‘It is a joy to be hidden, a disaster not to be found.’ – Donald Winnicott
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The Disaster School was founded as a learning space for creative and critical reflection, and for collaboration in response to the social, political, and environmental crises that have defined the first quarter of the 21st century. Our collective conscience has been shaped by ongoing catastrophe and trauma: the Darfur Genocide, the Iraq War, the invasion of Ukraine, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the ongoing war crimes in Gaza, to name just a few. Yet how is this moment different from those that came before? Humanity has always had an appetite for conflict and crisis.
Despite unprecedented technological connectivity, genuine communication is at an all-time low. On any metro platform in any country, each person is absorbed in their phone, detached from strangers both in real life and online. Whether humanity has become more violent is debatable; what is certain is that our exposure (both its volume and intensity) to physical and emotional violence is without precedent.
The Disaster School brings together writers, thinkers, and mental health practitioners from across the globe to explore how language—especially creative language—can equip
individuals with the tools to both express and examine themselves during times of crisis. It functions as a community space for workshops, classes, and discussions that foster multiplicity and dialogue.
Psychoanalyst and writer Adam Phillips advocates for a forensic interrogation of language, which is why I chose the word disaster: to examine all the ways and places it appears, all the situations in which we find ourselves using it, and what that might reveal. Language shapes our reality profoundly; it both grounds and expands our capacity to connect and collaborate.
The Disaster School is also a radical invitation to those who have not been heard in collective spaces. A phrase from Donald Winnicott gives the school its guiding line: “It is a joy to be hidden, a disaster not to be found.” Human survival depends on the presence and protection of diversity, including diversity of thought. The prevailing structures of Western society, built on consumption, competition, and colonialism, inflict deep physical and psychological harm on all forms of life. The Disaster School seeks to counter this through spaces of reflection, creativity, and shared repair.
The inaugural online edition of The Disaster School took place in the first week of August 2025, bringing together ten exceptional writers and speakers from England, France, Germany, Iran, Northern and Republic of Ireland, Norway, Palestine, Scotland, Uganda, and Ukraine. Over sixty participants from around the world attended the programme, which explored how personal disaster intersects with external catastrophe and how this relationship influences our creative expression.
The week’s workshops and conversations centred on transforming trauma into text and on fostering connection across cultures and disciplines. Feedback from participants was overwhelmingly positive: many described leaving with renewed tools for expression, a deeper sense of solidarity, and a tangible hope that changing how we think can change how we live and relate to one another.
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