Category Archives: Volunteering

Bookshops come and go

Do you have fond memories of brilliant bookshops that have sadly disappeared?

The Louth & District Hospice Charity Bookshop ceased trading on 31st May 2022

On 9th June 2022, Professor Sam Rayner’s fascinating inaugural UCL lecture, ‘Hidden in the bookshelves: Una Dillon and the ‘formidable’ women booksellers of London, 1930s-1960s’, featured several iconic London establishments, a few of which are still with us, most owned by Waterstones. You can watch her lecture on YouTube.

Growing up In Cambridge, we were spoilt for choice.

William Heffer, William Heffer,
Bowes and Bowes, Bowes and Bowes,
Galloway and Porter, Galloway and Porter,
Deighton Bell, Deighton Bell

This rhyme, sung to the tune of Frère Jacques, harks back to a golden age of bookselling in twentieth-century Cambridge, when the city was served by several excellent establishments, each with its own distinctive history and character.

Fifty years ago, our family Saturday morning routine included a visit to the new Heffers Children’s Bookshop, where I would spend all my pocket money on a paperback, often a Puffin or Green Knight imprint at two shillings and sixpence, or from 1971, twenty-five or thirty new pence. Every visit to Heffers was an immersive bookish experience, enhanced by the ambiance of the shop and the people you would find there.

The antiquated shop front of the Children’s Bookshop in those early days disguised the ultra-modern interior, with its turquoise carpet, low sky-blue ceiling, orange staircase lined with mirrors and plastic moulded pea-green tubs for sitting or standing on. Transcended by books in these psychedelic surroundings, seeking my good read for the week, I would now and again glimpse the carnival of stories, and of my mind, all reflected in a large distorting mirror at the top of the stairs.

Interior, Heffer’s Children’s Bookshop 1969

I can also remember the old Heffers bookshop in Petty Cury, with its bottle glass bow windows, polished wooden floors, towering bookshelves, and grand balcony.

Heffer’s Petty Cury Bookshop

For many years, this iconic bookshop was divided into several departments, all crammed with stock, as described in an early twentieth century brochure,

‘Visitors to this, our Book Shop, constantly remark to us: “How do you find your Books?” “How do you know what you have got?” The questions are not unwarranted, for, though the exterior of the shop is small, the interior – consisting of four floors each 40 feet in depth – is the reverse, and with every available space shelved and crowded with Books: with Books in portentous stacks invading the floors, the questions are very pertinent.’

In the 1960s, we would visit my great-auntie Winnie at this bookshop, where she worked as secretary to the renowned bookseller, Mr Frank Stoakley. I would sit patiently on the library steps in the dusky Antiquarian Book Department, inhaling the sweet vanilla and almond aroma of old books, as mother chatted to auntie.

My family clocked up one hundred and twenty years of service for Heffers, starting with great-grandfather Frederick Anstee, employed as an errand boy by William Heffer in 1896, when he opened the Petty Cury shop. Frederick’s two daughters, Lilian (my grandmother) and Winifred (great-auntie Winnie), also worked for the firm. We do not know the exact circumstances in which Frederick was taken on, but in a 1952 biography of his father, William, Sidney Heffer wrote, ‘The increase in the business necessitated employing an errand boy. One lad was anything but a bright specimen–practically uneducated and from a miserable home.’ That lad was Frederick.

William undertook to educate Frederick, insisting he write in a copy book and work out simple sums each night, bringing the results to work the next morning. Frederick thrived by this ‘strange tuition’, and eventually became head of the Science Department at the Petty Cury bookshop.

Amongst great-auntie Winnie’s papers is this portrait of an earnest boy with tight curls, sporting a smart knitted buttoned-up suit, captured at Ralph Starr’s photographic studio in Fitzroy Street, Cambridge. It was taken in 1892 and the boy is Frederick, aged nine years. At the time, his future benefactors were still living above the shop, just a few doors up from the studio. It is likely that the Heffer family arranged and paid for this portrait, as Frederick’s mother, a ‘Barnwell Lady’, would not have had the funds or indeed, the wherewithal, to do so.

In 2015, I combined my love of the past and of books, by researching and writing a history of Heffers. It was a project close to my heart. There were many quiet moments when I thought about Frederick and the other family members who had worked for the firm. It may sound whimsical, but I sensed their approval of the legacy I was trying to create, and it gave me an inner confidence. It was, and still is, a nice feeling.

Published Oct 2016

’This Book is About Heffers’, won a Cambridgeshire Association for Local History Award, and I’ve given dozens of illustrated talks on the topic to a wide range of groups and societies, and to students. I enjoy meeting people and hearing about their own memories of the firm, so many interesting stories. Sometimes I had repeat visits. An elderly gentleman who had long since retired from Heffers Printers, attended two talks and in tears, expressed his gratitude for my book that had prompted many precious memories. Two ladies who had together attended a Heffers talk, then came to one of my history of mazes talks. My husband, Trevor, went to introduce me to them as they arrived and they exclaimed there was no need, as not only had they already met Julie Bounford, but they had also brought some Heffers memorabilia I might like to keep.

I was especially pleased to meet people who had worked with members of my family. At one talk, a lady took out her album to show me snaps of her Heffers friends and colleagues. Inside was a photograph of her standing with great-auntie Winnie on the balcony at the front of the Sidney Street shop in Cambridge. The Heffers book is dedicated to auntie.

Winifred Anstee at the Petty Cury bookshop, with Frank Stoakley and bookselling colleagues.

When bookshops close

In September 1970, Heffers relocated the Petty Cury bookshop to new premises at 20 Trinity Street, Cambridge, where they remain to this day. While retaining the historic Georgian façade above ground level, the architects designed a wide shopfront in bronze and plate glass for the new premises, providing a, ‘simple and elegant showcase onto the street’, and internally, everything was altered in a radical new concept in bookshop design.

Lord Butler, Master of Trinity College, who officially opened the new bookshop, described the design as ingenious and attractive, combining great spaciousness with a, “superabundance of cosy private nooks where book lovers can tuck themselves away for hours on end perusing their favourite volumes”.

Trinity Street bookshop

The movement of stock from Petty Cury to Trinity Street was a major operation, carried out by the removal firm Bullens. It took six and a half days, night and day, to transfer more than 80,000 books.

Reuben Heffer, grandson of William and a third generation Heffers director, welcomed the closure of the Petty Cury bookshop, stating at the time that the shop had become almost unworkable, “it was so Dickensian”, he said. But that was what we loved about it.

Despite the generally positive reception amongst staff and customers, the new premises at Trinity Street did not suit everyone. Many employees and customers remember Petty Cury as a more intimate shop. Claire Brown, who had also worked at Blackwell’s in Oxford, was particularly sorry to swap Petty Cury’s polished oak for carpets and chrome,

“It was a great pity that Heffers didn’t adopt the sensible Blackwell’s policy, which was, and is, to keep it looking exactly as it did in the nineteenth century. Heffers, when it left Petty Cury, in the passionate urge to be new and up to date … What Cambridge and Oxford had to sell was the past. The fact that there is a modern business going on is beside the point … They did lose a lot when they left the Petty Cury.”

Opinion was clearly divided and many Cambridge folk still miss that old Dickensian bookshop.

Loss of the Louth charity bookshop

After moving to Louth in Lincolnshire, I took up a volunteering opportunity, as bookselling assistant at the Louth & District Hospice Charity Bookshop. My previous retail experience had been limited and I’ve never been a natural salesman. As a young teenager, I had had a Saturday job at a greengrocer in Akeman Street, Cambridge, standing around in the freezing cold, serving customers and lugging sacks of potatoes for a heavily made-up shop keeper who spent much of the time buffing her nails in the back room. And so, in my application for this role I emphasised instead my love of books and bookshops, and an interest in the history of bookselling informed by my family history.

From February 2022, my regular shift at the Louth bookshop was half a day a week, although, along with some of the other volunteers, from mid-May I helped to cover the manager’s shifts while he volunteered elsewhere on the Polish border, assisting those displaced by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Our volunteer manager was still away when we received news of the bookshop’s imminent closure on 31st May. With just a few days’ notice, we managed to notify many loyal customers, and we held a closing down sale.

Those last few days were distressing for all concerned. Especially those volunteers who had given much of their time over several years to the bookshop and the charity. As a relatively recent contributor, my emotional investment in this enterprise did not compare.

In her inaugural lecture, Sam Raynor declared that Una Dillon did for UCL, what Heffers and Blackwell’s did for Cambridge and Oxford, in establishing a flagship ‘campus’ bookshop. Dillon’s, Heffers, and Blackwell’s (owners of Heffers since 1999), have all been acquired by Waterstones. Of course, our little second-hand charity bookshop in Louth was never going to be of interest to the big W.

I understand what Ernest Heffer (son of William) meant when, in his 1933 address to young booksellers, he declared that a bookshop is a ‘microcosm of everything of importance which is happening in the world’. Although more recently, when I see our world going to hell in a handcart, a bookshop is my means of escape.

As I observed the anguish and chaos in the Louth & District Hospice Charity bookshop on that last day of trading, I felt bereft. It’s true that bookshops are close to the heart of our communities, and long may they remain so.

I never imagined that I would ever take part in closing one down.

Meet Cyril Wilmslow, volunteer extraordinaire

Meet Cyril Wilmslow, volunteer extraordinaire

This post, a bit of light relief from the academic writing, introduces a new fictional character, Cyril Wilmslow, volunteer extraordinaire.

Cyril Wilmslow’s discomfort was painfully obvious as he attempted to secure his seat in the already crowded gallery.  Close physical proximity, especially to those of his own kind, was something he tried to avoid – touching was out of the question.  Cyril shuddered visibly as he inevitably brushed past the well-rounded nylon clad knees of an immaculately attired, over odourised middle-aged lady who looked up and beamed invitingly.  She made no attempt to lean the other way and appeared to relish his unease.

Being a gentleman, Cyril grappled for the right words to apologise for his ungallant infringement of her personal space.  To his dismay he instead erupted with a senseless blustery gasp as he pressed his corpulent gut over the balustrade whilst straining to save, not hers, but his own blushes.  His blazing red cheeks, his flaxen hair plastered across his hot forehead and his cobalt waistcoat created above all, a patriotic vision of red, white and blue – a vision which, in different circumstances, Cyril would have most heartily approved of.

Cyril finally managed to squeeze his frame into the only remaining gap, next to the smiling lady.  As soon as he sat down, she gently tilted towards him as if anticipating his manly protection from what they were about to witness.  There seemed to be no escape.  He would have to remain at close range for the duration.

‘I fear the shock of what’s to come may be too much for me to bear,’ she sighed, clearly seeking comfort before the proceedings had even begun.

Cyril had that effect on people.  As he would remind his wife every morning at breakfast,

‘I have an aura of compassion that draws the sad and the sick wherever I go, Mrs W.’

In fact, the conversation at breakfast just an hour earlier had followed the usual pattern.  Sitting at an immaculately laid breakfast table, Cyril tucked in his napkin and consumed his bran flakes with military precision, starting with the top of the bowl and working his way downwards in a clockwise motion.  As ever, Cyril was oblivious to the clanking that reverberated around the small kitchen as he used his spoon to round up any deviant flakes, and oblivious to Mrs W’s flinching.   Mrs W never complained, so how could he possibly know that the sound drove her to distraction every morning?

In truth, Cyril was a real stickler for good table manners, always the first to spot the foul misdeeds of a fellow diner such as shovelling peas and what he contemptuously regarded as ‘chomping’.  He struggled immensely with the communal dining experience in the staff canteen and could not help scowling at offenders, making them feel dreadfully uneasy.  They could not know what they had done to displease but would be left in no doubt that whatever it was, their sin would never be absolved.

That morning at breakfast Cyril picked up his neatly folded Cambridge News and glanced at the headlines,

STUDENT IN DEATH PLUNGE TRAGEDY

‘Oh dear Mrs W’ he exclaimed, ‘another blessed soul has slipped through the net.’

Mrs W, waiting for Cyril to hand over his empty cereal bowl in exchange for a quieter plateful of mushrooms and scrambled eggs, asked,

‘Pardon, what’s that dear?’

Irritated at having to repeat himself Cyril retorted loudly, ‘I said yet another blessed soul slips through the next.  I would’ve talked him out of it.  Convinced him that life’s always worth living!’

Mrs W, a consistent and compliant player in the breakfast liturgy, declared,

‘Perhaps I shouldn’t say it Mr W but you’re a pillar of society, you are the life-blood of the Cambridge Samaritans!’

Cyril could not agree more but knew it would appear conceited to say so.  Yes, it was true.  Total strangers told him their life stories, their tragedies and tales – at the Coop checkout, on the guided bus and in the queue at the post office.  That was why he did what he did; one night a week as a Good Samaritan and one day a week as a Witness Service Volunteer, comforting the victims and witnesses of all manner of crimes.

Back on the gallery, resigned to the burden of consoling his new neighbour, Cyril made himself as comfortable as he could.  Looking around, he admired the symbols of office with reverence and reflection, sharing an acute sense of occasion with everyone present, officials and public alike.  The solemnity of the audacious yet utilitarian backdrop, designed by the town cemetery architect did not appear to dampen the anticipation of what could well turn out to be the best show in town.

Cyril had been here many times before but today was different.  This time he was a member of the public and he had personal knowledge of the major protagonist.

All present were about to be both fascinated and repulsed.

More to follow after the PhD…

 

 

Structuring community: resilience or resistance?

Structuring community: resilience or resistance?

This post is prompted by Lynne Berry’s keynote at the ‘Turning the Corner’ Conference, Anglia Ruskin University, September 2014.  Lynne Berry OBE is Chair of the Commission on the Voluntary Sector & Ageing.

In her address Berry contemplated the future of volunteering over the next twenty years in the context of our ageing population and the new legislation on health and social care. She wondered if the current structure of charitable organisations would survive and talked of building a new narrative and of specialist roles including providers of ‘mutual support’.  She also invited us to consider volunteering organisations from a different angle, posing the possibility of,

‘a new structure for new sorts of ‘being there’ services.’

The suggestion that we need a structure for ‘being there’, and the implication that the very act of ‘being there’ could be construed as a voluntary service, prompts a number of questions about volunteering.  In my post on, ‘Why extreme volunteering is too extreme’ (January 2014), I warn against the danger of ignoring basic needs, such as having some form of day-to-day human contact, which can be met via a simple act of kindness, no matter how small (this was in response to Lindsay Levkoff Lynn’s 2014 prediction for NESTA about extreme volunteering).  In this post I consider the question of ‘structure’ in the context of Berry’s invitation.  In my next I will consider the question of ‘services’.

It’s not that I’m against structure as such.  As a sociologist I spend much of my time observing and thinking about structure in society.  However, in working towards the final conclusion of my doctoral thesis on community inside higher education, I do find myself questioning the utility of structure as applied to the notion of a university community – a task that is especially challenging when, as a researcher, I find myself at different times inside or on the margins of that community, depending on the day, the role, the task and so on.

Sarah Mann considers alienation in the learning community in the context of online learning environments and cites Derrida’s understanding of community as something that has ‘an inside and an outside’ (Caputo 1997).  The word ‘community’ can presuppose the idea of exclusion and as Mann says,

‘belonging and sharing in common imply not belonging and sharing in common.’ (my emphasis)

Mann concludes that belonging or having a shared purpose is not at issue.  Rather, what seems to be at issue is the opening up of possibilities for expression (e.g. seeking understanding; making explicit norms and assumptions in order to question and configure them more appropriately; and voicing different experiences, histories and positions, and having these accounts heard).  Facilitating dialogue is more critical than establishing a sense of belonging, in the quest for reducing alienation (Mann 2005).

In my thesis I ask whether a sense of ‘community’ is somehow structured, or if not, should it be; that is, imposed and regulated.  UEA’s Corporate Plan 2008-2012 for example, declared, ‘we are a scholarly community within a wider community… the cohesion of our own community depends on parity of esteem and a sense of collegiality and mutual obligation.’

Mann describes a ‘dynamic of compliance’ which pulls teachers and learners towards a ‘surface form of harmony’ – sound familiar?

I’m drawn towards Mann’s suggestion that we resist the idea of certainty contained in a consensus-based (or more structured) view of community, ‘in order to maintain openness to the possibility that the future might bring something which is as yet unimagined or unknown.’

Ron Barnett, in acknowledging the existence of structure, or structures in the contemporary university, concludes that the space for an academic community to be an academic community is shrinking and that structure as such may tend to obtrude into the human relationships of a community.  There is too much structure (Barnett 2004).

So, where does this leave Berry’s proposal for ‘a new structure for new sorts of ‘being there’ services’?

Perhaps we should think of ‘being there’ as a form of structuring itself.  After all, as Berry stated in May 2009, there is a, ‘mutuality that engages us all.’

‘…Ties that bind. Contacts that help build strong, cohesive and resilient communities. These acts of citizenship build communities that can withstand snowstorms, unemployment, fire and flood…The personal experience of volunteering helps build lives and communities; and through the power of volunteering we can make a difference.  We all need help sometimes.’ (Berry 2009)

If this is a form of structuring within society, how might it relate to the notion of, ‘a new structure for new sorts of ‘being there’ services’?

Was Berry envisaging the emergence of new organisational forms, arising from communities, or was she telling existing community organisations to transform themselves, to re-structure?  Her audience at Anglia Ruskin in September comprised representatives from charities and social enterprise.  All no doubt, concerned about their future role and indeed, existence.  I was there representing ARVAC, the Association for Research in the Voluntary & Community Sector.

Professor Jenny Pearce assessed the potential of community organising in the UK at the ARVAC 2014 Annual Lecture.  Writing in the ARVAC Bulletin (Issue 121), Pearce discusses the possibility of a ‘resistant citizenship’ which may be short of ‘activism’ but could still amount to a new form of organising in the community that contributes to a, ‘greater sense of belonging to place and more intra and inter neighbourhood relationships capable of giving voice to local needs.’

On the face of it, the Berry and Pearce descriptions are similar – ‘ties that bind’, ‘intra and inter neighbourhood relationships’.  However, a significant difference is their use of the terms ‘resilient’ (Berry) and ‘resistant’ (Pearce).  Resilient communities may ensure their survival but they do not necessarily challenge the current social order; they are more likely to reproduce it.  Resistant communities have the potential to challenge and change the social order.

Also, whilst Berry endorsed the role of the voluntary sector as a campaigner at her Anglia Ruskin address, I suspect she does not envisage the sector’s role as an agent for change.  In an interview with Third Sector in January 2014, Berry referred to the future charity workforce as a ‘post-employment group of portfolio workers’, drawn from a growing group of people who are retired for up to twenty years; a group that will have a lot to offer but will have high expectations of the charities they support.  She said, ‘this generation will contain a lot of stroppy older women who want a bit more.’  That’s about as radical as it gets.

According to Pearce, citizens today are offered the role of consumers and little else.  I wonder if Berry is offering much the same.

What real purpose would Berry’s new structure serve – resilience or resistance?

In my next post I will consider what ‘services’ may mean in this context.

The ARVAC AGM and Annual Conference, on ‘Talking out of turn: getting community voices heard’ is taking place at The Circle in Sheffield on 20th November 2014.

Book your place here – www.arvactalkingoutofturn14.eventbrite.co.uk

References

ARVAC, The Association for Research in the Voluntary & Community Sector http://www.arvac.org.uk/

Barnett, R. (2004). Epilogue: Reclaiming Universities from a Runaway World. Reclaiming Universities from a Runaway World. M. Walker and J. Nixon. New York, Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press.

Caputo, John D (1997). Deconstruction in a nutshell: a conversation with Jacques Derrida Fordham University Press

Mann, S. J. (2005). “Alienation in the learning environment: a failure of community?” Studies in Higher Education 30(1): 43-55.

http://www.royalvoluntaryservice.org.uk/news-and-events/news/Lynne-Berry-launches-WRVS–first-independent-Social-Impact-Report- [accessed 25th October 2014]

http://www.thirdsector.co.uk/interview-lynne-berry/management/article/1226660 [accessed 25th October 2014]

 

 

Conviviality with a cause

Conviviality with a cause

This is the second of two posts prompted by a reading of Colin Rochester’s publication ‘Rediscovering Voluntary Action: The Beat of a Different Drum’ (2013) Palgrave Macmillan

My first post, entitled, ‘The marketisation marvel in higher education’ (26th March 2014) included observations about the relationship between the state and the voluntary & community sector:

https://jebounford.net/the-marketisation-marvel-in-higher-education/

This post is about voluntary action and the research agenda.

In critically appraising the historiography of voluntary action, Rochester embraces notions of ‘conviviality’ and ‘expressive behaviour’, providing a fresh insight into the roots of volunteering.  Breaking free of a ‘narrow paradigm’, he looks beyond the restrictive archetype of volunteering as a philanthropic act and explores what he describes as a desire for ‘conviviality’ that is closely allied to recreational activities and the constructive use of leisure time.  I don’t believe for a moment that Rochester is claiming we use all our spare time for idle pursuits.  I do believe that he is retelling the traditional chronicle and in doing so, providing a new lens through which we may see the act of volunteering as ‘serious leisure’; a term used by Rochester as he works towards his, ‘truly ‘round earth’ map of the territory’.

Rochester draws upon Hemming’s conclusion that participation in volunteer groups provides, ‘a sense of camaraderie and fellowship; a sense of belonging or identity; and above all, ‘an excuse to escape’ and ‘an adult form of play’.  It contributes to a sense of community (Hemming 2011).  He believes ‘expressive’ volunteering enables people to pursue an interest out of love for the activity rather than financial reward, and to act upon their most cherished beliefs.

In my blog entitled, ‘Why ‘extreme’ volunteering is too extreme’ (31st Jan 2014), I pleaded for us not to ignore the mundane, as without it, society would come unstuck; meeting basic needs, such as having some form of day-to-day human contact via a simple act of kindness, no matter how small:

https://jebounford.net/why-extreme-volunteering-is-too-extreme/

It’s about community on many levels.  Since moving to Great Gransden, for example, I’ve been struck by the way in which the expressive and the mundane are fused in friendships of all kinds, in all scenarios, responding to need, and sharing recreation, joy and troubled times.

I would call it conviviality with a cause.

Rochester also calls for a radical revision of the research agenda in this field.  Critical of an academic tradition that has, ‘not produced much in the way of additional ‘usable theory’’ (his ‘honourable exceptions’ include Horton Smith 2000, Lohmann 1992 and Milofsky 2008), he wants research to move away from quantitative methods, that is, collecting evidence by measuring e.g. organisations, resources and time spent on volunteering.  Existing qualitative research is also judged to be of limited scope, diverting attention from what volunteers actually do, and how they work together; what is the balance – or tension – between expressive aims (or member benefit) and instrumental aims (or public benefit)?; why and how do people join non-bureaucratic groups?; how is the ‘work’ of the group organised?  He says we need qualitative research that develops ‘usable’ theories to explain ‘how things work’.

In attempting to move away from the concentration on measuring the instrumental impacts of volunteering, Rochester looks to the IVR Impact Assessment Toolkit which groups ‘the major ways in which stakeholders can be affected’ into five types of ‘capital’ – physical, human, economic, social and cultural.  He clearly approves of this societal level analysis, saying it captures much – but not all – of the constellation of roles and functions played by volunteering.  Social capital, for example, contributes to the creation of a ‘more cohesive community through building relationships, networks and bond of trust between people’.

My concern is that having criticised a ‘dominate paradigm’ that characterises volunteering as a gift of time (analogous to a gift of money) Rochester then appears to endorse the notion of capital which itself is contested as a tool of analysis in certain academic quarters.  For example, Bev Skeggs, in her 2013 BJS Annual Public Lecture last October, concluded that as sociologists we have a duty not to reproduce the logic of capital in everything we analyse.  In applying the logic of capital we convert everything into commodity.  We become the subject of capital and we internalise its imperatives.

http://www.lse.ac.uk/newsAndMedia/videoAndAudio/channels/publicLecturesAndEvents/player.aspx?id=2057

I am currently grappling with this issue in my own research where I am asking if ‘community’ may be construed as a form of capital and exploring the conditions necessary for the existence of community inside the academy.  I am, for example, seeking signifiers of personal, physical and institutional attributes that may reveal the existence of ‘community’ capital.  Last week my supervisor asked me how I intended to ‘measure’ these forms of capital.  I didn’t have an answer and, to be honest, that doesn’t worry me.

As I work through the final analysis, I am minded to heed Skeggs’ call for us to look for where the theories don’t work, where they can’t be applied.  This is where, in my view, Rochester’s plea for us to embrace the expressive and Skeggs’ entreaty for the expression of ‘values beyond value’, come together.

I’m now wondering how ‘community’ may be understood in its expressive form… in 2015 I may have an answer.

References

Bev Skeggs, ‘Values beyond value? Is anything beyond the logic of capital?’

2013 BJS Annual Public Lecture, given at the London School of Economics on 17th October 2013 –

http://www.lse.ac.uk/newsAndMedia/videoAndAudio/channels/publicLecturesAndEvents/player.aspx?id=2057

Hemming, H. (2011) Together: How Small Groups Achieve Big Things, London: John Murray

Lohmann, R. (1992) The Commons: New Perspectives on Nonprofit Organisations and Voluntary Action, San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass

Milofsky, C. (2008) Smallville: Institutionalizing Community in Twenty-First Century America, Hanover, NH and London, University Press of New England

Smith, D. H. (2000) Grassroots Associations, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Why ‘extreme’ volunteering is too extreme

At the turn of the year I read NESTA’s ‘14 for 2014’, predictions compiled by their ‘team of in-house experts’ for the coming 12 months.  My attention was drawn to the topic ‘The rise of extreme volunteering’ by Lindsay Levkoff Lynn.  (For some reason, for me the word extreme always conjures up an image of the sport they call extreme ironing but that may just be an indication of how much I loathe that particular activity; a topic for another posting maybe.)  Lindsay says that extreme volunteering is about regular people going beyond the usual levels of volunteering, and gives some great examples such as the City Year volunteers; 18-25 year olds who dedicate a year, full-time, before university, or work to support head teachers in turning around underprivileged UK schools, and Shared Lives Plus, whereby families ‘adopt’ someone in need, giving them a place to live and making them a part of the family.  I have no doubt that these, and many such similar schemes, truly change people’s lives.

For many, volunteering is simply a way of life.  It’s in their DNA, and represents the more positive side of human nature.  What worries me is Lindsay’s prediction, and in particular her application of the term ‘extreme’ in the context of volunteering.  I am concerned that –

–          any volunteering which is construed as ordinary, or not extreme, may be viewed as a lesser activity.  We seem to be in an age where people feel they must do something out of the ordinary to get noticed and we are in danger of not valuing the mundane without which, society would come unstuck.

–          any cause or need which is construed as ordinary, or not extreme, may be viewed as a lesser cause.  There is a danger of ignoring basic needs, such as having some form of day-to-day human contact, which can be met via a simple act of kindness, no matter how small.

–          volunteering might be relied on to take the place of state services in times of austerity.  There is nothing wrong in recognising the value of neighbourly assistance, particularly in hard times such as these.  There is a danger, however, in accepting a lesser role for the state in the welfare of our society, and in assuming that volunteering will fill the gaps.

–          the notion of a gap year as a ‘give back’ year detracts from the idea of giving.  I agree that those young people who are privileged enough to take a gap year at all are likely to appreciate the notion of giving back but this may well detract from the act of giving itself.  Of course, the volunteer also benefit from volunteering, but does it have to be promulgated as some sort of reciprocity?  Why not just give?

I first started volunteering at the age of thirteen years, helping my parents, Triss and Bas Driver, at the Cambridge PHAB Club, founded by my amazing godmother, Joyce Mitchell who, at nearly ninety, is still actively involved.  My parents were also involved in running a youth club at the United Reform Church in Victoria Road also in Cambridge;  this at a tender age when they weren’t much older than the club members themselves.  I have a vivid memory of Mum and Dad running the pram race from Cambridge to Ely as a fund-raiser.  This was in the 1960s – remember those Silver Cross prams? – you can easily accommodate a grown man dressed as a baby in one of those!  And they’re still volunteering; although maybe not the pram racing these days.  I’m indebted to them both for passing on that lifelong passion.

I was also lucky enough to take two gap years, before and after my undergraduate degree over thirty years ago. Volunteering featured in both, particularly the second, when I worked as a full-time volunteer at the Cambridge Women’s Refuge.  As an undergraduate I had been involved hospital visiting, working with the Gingerbread Group, supporting lone parents, and with the College Nightline Service, which served, not only students but also the wider community.   As a postgraduate, I had the privilege of being involved in the miners’ strike, not only in the political act of picketing, but also in putting together and distributing food parcels to the miners’ families.  I had the time to do all this because I hadn’t had to work my way through college, unlike so many, who must now do so in order to pay their way.

Students bring a passion and volunteering ethos to our universities.  And higher education institutions should indeed support, encourage, and most of all, recognise and value, what they do.  I’ve been impressed, for example, by the work of UEA’s Stop the Traffik student society, and the incredible commitment of individual students, who are driven by a desire to make a difference.

I’m concerned, however, about the industry that has of late emerged around student volunteering, or ‘employability’ as it is called these days.  I’m not denying that volunteering is good for the CV, and I always encourage young people to make the most of their credentials in order to improve their prospects of employment.  It’s certainly useful to have an addition to the standard CV when setting out your stall.  However, it is absolutely vital that accreditation, and indeed certification in the form of instruments, such as the Higher Education Achievement Report, does not end up commodifying the very act of volunteering.

Lindsay predicts that in 2014 extreme volunteering will become the norm, and that we will live in a better world as a result.  I say, don’t neglect the mundane and value all who want to make a difference.

You can find her prediction here –

http://www.nesta.org.uk/news/14-predictions-2014/rise-extreme-volunteering