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Lockdown Diaries of the Working Class
The Lockdown Diaries of the Working Class is a celebration of working class culture in the UK. This book is the first project of The Working Class Collective, a community of working class creatives and people who want to celebrate working class culture around the world. The original idea for the book comes from Dr Lisa Mckenzie, a working class academic who initially sought the diaries as part of a research project. Lisa was frustrated the with academic institutions and the lack of interest in the diaries and what they captured and so the collective was created to do something with them - which turned into this incredible book!
The diaries, submitted by working class people across the UK capture their experiences of the first lockdown during Covid19 in 2020. The diaries are brought to life by six incredible working class illustrators, each of them very different in style and tone but perfectly capturing the experiences of the diary writers. This book was made possible by 700+ backers through a Kickstarter campaign.
The diaries, submitted by working class people across the UK capture their experiences of the first lockdown during Covid19 in 2020. The diaries are brought to life by six incredible working class illustrators, each of them very different in style and tone but perfectly capturing the experiences of the diary writers. This book was made possible by 700+ backers through a Kickstarter campaign.
295 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 14, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 5, 2022
There could be lots of ways to review this great book and I’m just taking one approach.
The books stand-out achievement is in being a working class innovation in the presentation of a sociological study. It gets right away from the usual dry academic format and is makes knowledge accessable to a wide audience.
The book is based on peoples diaries during lockdown. Lisa McKenzie inserts commentary informed with her sociology oversight, but with a light hand, and its the people voices that come across strong and authentic. In a m/c sociology the commentary would usually come first and the voices of the respondents would be second in sprinkled quotes.
The book is put together by a collective of people. It’s a beautiful production and the love of the makers comes through in a way you rarely see in books from the big publishers - especially academic books!
The inclusion of visual artists is another innovation, not least because visual communication was historically side-lined to the text borne knowledge in ‘serious’ books of knowledge. And this was a class issue as in picture books are supposedly for children, bare text without images is what educated men want. See my review of Barbara Staffords book on this subject - link below. In The Lockdown Diaries the artists are a vibrant, assertive presence with obvious freedom to respond in whatever way they feel. So they are not ‘illustrators’ responding to a brief but displaying their own thinking.
Maybe we should be asking what a working class led knowledge academy might look like, rather than simply mewling about being treated poorly by the current academic system, and this is a good example of a work to kick off such a discussion.
My review of Barabara Stafford’s book ‘Artful Science: enlightenment entertainment and the eclipse of visual education (1994) is here:
https://stefan-szczelkun.blogspot.com...
The books stand-out achievement is in being a working class innovation in the presentation of a sociological study. It gets right away from the usual dry academic format and is makes knowledge accessable to a wide audience.
The book is based on peoples diaries during lockdown. Lisa McKenzie inserts commentary informed with her sociology oversight, but with a light hand, and its the people voices that come across strong and authentic. In a m/c sociology the commentary would usually come first and the voices of the respondents would be second in sprinkled quotes.
The book is put together by a collective of people. It’s a beautiful production and the love of the makers comes through in a way you rarely see in books from the big publishers - especially academic books!
The inclusion of visual artists is another innovation, not least because visual communication was historically side-lined to the text borne knowledge in ‘serious’ books of knowledge. And this was a class issue as in picture books are supposedly for children, bare text without images is what educated men want. See my review of Barbara Staffords book on this subject - link below. In The Lockdown Diaries the artists are a vibrant, assertive presence with obvious freedom to respond in whatever way they feel. So they are not ‘illustrators’ responding to a brief but displaying their own thinking.
Maybe we should be asking what a working class led knowledge academy might look like, rather than simply mewling about being treated poorly by the current academic system, and this is a good example of a work to kick off such a discussion.
My review of Barabara Stafford’s book ‘Artful Science: enlightenment entertainment and the eclipse of visual education (1994) is here:
https://stefan-szczelkun.blogspot.com...
December 31, 2024
This was a great read, and a brilliant insight into the real lives and challenges during the terrifying and confusing period of lockdown, and how it affected ordinary people in different ways. I'd have liked to have heard more from people working in retail, delivery drivers and the NHS/care sector, but I guess most were too stressed and knackered to write diaries. I loved the illustrations.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews