Anti-Racism in Creative Health: Beyond the Optics

Guest Blog: Written by Jemilea Wisdom-Baako, Director, Writerz and Scribez 

Anti-Racism in Creative Health: Beyond the Optics

The world shifts in response to major events that capture our attention, redefine culture, and shake the ground beneath us. In the immediacy of their aftermath, there’s a collective urgency to do something. But this urgency is often fleeting. People move on. They turn their gaze elsewhere. Some grow weary of the continued reminders.

But when you live in a body that is targeted, you don’t get to change the channel. The state of society impacts your daily existence—mentally, emotionally, economically. You carry it everywhere.

After the murder of George Floyd, we saw a wave of global protest. Black squares filled social media. Public statements were issued. Anti-racism became the motive. Books were published, speeches made, reading lists circulated. From the pulpit to the pavement, the cry was loud. But for all the noise, much of the response was hasty—some of it hollow. Steering groups sprang up. Brands, governments, and institutions promised to reflect, to introspect, to change.

Until people got sick of it.

Anti-racism was framed as a trend. Training sessions became eye-roll territory. DEI fatigue set in. Tick-box exercises replaced deep engagement. Boardroom high-fives were celebrated as progress, while Black and Brown staff continued to experience racism—now with the added weight of performative allyship.

Maybe you too are tired. Tired of the fight. Or tired of the fighters.

In the creative health sector, many practitioners see themselves as inherently good people—helpers, healers, changemakers. But that self-perception can make it hard to acknowledge how our behaviours and assumptions feed into the poison of colonisation, white supremacy, and systemic racism. We like to believe that because our work is rooted in care, it is inherently just. But good intentions are not enough.

The facts are clear.

The arts sector is racist.

The health sector is racist.

And so, Creative Health—as a sector that emerges from both—has inherited that legacy.

So the question is: as we pioneer and champion this growing field, what are we doing to build something different? Are we embedding equity and inclusion from the foundations up?

Or are we replicating the same systems—just with better branding?

Anti-racism in creative health cannot be occasional or reactive. It must be embedded. It must be lived. It requires us to move beyond tokenism and toward structural transformation. This means examining who holds power, whose voices are centred, whose work is funded, and who is missing from the room.

At Writerz and Scribez—a Black-led organisation working at the intersection of arts, health, and equity—we developed anti-racism training in direct response to the state of our sector. We looked beyond the statements and slogans. We interrogated policies, read through toolkits and impact reports from both arts and health sectors. We asked hard questions: Do these policies protect us? Do they meaningfully include us? Or are they simply signals that organisations want to be seen as anti-racist?

Awareness is not enough. Acknowledging the problem is not the same as working to solve it. Change requires action. Consistent, intentional, and systemic action.

It also requires creating spaces where people of the global majority are not merely included, but truly seen, heard, valued—and leading. Where our experiences aren’t seen as exceptional or supplementary, but as integral to the very foundation of the sector. We often talk about co-production and co-design—so why does our sector still struggle to embody those values internally?

I don’t claim to speak for all global majority artists. But I am committed to creating room for us. To reframing the conversation. To using the access and influence I have to shift narratives, challenge assumptions, and disrupt systems—until real, lasting change takes root.

Inside the Room: Reflections from the Anti-Racism in Creative Health Workshop

In our recent anti-racism training workshop for the creative health sector, we invited participants to move beyond the language of inclusion and into a deeper practice of cultural humility. The training was built around the principles of reflection, accountability, and collective learning. We didn’t come to provide easy answers—we came to ask difficult, necessary questions.

We opened by exploring the difference between diversity, inclusion, and equity, and how each functions within systems that are not neutral. One of the most common misconceptions we addressed is that simply having more representation solves the problem. Representation without redistribution of power is just optics.

We introduced the Cultural Humility framework—a model that centres ongoing self-reflection and critique over the assumption of competence. Unlike traditional cultural competence models that suggest one can "arrive" at understanding, cultural humility acknowledges that we are never done learning. Importantly, it also calls for institutional accountability as a core pillar: not just naming harm, but having systems in place to respond to and prevent it.

Participants engaged in activities that examined personal and organisational values. We looked at what it means to be an ‘active bystander’—not just in moments of overt discrimination, but in the quieter, systemic ways exclusion operates: in who is hired, who gets leadership roles, who receives funding, who is seen as a ‘safe bet’, and whose trauma is deemed legible.

One of the most revealing exercises invited attendees to map their own spheres of influence. Whether you're a freelance artist, a GP, a programme manager or an executive director—every role has reach. The conversation that followed asked: what would it mean to leverage that influence in service of anti-racism?

We also held space for lived experience—something too often tokenised or treated as anecdotal. Facilitators and participants shared how racism has shaped their experiences in both arts and health settings: being talked over, spoken for, excluded from decisions, or invited into spaces only after the structure and narrative had already been set.

A recurring theme was discomfort. That often things don’t change because as a society we are not adept at holding and managing discomfort. Discomfort with unlearning. Discomfort with sitting in uncertainty. Discomfort with recognising complicity. But we reminded the group: discomfort is not harm. In fact, for many of us, discomfort has been a long-term condition of survival.

We looked at sector governance, tools, impact frameworks, and guidance—but through a critical lens. As a group we made comments and suggestions on Equality Plans and Policies that were fed back to those organisations. 

We also used creative methods to ground our emotional reflections—check-ins and check-outs using paint, collage, playdough, and other tactile materials gave participants a chance to express feelings without the constraints of language. These practices allowed us to centre wellbeing and imagination as legitimate and vital tools in anti-racism work.

We closed with reflection prompts—what each person could commit to doing within their role and institution over the next six months. And crucially, how they would be held accountable understanding that anti-racism is a practice. It is work we must all return to, again and again.

We are deeply grateful to the National Centre for Creative Health, the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance, and London Arts and Health for sponsoring places on the course and making this space of reflection and growth accessible to a wider group of practitioners.

Real change starts with courageous conversations—but it doesn’t end there.

Many of these conversations have already begun. Across the sector, we are seeing real groundwork being laid. The Artist Represent Recovery Network by London Arts and Health, Arts & Health Hub and RAW Material, the Culturally Mindful programme by Wandsworth Council, MYRIAD project in Manchester and the Advocacy for Representation in Creative Health network are just some of the initiatives pushing us toward a more equitable future.

But we need more than projects—we need commitment. Anti-racism is not a one-off workshop. It is a sustained practice, a willingness to reimagine how we care, create, fund, hire, and lead.

Cultural humility asks us to stay open, self-critical, and reflexive. But it also requires institutional accountability—the recognition that systemic harm needs systemic repair. Without policies that protect, budgets that reflect priorities, and leadership willing to change course, we are simply rehearsing inclusion, not living it.