Image of Dr Teri Howson-Griffiths

Dr Teri Howson-Griffiths

Liverpool Screen School

Faculty of Arts Professional and Social Studies

Email: T.R.HowsonGriffiths@ljmu.ac.uk

Telephone: 0151 904 6556

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ORCID

Teri (she/her) is a Senior Lecturer whose work centres on arts and health practices, focused on utilising applied approaches to support and improve individual and community well-being.

Teri is currently on a three-year, part-time 0.6 FTE secondment working 3 days for the North Wales Health Board as the Arts in Health Strategic Lead, where she is engaged in the development, planning, commissioning, and advocating for arts-based approaches within health and wellbeing. Alongside this, she maintains a 0.4 FTE part-time role within the Drama programme team.

She joined LJMU as a Lecturer in Drama in 2017. Prior to this, she was a Research Officer on Dementia and Imagination, a UK wide AHRC funded study looking at the potential of visual arts for people living with dementia. She graduated with her PhD in 2016 which was a practice-led study on the therapeutic potential of immersive theatres to augment personal well-being, focusing on sensory labyrinth theatre and other forms of immersive practice to better understand audience experiences, supervised by Professor Kate Taylor-Jones. This involved practice-led and qualitative audience research explored partially through the creation of two immersive performances.



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Research


As a researcher, Teri is interested in immersive theatres, verbatim and sensory methodologies, particularly linked to socially engaged and applied practice, as well as the broader arts in health sphere. She is interested in practice-led, qualitative, and creative forms of research and utilising creativity for engagement and dissemination.

Teri has published several journal articles and a co-authored book chapter within the scope of immersive theatres, arts and dementia and arts in health. She has also contributed to conferences both nationally and internationally to present her research (see publications for further details). Recently, Teri contributed to the 'Let's talk preventative Healthcare' podcast episode on arts and health: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6G8Ld0edTlWAP34ns7RsR9

Teri is a member of the City Lab research group and the Institute for Health Research at LJMU.


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Teaching

Teri became a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in 2018.

At LJMU, she contributes at all levels to the BA Drama programme. She is currently Director of Studies for a PhD study on 'Rape and Intimacy on the Fourth-Wave Stage'. She is also on PhD committees for two studies on: 'a practise-based exploration into identity, mental health and the impact of Covid 19 on the Showmen community' and 'Towards a new musical theatre practical pedagogy'.
She has previously taught on the undergraduate Theatre Studies and Performance programme and Visual Culture modules in the then School of Creative Studies and Media at Bangor University. Teri has supported a Masters level open research project in Drama at Bangor University, and previously taught on the MA in Immersive Theatres at LJMU.


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Service

Teri serves as a Wellbeing Connector within LJMU (since 2021). She is also the department representative for DramaHE who 'provide a forum for professional and scholarly debate' and 'represents the interests of drama, theatre, and performance in the Higher Education sector of the United Kingdom' (Drama HE). She has previously served as the Ethics Committee Representative for Drama (2018-2022) and School EDI rep (2019-2020). In 2018 she co-convened a symposium on arts, health, and well-being at the university and is developing further work within this field through her current secondment into the NHS in Wales.

She has been a volunteer mentor with The Girls Network since 2021, which 'aims to inspire and empower girls from the least advantaged communities by connecting them to a mentor and a network of professional role models who are women' (The Girls Network, no date). Teri was a Volunteer Community Manager (2020-2023) for a Facebook group related to her love of reading and literature.

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Practice and training

Since 2009 Teri has been performing in and creating work that is embedded in its performance site by its response to place and community.

She has been involved with the construction of labyrinths with labyrinth artist Alex Irving, assisting with a candlelit labyrinth for Light Night, Liverpool 2017. She has also collaborated with Alex and Elaine McNeill from the School of Art and Design, for Tangled Tales, a dementia project looking to use humour and positive stories to challenge the stigma associated with dementia, through drawing on collected experiences and stories of living with dementia. The team created a labyrinth installation at the Open Eye Gallery in October 2017 , the Anglican Cathedral as part of the Liverpool Biennial 2018 which was visited by around 2000 people, Manchester Museum of Science and Industry's Open Late on Well-Being in March 2019, as well as several primary schools in the area. The collected stories have been developed into a comedy play for adult audiences, 'On Cloud 79', with several performances at venues across the city including Laughterhouse Comedy Club, NHS Royal Liverpool Hospital, and Hope Street Theatre.

Teri has participated in a number of community performance ventures, including a sensory labyrinth and interactive/ immersive theatre performances such as: 'Fear' (2014) Theatr Dan y Coed, 'Cerebellium' (2012 and 2013) Pontio, Bangor; 'Digital Tea Dance' (2011), Pontio, Bangor; 'Come the Dawn' (2009), Theatr Cynefin, Conwy Falls. Teri also created a small installation piece for the Gwaith Powdr nature reserve trail in Penrhyndaedraeth in 2009, as part of an art project in the reserve.

Between 2009 and 2012, Teri attended training and performance events through the European Youth in Action programme in Portugal, Macedonia, Austria, Romania and the UK, in Sensory Labyrinth Theatre, Forum Theatre, Theatre of the Oppressed, and Danceability, led by several European theatre companies and taught by Iwan Brioc (TROTI and Theatr Cynefin), Vera Rebl (Danceability, Wien) and Barbara Santos (TDU Wien). In 2017 she attended a training workshop on Timeslips with City Arts, Nottingham.

Degrees

2016, Bangor University, Wales, UK, PhD
2009, University of Wales, Bangor, Wales, UK, MA
2006, University of Wales, Bangor, Wales, UK, BA (Hons)

Certifications

2018, Advance HE, Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy

Academic appointments

Research Officer, Dementia Services Development Centre, Wales, School of Healthcare Sciences, Bangor University, 2014 - 2016
Graduate Teaching Assistant, School of Creative Studies and Media, Bangor University, 2010 - 2014

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