Skip to content
Who is Your Neighbour? (logo)

“Support a Conversation that Matters”

Donate!
  • Home
  • Our WorkExpand
    • Our Work
    • Conversations
    • Who we areExpand
      • The team
      • The region
    • Reports
    • FAQs
  • How We Can HelpExpand
    • Conversations, training, support
    • Resources
  • Connect With UsExpand
    • Contact
    • Donate
    • Join Our Mailing List
  • WiYN? NoticeboardExpand
    • New Post
Who is Your Neighbour? (logo)
Stories

Living (with) the Legacy

ByAnna

Stories

Being heard and listening is valuable. Some people get too few opportunities to explore stories of who they are, the places where they live, the changes they have processed and their experience of new arrivals

When space is made for such stories, it can inspire positive change.

older woman sitting at kitchen table looking at somebody opposite her who is out of shot

Empathy

Holding conversations can provide time and space to discover stories together.

Angela and Ray* shared anecdotes that revealed to them, and others, a strong inclination to reach out to, learn about and empathise with people who are different.

In Angela’s Rotherham neighbourhood, there had been racial tension. But she talked about noticing and helping a young “boy in the front garden, really upset” by a piercing burglar alarm. His family, newly-arrived asylum seekers, had been housed and had no information about the alarm. Angela worked out how to silence it, relieving the child, who had:

Selection of mismatched mugs and items for making hot drinks on top of a pair of filing cabinets
come from somewhere war-torn. That brought it all back. He's in this panic state. To give ‘em a house and not care, I thought, that is disgusting.
Ray, an older member of a Sheffield community struggling to adjust to new arrivals, also described a story of deepening tolerance - for people who are different and for people who find it hard to welcome:
My Dad fought in World War II and I think that twisted him up to foreigners. A lot of his friends got killed in front of him.

"That's Bang On!"

Ray told stories of division and violence being imposed on people from outside:

It’s older men putting guns in younger men’s hands, has been from year dot.

He also told stories of warmth, captured in responses to an England v. Pakistan Test Match:

There were taxis going around, English flag out one window and Pakistan flag out another. I thought, that’s bang on, that, fantastic!

group of people chatting animatedly over tea and biscuits around a table

Ray understood well the challenges of adapting to change; and was delighted to see this sign of optimism:

‘I support Pakistan but I’m English’. Brilliant! We need more of that.

What We Learned

One of the reasons we were invited to work in Angela’s and Ray’s communities was a perceived tension with newer arrivals. The stories that emerged revealed that reality is more complex. New discoveries are happening in people and communities all the time.

Angela wasn’t sure about how her place was changing; she was also compassionate. Ray understood his Dad’s “racism”; he also embraced difference.

* all names have been changed

Sometimes, talking and listening create space for people to notice their story and how they really feel. Changes and revelations can happen during a carefully-held conversation:

What We Learned

One of the reasons we were invited to work in Angela’s and Ray’s communities was a perceived tension with newer arrivals. The stories that emerged revealed that reality is more complex. New discoveries are happening in people and communities all the time.

Angela wasn’t sure about how her place was changing; she was also compassionate. Ray understood his Dad’s “racism”; he also embraced difference.

* all names have been changed

Sometimes, talking and listening create space for people to notice their story and how they really feel. Changes and revelations can happen during a carefully-held conversation:

Moments of Change in Conversation

  • People living near Doncaster realised none of them had ever met a Muslim
  • Residents in part of Barnsley noticed that violence could exist in their community, just as it could in gypsy / traveller communities, and in many others
  • Young people in Rotherham challenged one another about the validity of Stephen Yaxley Lennon’s arguments

Some Moments of Change in Conversations

People living near Doncaster...
Residents in part of Barnsley ...
Young people in Rotherham ...

People living near Doncaster realised none of them had ever met a Muslim

Residents in part of Barnsley noticed that violence could exist in their community, just as it could in gypsy / traveller communities, and in many others

Young people in Rotherham challenged one another about the validity of Stephen Yaxley Lennon’s arguments

Read all four resources in It Comes Up (in conversation) …

Share this on...
Post Tags: #It Comes Up in Conversation

Supported by:

The Tudor Trust [logo]
Supported by Southall Trust [logo]
Paul Hamlyn Foundation (PHF) [logo]
The Wharfdale Foundation [logo]
Orange Tree Trust (logo)
  • The Tudor Trust [logo]
  • Supported by Southall Trust [logo]
  • Paul Hamlyn Foundation (PHF) [logo]
  • The Wharfdale Foundation [logo]
  • Orange Tree Trust (logo)
  • Contact
  • Donate!
  • Privacy

© 2025 Who is Your Neighbour? Registered charity #1196667 All photography by @lesmonaghanphoto (unless otherwise stated). Website by @mounsey

Scroll to top
  • Home
  • Our Work
    • Conversations
    • Who We Are
    • The Team
    • The Region
    • Reports
    • FAQs
  • How We Can Help
    • Conversations, Training, Support
    • Resources
  • Connect With Us
    • Contact
    • Donate
    • Privacy Policy
Facebook Instagram Linkedin