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Dear white middle class British women: Please don't send used bras (or anything, really) to Africa

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I am supposed to be on my summer blogging break, but the world of bad development does not seem to take a vacation...

The first time I came across the #SWEDOW (Stuff We Don't Want) debate about what to do with unwanted stuff and whether to send it to 'Africa' was in 2010; in fact, I wrote about a shoe donation project on the blog in 2012.

Fast forward to July 2019 and a local British Women's Institute Facebook page with about 500 page likes is posting a picture of two innocent-looking parcels that has been shared very widely. The vast majority of the 500+ comments under the post are positive and I am sure that both charities will receive quite a few parcels in the next few days.

It seems almost futile and pointing out bad examples of charity and development is not always the best way to communicate, but I anonymize the post as much as possible to avoid simply shaming a particular Women's Institute chapter.

'Rapey men here are the same as rapey men there'
Let…
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White saviour communication rituals in 10 easy steps

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The David Lammy/White Saviour versus Stacey Dooley/Comic Relief debate is an excellent opportunity to look at some of the core elements of ritual communication behind many debates in international development-especially when charities and celebrities are involved!

At the time of writing the debate has already followed the first seven or eight steps and I’m pretty sure that it will go full circle between now and Red Nose Day 2020…

1. Don’t learn from past debates
It is worth remembering that this is not some obscure debate a few development bloggers have pointed out. In late 2017, Comic Relief got called out for their video of sending Ed Sheeran to Liberia.

A quick reminder from a December 2017 Guardian piece:

The Sheeran-fronted Comic Relief video, during which the singer offers to pay hotel costs for street children in Liberia, verged on “poverty tourism”, according to the jury.
(...)“Ed Sheeran has good intentions,” she said. “But the problem is the video is focused on Ed Sheera…
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Should I consider a PhD in International Development Studies?

After the Economist’s piece on the (non-)value of doing a PhD and some comments later (e.g. Prometheus doesn't read the Economist (I like the slightly cynical dichotomy between ‘civilians’ and the ‘academic insiders) or the '100 Reasons NOT to Go to Graduate School' (they are only halfway through so check it out regularly in the future...) I had an interesting conversation with a prospective PhD student a few days ago.
This was not the first time that I had been approached about doing a PhD and I always try to be as frank as possible, even playing the ‘devil’s advocate’ when it comes to the complicated ‘should I or shouldn’t I?’ decision-making process. At the end of our conversation I sat down and tried to summarize a few important and generic points from the point of view of doing a PhD in Development Studies and in the UK.
I understand that every case is different and involves a range of motives, options and rationales, but there a few important questions and topics t…
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Dear ICRC: We need to talk about Nas Daily & “the most undiscovered country”

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Dear ICRC,

Let’s start with the good news: Nas Daily’s video The Most Undiscovered Country (#undiscoveredcountry #ICRC #honor) has only been viewed about 2,600 times since it appeared on YouTube on 21 August – so the damage is limited.
However, it is still a pretty terrible video.

Maybe a I am bit more sensitized as an academic who does communication for development as a job, but the mixture of ‘exploration’, ‘tourism’ and ‘aid work’ is usually not the best starting point to promote a professional global development organization.
Sending someone from the global North to ‘discover’ Papua New Guinea rubs me the wrong way right from the start of the 5 minute video. 
I know, I know: Many of us could easily get enticed by the story of Nuseir Yassin and his journey from Israel to Harvard to tech industry to travel blogger and you wanted to work with a digital influencer to get the young kids interested in ICRC work, I guess.
Nas has created a business off of his personal mantra of self-f…
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Links & Contents I Liked 330

Hi all,

Glad Midsommar from Sweden!

This will be one of the last link reviews before the summer break and from a communication for development perspective this one almost has it all-from terrible ideas of how to spend your honeymoon to female leadership, capitalist-fix critique & instructions on how to reboot your lightbulbs!
Enjoy!

My quotes of the week
There’s a real need for Arab women in our field. We’re based in a region where most countries have experienced wars, disasters, crises and upheavals, so there’s a need for more hands, especially in the form of Arab women,” she added. “We have empathy, we understand the culture and we speak the language. It makes a big difference.
(Rana Sidani Cassou, Why more women should take up humanitarian work in Middle East and North Africa)
We have a strong recommendation for a reparations fund.
(...) we would like to see this fund actually being focused on the individual survivors and helping them repair their lives. We know that when people ar…
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