03. Empire, Colonialism and Identities through the Stories and Memories of Ordinary People

Published by: Creative Pedagogy

Volume: 1 Issue: 1 Year: 2026

Authors: Kristin Marshall & Damon Bannister, Manchester Metropolitan University, School of Digital Arts, Arts & Humanities.

Corresponding Author: k.marshall@mmu.ac.uk

This Co-Lab brief, took inspiration from international artist Chila Kumari Burman and her commission for 14-18 Now Legacy fund as the springboard for this third-year collaborative project.

Chila, celebrated for her radical feminist and multimedia practice,

responded to local and global legacies of twentieth-century conflict.

Drawing on a bank of archive material from sources including Imperial War Museum North (IWM) and Oldham Archives, students were encouraged to respond to one of Chila’s key provocations from the show, which directly address the colonial backgrounds of specific communities moving to the UK in the 1960s, representative of Chila's heritage and the subjects present in the archives:

 1) Disobey, their power comes from our obedience 

 2) We are here because you were there 

 3) Self defence is no offence