“…There's too many of you crying
Brother, brother, brother
There's far too many of you dying…
We don't need to escalate
You see, war is not the answer
For only love can conquer hate
You know we've got to find a way
To bring some lovin’ here today”

“What’s Going On?” Marvin Gaye (1971)

Conferences are places where people talk to (and too-often at) one another. Epistemic trust is assumed in theory but is difficult to establish in practice. They are sometimes spaces for community and understanding and too-often places where unhoused minds encounter inhospitable environments - in ways that reflect and repeat “what’s going on” in wider social and global contexts. They are institutions that exclude even as they seek to include and that falter and fail in this and other ways, as so many institutions do.

Our invitation to you, the membership of this particular conference, is to join us in this open-space to reflect upon and discuss “what’s going on”. Old conversations are growing cold, as the world heats up, and epistemic trust breaks down. Let’s begin some new ones – if and while we still can.

This event follows on from a similar event that took place at last year's conference. It is offered as a co-facilitated Large Study Group and chairs will be set out in a spiral formation.