Events

Hidden Harm panel event

Mark your calendar for an upcoming panel event on Thurs Nov 28, 2024, 4-5pm on Zoom: "The Hidden Harm: Understanding and addressing the consequences of patient shaming". The event, which will be of interest to anyone who works in or around healthcare, will be hosted by Dr Karen Patterson, co-director of the ROK, Respiratory Physician and Senior Lecturer at the Brighton and Sussex Medical School. She will be joined by:

  • Prof Sumita Verma, Professor of Heptaology at BSMS, Honorary Consultant at the University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust
  • Zoe Yates, patient speaker, Hepatitis C Trust
  • Prof Luna Dolezal, Professor of Philosophy and Medical Humanities at the University of Exeter, Prinicipal Investigator for the Shame and Medicine Project

Click here to register

Recruitment flyer - feel free to share

Friends of Vale Park: Kindness Talk

On 19 May 2024, placement students Ray and Freya delivered a Kindness Talk where they spoke about the meaning of kindness and its importance for a variety of different constructs of our everyday life with the use of some fun, interactive activities!

Community Event

Based on their event back in November, placement students Freya and Ray hosted a similar event at the Open Market on London Road whereby participants wrote kind anonymous messages to be passed along to a stranger!

Panel debate: Scaling-up Kindness - exploring the connections between small acts, charity, rights and systemic change

On 28 February 2024, 3-4:30pm, as part of the Anthropology Department Seminar series, we have a panel debate: "Scaling-up Kindness - exploring the connections between small acts, charity, rights and systemic change". Panellists will include: Dr Amy Clarke, Prof Ben Rogaly, Dr Liz McDonnell, Muthanna Sari, and Prof Meike Fechter. If you're on the University of Sussex campus, you're welcome to join us in person, in the Global Studies Resource Centre (Arts C157).

Stay tuned:

  • Click here to join the event live.
  • We are investigating the possibility of recording the event. If this is possible, we will post a link to the recording here.

The Kindness Exchange

To celebrate World Kindness Day (Monday 13 November, 2023) our 2023-24 placement students, Freya Smith and Ray Teso, hosted a week-long event consisting of two main activities: the first asked participants to answer question prompts related to five subtopics of kindness, the second encouraged them to write a kind letter to be passed along to a stranger!

Learn more about the Kindness Exchange

The Kindness Corner

Placement student Kerry Moor planned and ran the "Kindness Corner" event on the University's campus in 2022. The Kindness Corner is an interactive space where people can share their thoughts about kindness, learn about kindness, and carry out kind acts in the moment. Daily origami classes were arranged with the intention of having people give away their piece to a stranger, as an act of kindness.

Learn more about the Kindness Corner

Sussex Centre for Research on Kindness - Public launch

We held a public launch event for the Centre on Thursday 23 March, 2023, hosted by BBC Radio 4 presenter Claudia Hammond.

View the recording.

0:00 - Opening remarks
7:49 - Claudia talks about her book, "The Keys to Kindness", which draws on the results of The Kindness Test: a global research collaboration between the University of Sussex and the BBC.
36:08 - Audience sharing stories about acts of kindness. View the responses from our online audience members
41:38 - Claudia hosts a panel discussion on kindness in schools, in the workplace, and in the community
1:22:05 - Questions from the audience
1:39:19 - Closing remarks

View Images from the event.

Ask the Experts: Discussion on Kindness - University of Sussex Alumni Network

On Monday 16 May, we held the fourth in our online Ask the Experts series. This episode explored the concept of kindness. The discussion was chaired by Sussex alumna, BBC broadcaster and visiting psychology professor, Claudia Hammond.

With our special guest panelists: -

  • Professor Robin Banerjee
  • Professor of Developmental Psychology, and Head of School of Psychology 
  • Dr Tom Farsides, Lecturer in Social Psychology 
  • Dr Anne-Meike Fechter, Reader in Anthropology 
  • Dr Gillian Sandstrom, Senior Lecturer in the Psychology of Kindness, and Director of the Kindness Research Centre

Watch the discussion