In the sixth episode of our podcast series, Anthony and Giulia speak to Mat Southwell, a global advocate on drugs and HIV, technical support consultant and drug user activist.
Mat was one of the co-founders of the the European Network of People who use Drugs. Mat was also one of the first people to introduce party harm reduction education through his work with MixMag in the 1990s.
Here we discuss this early work, as well as media representations of drug use, the Dance-Drugs Alliance, and the importance of harm reduction as a strategy for drugs policy in the UK.
S01 E09 – In conversation with Verity Smith – People and Dancefloors
In this episode, we invited Verity Smith, a PhD researcher at Durham University, to share insights from her ethnographic study of drug policing at music festivals. In the podcast, she reflects on the challenges of multiagency work in festival environments, focusing particularly on some of the tensions between enforcement policing and harm reduction and risk minimisation objectives. Verity takes us on a journey from policing, private security, and sniffer dogs at the festival gate, all the way to festival utopias.
Can we change the culture of festivals towards harm reduction embedded in festival environment design? Total ear candy!
Follow Verity on Twitter at @veritymasmith
More snazzy content on the links below!
