Listening to Sarah

I feel Sarah’s frustration about how we often end up focusing more on internal processes or logics, rather than people. She says that what matters are people in front of me holding a photograph. For her the message seems to be about being a facilitator and being interested in people’s stories, but sometimes loosing that focus.  

She hints at the fact that as an organisation or in our job roles, we can sometimes be a dividing force, creating boundaries, which has to do with the tensions we have to hold, while we should rather be a uniting force. National and local are not divided but one story, it’s not either or. Bradford is the national story – the nation is Bradford. And we need to be a bit more critical of what we think of when we say national anyways.  

Sarah says she wouldn’t be reminded of what the collections are there for, being Bradford, being national, and mattering to people if it weren’t for occasions and activities like at Windrush Day in City Park. Without people using the things the museum collects, without their input and knowledge, we would lose insight, information, it would make us intellectually poorer. Her saying that this is possible for us to forget while doing our jobs, says something about how we are set up as an organisation.

Gin Jacobucci, Volunteers Coordinator

Sarah Ledjmi's moment

In June 2019, I joined our project partners Elizabeth Llabres (Bradford Museums and Galleries) and Tim Smith for an activity...