What does it mean to be queer and identify with the LGBTQIA+ community? What is it to be a queer Allied Health professional? Who are ‘we’ and how do we navigate the health and social care setting with our maginalised social identities? What does it mean to be in community and what would that look like?

It is well known that individuals who identify from marginalised groups, encounter more minority stress and are more likely to experience or witness bullying, harassment and discrimination within the workplace (CSP member survey 2020). The stress of navigating the social ‘norms’ within our professional spaces mirror that of the wider cultural landscape where disclosure, values, identity and safety become integral concerns for our daily work lives.

This is the 3rd gatherinng of this kind and it will be on online event. The workshop is led by Andrea Wright and Louie Howie, both working in the physiotherapy field, and members of the LGBTQIA+ community. They are keen explorers in creativity, somatics and radical thinking around issues of social justice, anti-oppression and equity work. They wish to invite a co-creative space for critical and creative praxis to explore how we are ‘becoming’ ourselves as individuals and in community as health professionals. This is a trauma-informed workshop.

Please note: This event is ONLY for AHP's who identify within the LGBTQIA+ community.

Aims

To explore what does it mean to be a queer AHP, through creative expression, embodied practices and community dialogue.

Objectives

• Participants will have a broader understanding of the experience of other queer AHP colleagues.
• Participants will co-create possible ways in which we can support each other in and outside the workplace.
• Participants will gain familiarity with embodied ways of being
• Participants will increase their embodied knowledge and be able to access systems of care for themselves.
• Participants will be invited to think together what does it mean to be in community.

About your facilitators

Andrea Wright enjoys asking questions that expand the understanding of our human experience. As a queer, cis-gendered, non-disabled woman racialised as black, she is curious about embodiment practices and how it intersects with social identity, creativity, spirituality and social justice. Her early career research is exploring the experiences of the Global Majority & LGBTQIA+ groups within physiotherapy. She works as a physiotherapist, facilitator, somatic educator, healing practitioner and is a mental health first aider.

Louie Howie is an older, white, trans, queer, non-disabled physio student in Bristol who goes to a lot of dance workshops, particularly movement improvisation. She loves being in participatory creative spaces, and occasionally facilitates. Her fascinations include relationship, listening, trust, and processes of discovery. “What’s alive for me right now?” is a favourite question