Hello, Friends! I’m Ali Fraser, Director of the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research - a community critical, curious and creative researchers based in Scotland. Dedicated to rethinking crime and justice.

In this podcast series, I’ll be introducing you to the people that make the Centre, their lives and work, what inspires them and makes them tick. To pique your interest, perk up your ears, and probe your thinking.

In each episode we’ll look at a different topic, turning it over and holding it up to the light. We’ll hear stories of justice and injustice, darkness and light, laughter and hope. Stories of justice from the people who make it.

Welcome to the Just Humans Podcast.

Just Humans: Darkness with Dr Anna Souhami

Our first episode is about darkness with Dr Anna Souhami, Senior Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Edinburgh.

Anna takes us on an audio trip to Shetland, around 200 miles north of the Scottish mainland, where she researched policing on the periphery and discovered how the dark skies loomed large in people's daily lives.

"It struck me even on that first day; the sea and the weather and the light and the darkness was so fundamental and central to life in Shetland, and how could they not be to policing on Shetland also?"

Host: Dr Alistair Fraser

Produced and edited by Rachelle Cobain and Mark Cunningham

Follow Anna on twitter via: @AnnaSouhami

Music: ‘Rewind’ by Donna Maciocia and Sean H available to download from the Distant Voices EP ‘Looking at Colours Again’.

Poems written by Christine de Luca www.christinedeluca.co.uk/

Visit our website: www.sccjr.ac.uk

Translation: Dr Phil Crockett Thomas

When we think about translation we usually think of translating from one language to another but research is an act of translation too. Often you are translating an experience, a conversation or observation into quotes and tables. Maybe there’s a better way of doing this?

Our guest, Dr Phil Crockett Thomas, a visual sociologist based at the University of Glasgow and research associate on the Distant Voices project, has found poetry to communicate her research and talks to Dr Alistair Fraser about her latest collection ‘Stir’.

“The poems really developed out of my time spent in these prison based song-writing workshops. What I found was that my ongoing practice as a writer of mainly fiction lead to the production of these fragmentary poetic fieldnotes.”

Host: Dr Alistair Fraser

Produced and edited by Rachelle Cobain and Mark Cunningham

Follow Phil on twitter via: @crowdedmouth

Phil’s collection of poems ‘Stir’ is available to read on her website: bit.ly/35H9Uj9

Music: ‘Rewind’ by Donna Maciocia and Sean H available to download from the Distant Voices EP ‘Looking at Colours Again’.

Visit our website: www.sccjr.ac.uk