The BU Research Centre for Seldom Heard Voices brings together academics from across different disciplines including social sciences and social work to engage with marginalised communities and to amplify often excluded or silenced voices. 

We have a strong track record of developing collaborative partnerships with communities and key stakeholders and for using participatory and co-created approaches. Our aim is to apply our research to real-world challenges to maximise societal impact. 

Our research includes collaborations with looked after children, youth in the developing world or conflict areas, rough sleepers, substance users, transgender youth and LGBT+ communities, stigmatised and threatened minorities, immigrants and trafficking victims, disabled children and adults, older people, carers, and many more. Impact includes contributions to child and adult social care practice, influencing policy, theoretical contributions to conflict resolution and community engagement and empowerment in the UK and globally including Kosovo, Albania, Malaysia, Costa Rica, Nepal and Rwanda. 

Research themes

Featured research projects

Resources

Community activism

Part of our role within the Centre for Seldom Heard Voices is to use our platform to amplify seldom heard voices. In collaboration with the BU PIER (Public Involvement in Education and Research) partnership, we engage with many community groups, organisations, activists and campaigners who are conducting some wonderful work to promote inclusion and advance social justice across our region and further afield. 

Blog posts

Latest news

19/07/2024

Our Digital Lives - ESRC Festival of Social Sciences

This year the national ESRC Festival of Social Sciences theme is 'Our Digital Lives'. For the festival, BU is supporting events that will run between Saturday October 19th and Saturday November 9th. Jayne Caudwell and Frankie Gaunt in the Department of Social Sciences and Social Work were awarded up to £1,000 to hold an event in the festival. Their event is an art exhibition focused on "Communities of Positive Well-Being: The Digital Lives of LGBTQ+ Young People".