeying to Mars or remaining on Earth as others venture out.
Message Space is a new project, still in its prototype phase. In anticipation of a future, yet to come, it aims to support people from across the world to create and send messages into space. The project will be a launch pad for diverse audiences to share their narratives beyond Earth’s atmosphere.
The project is led by Winged Chariot, a consultancy that focuses on cross-media content in arts and technology. Working with a small team, Neal Hoskins (CEO of Winged Chariot) has been looking into how partnerships with national space agencies might work to deliver the project.
To set the project in motion, Neal has been in conversation with laser technologists and rocket scientists from major international space agencies to explore the risks and challenges involved in delivering a unique beam of messages into space…
A hero is called…
Neal Hoskins is looking for a creative practitioner to join his small team. The Story Associate will be invited to support Neal on the Earth side of the mission, leading on two key aspects of the project.
First, they will develop a campaign to inspire members of the public to take part in Message Space.
Second, they will test and document public engagement methods for supporting participants to create their stories, messages or narratives.
The process might take the form of in-person writing workshops (at community centres, museums, etc.), or it could be delivered as an online writing challenge (along the lines of the Summer Reading Challenge). Regardless of the chosen public engagement, we will need a repeatable process that can be easily scaled in the future, at an international level.
The Story Associate will have access to previous models, tools and templates developed through the ACE-funded Dare to Write? scheme. StoryArcs’ Director, Professor Bambo Soyinka, will provide the Story Associate with mentoring and help to adapt The Writer’s Cycle and Dare to Write? In addition, Winged Chariot will share information about complementary methods delivered by other writing agencies from the internal youth writing centres alliance
An adventure gets underway…
The Story Associate will create detailed plans for how the project will run on Earth and investigate how and with whom we might run pilot schemes to test packages and generate scenarios for optimal collaborations between arts organisations and members of the public…
Towards the end of the project, the associate will collaborate with Neal on the development of a punchy message, publishing a paper of around 3000 words on ideas and paths for scaling the methods and collaborations. Alongside a written outcome we may agree on, creating example forms of anthology media (eBook, audio, short animation) for the future multimedia production of the project.
This adventure will contribute to the StoryArcs mission to explore the value and uses of Story Skills in life, learning and work. The findings brought back to StoryArcs HQ will be crucial in our development and co-creation of a Story Skill Set.
This is one of eleven projects. You can find out more about the Story Associate opportunity and explore all eleven opportunities.
Application Portal is now closed.
If you were unable to submit your application due to technical difficulties, personal reasons or other factors please contact us at story@bathspa.ac.uk.