Case Study - Coming to Coventry

Programme: Your Heritage
Applicant: Asian Mental Health Access Project
Grant awarded: £50,000
Project length: 2 years, 9 months

Coming to Coventry - printable (MS Word, 212KB)

Summary

Coming to Coventry was a partnership project between the Asian Mental Health Access project (AMHAP), Coventry Teaching Primary Care Trust and the Herbert Art Gallery.

The partnership recognised that many early migrants to Coventry were now dying, taking their personal histories with them so the project aimed to record those important memories before they were lost and to celebrate the history and achievements of Coventry’s South Asian community.

Interviews, artefacts and photographs were collected for a book, touring exhibition and web site, and they are now available for everyone at the Herbert Art Gallery.

The aims of the project

The project had two main aims:

to research and record the personal histories of those members of the South Asian community who led the way in establishing their community in Coventry; and
to celebrate those histories and achievements and to tell the stories to a wider audience through a touring exhibition, book and web site.

Benefits for heritage

The project captured the experiences of members of the South Asian community who were pioneers in settling in Coventry and who now form the city’s largest ethnic minority community. Themes explored were: employment in transport and factories; involvement in local politics; establishing businesses; securing professional posts; sports and leisure activities; artists and writers; and women in the workplace and at home.
The project recorded how the community maintained cultural traditions and customs, established places of worship, and conducted ceremonies such as weddings, funerals and festivals.
More than 600 photographs and artefacts were collected and are available at the Herbert.
Without the project many of these stories, and thus an important part of the city’s heritage, would have been lost.

Benefits for people

Over 60 pioneers were interviewed and encouraged to tell their stories in their own words. Interviews were largely conducted in the speaker’s first language and were translated into English for greater accessibility.
The project targeted both the South Asian community to encourage people to cherish their own heritage and non-Asian communities to help people learn about their neighbours and challenge stereotypes and misconceptions.
The book was distributed free to all 118 Coventry schools and to libraries, museums and the university. It is available in both English and Punjabi.

Lessons learnt

If you want to engage a particular community for the first time, partner with an organisation that is already doing this successfully or work through key individuals who have credibility in the community.
Make sure your overall aims are clear at the outset and stick to them, but be prepared to change your way of working in response to community needs as the project progresses. Have regular progress meetings so that targets are met and reviewed.
A written document outlining the projects aims and individuals’ roles and responsibilities is important. If the lead responsibility shifts from one partner to the other during the project, make sure that this is clearly and formally acknowledged in revised partnership documents and new arrangements for managing people and budgets.

Managing project workers and volunteers, including supervising and supporting them, is an important skill. If you are inexperienced in managing people you should ask for help from within your organisation or beyond.

Long term benefits

All the interviews, photographs and artefacts collected are held at the Herbert and are publicly accessible as a long term record of the pioneers’ stories;
Further information can be found on the Coming to Coventy project website

The budget

Main Project Costs	£	Funding	£
Staff/recruitment/fees	21,780	Other grants	0
Equipment/materials/training	21,600	Non-cash contributions	7,500
Overheads / travel / stationery	6,620	HLF grant (87%)	50,000
Volunteer labour	5,700
		Total costs	57,500

Pariticipants of the Coming to coventry project

Some of the pioneers who took part

Sector

Cultures and Memories

Activity

Conservation