We Built This City on Rock and Coal
Year Awarded
2024
Amount
€59,960
- Organisation:University of Galway
- Audience:General Public
- Location:cork;donegal;mayo
- Topic:STEAM
Project Summary
The complex and existential threat of climate change means people struggle to feel their actions can make a difference. This effect is compounded for rural communities, who will bear the brunt of climate change but are often forgotten by decision-makers. ‘We Built This City on Rock and Coal’ empowers people across the west coast of Ireland by co-creating live shows and workshops that spark climate action, adapted to the concerns of each unique location.
The live shows are co-created using audience contributions and a cast of improvisers and scientists. These experts build comedy on the spot, creating space for facts and figures alongside affective responses to the issues. We partner with local musicians and performers, a dedicated arts producer and local community arts venues. Before the show visits each location, we contact community organisations and connect them with biodiversity or storytelling citizen science projects, depending on their interests, to enable audience members to become part of the scientific process of studying climate change. We then host sustainability and improvisation workshops, and plan to develop a policy brief, to further empower the people who take part.
The project will develop an ecosystem of empowerment and climate action in rural communities with a 13-location tour across the west of Ireland in summer 2025. The events are hopeful and fun, making space for the full range of feelings about climate change while also inspiring and enabling climate action at all levels.