Channeling Anger to Create Change - Elif Emma True

Former Laidlaw Scholar at the University of York, Elif, discusses her research into the importance of the way we talk about poverty in the UK, the power of being angry in this world, and her podcast Deprivation Discourse.
Channeling Anger to Create Change - Elif Emma True
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Description: 

Elif interviewing Professor Greta Defeyter for her podcast 'Deprivation Discourse'
Elif interviewing Professor Greta Defeyter for her podcast 'Deprivation Discourse'

This week Nikol talks to Elif Emma True, a former Laidlaw Scholar at the University of York. Elif talks about her Laidlaw research into the importance of the way we talk about poverty in the UK, the power of being angry in this world, and her amazing podcast called Deprivation Discourse, which you can find on her website or on Spotify.

Elif has been campaigning against poverty since she was 15. She went on to represent the UK in the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, and at the end of 2019 she travelled to the International Conference on Poverty and Sustainable Development in Sri Lanka to present her Laidlaw Scholarship research into poverty discourse in the UK. 

Connect with Elif: Laidlaw Scholars Network, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Web.

Send us your thoughts at contact@laidlawfoundation.com or leave a comment below!


Further Reading on the Topic of Poverty in the UK (by Elif): 

Research:

‘Tackling poverty and social exclusion: promoting social justice in social work’ has some great ideas around the cycle of poverty, and around how networks and communities are so key in breaking the cycle of poverty.

-       Pierson, J.H., (2016). Tackling poverty and social exclusion: promoting social justice in social work. Abingdon, Oxon. Routledge.

‘It's our problem too! Challenging the exclusion of poor people from poverty discourse’ is an excellent short article on the exclusion of disempowered voices in politics and research and the negative impact this has on research and policy.

-       Beresford, P. and Croft, S., (1995), It's our problem too! Challenging the exclusion of poor people from poverty discourse, Critical social policy, 15(44-45), 75-95.

‘Poverty Discourse and the Disempowerment of the Poor’ is another excellent short article on the complicated discourse people in poverty must navigate to avoid becoming the ‘undeserving poor’. 

-       Dean, H., (1992), Poverty Discourse and the Disempowerment of the Poor, Critical Social Policy, 7(2), 243-258.

‘The undeserving poor: From the war on poverty to the war on welfare’ is a staple in the understanding of the deserving and undeserving poverty discourse used often in everyday discourse and media discourse.

-       Katz, M.B., 1989. The undeserving poor: From the war on poverty to the war on welfare, 60,  (New York: Pantheon Books).

Throughout my time as a campaigner, many people have asked me ‘what qualifies a person to be in poverty?’ I don’t think there is an easy answer to that question, but I would say that poverty is a symptom of structural inequality, intertwined with racism, sexism and ableism where people are deprived in terms of money, networks and resources. With this in mind, the Social Metrics Commission report into measuring poverty is my preferred measure of poverty:

-       Social Metrics Commission, 2019, Measuring Poverty 2019, Date of access: 27/12/19. https://socialmetricscommission.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/SMC_measuring-poverty-201908_full-report.pdf#page=22

In my time campaigning, I often came across the double standards set for young people in poverty, for example in the ways their free school meals were provided. This example went somewhat viral last year of young people being unable to use a playground if they were in social housing. These restrictions on young people in poverty go way beyond the playground and way beyond this single example.

-       Grant, H., Mohdin, A., & Michael, C. (2019). This article is more than 1 year old 'Outrageous' and 'disgusting': segregated playground sparks fury. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/ci...

Solutions:

This toolkit is an excellent practical example of how we can all start framing poverty differently. One of my favourite recommendations is framing poverty as a problem that has a solution and can be fixed instead of an inevitable problem in the 5th wealthiest nation in the world. Poverty would be solved sooner if we viewed it as something we could end in our lifetime.

-       JRF., 2019, Framing Toolkit, Date of access: 27/12/19. https://www.jrf.org.uk/report/framing-toolkit-talking-about-poverty 

‘Rethinking poverty’ is my favourite book on poverty. It was one of the first books I read for this research project when I was able to meet and pick Barry’s brain. This book is incredibly empowering and offers real solutions to ending poverty in the UK.

-       Knight, B., 2017, Rethinking poverty. Bristol, U.K. Policy Press. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv43vv1s 

The UN’s special rapporteur report into poverty in the UK offers political solutions (such as the rejection of austerity). The Guardian have a lot of fantastic coverage on this report and how important it is to end poverty denial in the UK. I’d recommend the response the special rapporteur had to the government response (or lack of) to his report.

-       Booth, R. (2019). UN poverty expert hits back over UK ministers' 'denial of facts'. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/so... 

-       United Nations. (2019). Visit to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland Report of the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights. United Nations. Retrieved from https://undocs.org/A/HRC/41/39/Add.1 

Quote from the report: “The social safety net has been badly damaged by drastic cuts to local authorities’ budgets, which have eliminated many social services, reduced policing services, closed libraries in record numbers, shrunk community and youth centres and sold off public spaces and buildings. The bottom line is that much of the glue that has held British society together since the Second World War has been deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos.”


Transcript: 

 

NIKOL CHEN: Hi, I’m Nikol Chen and this is The Good Leader. A podcast where we talk to remarkable individuals in all sorts of fields to learn more about how to lead with integrity and explore what the next generation of leaders is doing to solve the world’s most intractable problems.

You’re listening to a Scholar Spotlight episode - a rubric in which we interview our current and former Laidlaw Scholars about their research and leadership journeys. 

Today we have Elif Emma True - a former Laidlaw Scholar at the University of York. Elif is currently on her year abroad in Sweden...well, technically she is back in the UK because of coronavirus but when we recorded this the world hadn’t collapsed yet. Elif will discuss her Laidlaw research into the importance of the way we talk about poverty in the UK, the power of being angry in this world, and her amazing podcast called Deprivation Discourse, which you can find at deprivationdiscourse.com. 

Elif has been campaigning against poverty since she was 15, starting in her local area with Poverty Ends Now, a young person led group ran by Children North East; then she went on to represent the UK in the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, and at the end of 2019 she travelled to the International Conference on Poverty and Sustainable Development in Sri Lanka to present her Laidlaw Scholarship research into poverty discourse in the UK. Yeah. She’s pretty extraordinary. 

You may notice that Elif has a little cold but it was the only day I could catch her before she returned to Stockholm, so thank you Elif for your commitment to talking about the cause you’re passionate about despite feeling unwell. Just a quick note - you can find the transcript of this episode, further reading suggestions and a list of references on the Laidlaw Scholars Network. Here is Elif. 

NIKOL CHEN: Hi Elif, welcome to our podcast!

ELIF TRUE: Thank you, it’s so nice to be here!

NIKOL CHEN: So, first of all - I am obsessed with you. 

ELIF TRUE: [laughs]

NIKOL CHEN: Second of all - what does it feel like to be on the other end of the mic?

ELIF TRUE: It feels so strange. I feel like, I don’t know, I don’t want to be a backseat driver but I’m really glad that you’re using podcasts as a medium to get messages out to other scholars and people who are interested in leadership. I think it’s really really cool.

NIKOL CHEN: So, could you just tell me briefly about your research?

ELIF TRUE: My research is about poverty and it’s about discourse. I found it really interesting when I was working in spheres in Parliament in the Commonwealth how people would talk about poverty and I think the way we talk about things creates stigma around things, and really impacts people’s lived experiences. So, my research is all about the way that people talk about poverty and how that impacts people’s lived experience, especially children’s lived experiences within schools. 

NIKOL CHEN: Could you tell me more about some of the interesting findings that you had during the research?

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, so I used cyber ethnography which is basically where I just put myself under a blanket for like 2 days and searched Mumsnet and I collected hundreds of comments about mums talking about “poverty themes”, in quotations marks. So, things about free school meals, things about uniforms. 

And the findings from my research, when I analysed the discourse, were that the way that we talk about poverty perpetuates ideas of shame and ideas of stigma. So, feelings like mums felt like they couldn’t have their children carrying Lidl bags back home because they were worried that someone on their street would see them and think that they were poor. 

And then we had kind of bigger things where mums would buy into this culture of justification, so they would say “Well, my child has to be on free school meals because my husband is disabled or because we lost our jobs” and it’s really mums sharing these quite soul-baring reasons for claiming this welfare that they are entitled to and it kind of just plays into this stigma of if you are claiming welfare from a school, you need to be a ‘good’ poor person and not a ‘bad’ poor person, which we hear so much about in media stereotypes. 

NIKOL CHEN: Could you tell me more about the potential of your research and what world problems could it solve? 

ELIF TRUE: I think the potential of the research is that I really want to link the way we talk about issues with policy. A lot of schools, I think, not in any not well-meaning way - they want to protect their children, their parents - but there’s a lot of shame and stigma that plays into discourse and how that shapes school policy and how the way we talk about poverty as a society shapes social policy. So, I think the potential of the research I hope is to connect the dots between using words such as ‘scroungers’ for people on benefits, having media representation, such as on Benefits Street, with the difficult ways that people have to deal with Universal Credit and have to deal with the social welfare systems here in the UK. So, that’s what I hope for the research but that’s quite a long shot. 

NIKOL CHEN: And where did your passion for that research topic originate?

ELIF TRUE: Well, I’ve been a campaigner on poverty since I was like 15 because I was just very angry as a child and I feel like when anybody experiences injustice, you just feel very passionate about it and I was very lucky because I got to put that passion into campaigning in places like Parliament and later on places like Commonwealth and the EU. And I think the passion kind of came from seeing what poverty and loss of jobs did to my local area in South Tyneside, being like the 6th most income deprived place in the UK [South Tyneside is actually 15th income deprived and 7th for employment deprived(https://www.southtyneside.gov.uk/article/49429/Deprivation)] It really did have an effect on my friends and my school and yeah, I think my passion came from my anger and my ability through really amazing EU-funded campaign groups, such as the UK Youth Parliament and other kinds of profiles that people can use to express their voice about something, yeah.

NIKOL CHEN: Could you tell me more about the effects that you saw that poverty has on your friends and you and the North East of England?

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, so I think, for example, I remember I was a part of this youth organisation that would look into how schools would treat children in poverty and kind of be unaware of how they are doing it. And there was one example where in the North East there was a school, they had a home baking class, so you would bring all the ingredients into school and obviously bake whatever it was that you were baking. At one school if you didn’t bring the ingredients because you “forgot them”, in quotation marks - you couldn’t afford them, of course - the school would give you the ingredients but then when you’ve made the thing, when you’ve made the cake, when you’ve made the curry, they would throw it away. And the school...Nikol’s face here is grimacing [both laugh] But like when we told the school “Oh, you know, maybe these kids aren’t being naughty, maybe they can’t afford it” and this synonymous link between kids in poverty and naughty kids, they clicked on and they thought “Oh, you’re absolutely right, you know, it makes perfect sense”. And I mean, the idea 1 of food waste is obviously awful, but 2 - just shaming children. And I think those kinds of experiences where schools, they were naïve, they didn’t know what they were doing, they were just trying to discipline children, it actually really affects how children in poverty live their everyday lives and miss out on school, and that really affects the attainment gap between kids in poverty and kids who live without poverty. 

NIKOL CHEN: And so, as part of your research, you also produced a podcast, could you tell me some of the highlights with that experience, what was something that you found that really stands out to you?

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, I loved the podcast. I’m so glad that I did it because, as I say, my research was a cyber ethnography, so, people’s identities were anonymous because I didn’t want a power dynamic between me & the participants because I didn’t think that was right. But I decided that as a way to share the research, I’d use a podcast. So, I got young people involved because I thought “I cannot do a research project that I was inspired by when I was a young person without young people.” So, I got young members of parliament involved, I got youth groups involved, and I got professionals involved and food banks involved. It was amazing and I think I thought I was an expert of poverty because I did all this research and I’d met researchers and whatever and when I sat down with people who lived in my local area and were working with people in poverty in my local area that I knew, it was just like “I knew nothing, John Snow” [both laugh] I was not aware. And one really lovely moment was when I got to...actually, it was really nice because I went on Twitter and I did a silly tweet and it was like “Umm...I think I’m going to do a podcast and for my research project if anybody wants to be on it, hit me up” and so many people in my local area were like “We’d love to speak to you about what we’re trying to do with people in poverty in the local area and lifting up marginalised voices”. And I got to speak to the foodbank, Hebburn Helps, that’s in my local area in Hebburn and just going into the foodbank, it was just a place that was filled with just so much love for people and they were telling me about how anytime that anyone goes in, they just get a hug. No judgement. And a parcel. And then they can come back whenever they want. Poverty, I think, it really revealed to me, and I already knew this, but it just demonstrated that people who are working with people in poverty, police included, foodbanks included, whoever, it’s so much more than about money. It’s about people’s mental health, it’s about people’s resources and I think it was just really wonderful to see practitioners at work and just the amount of love and respect that I had for them. It was overwhelming.

NIKOL CHEN: Here is a soundbite from Elif’s podcast episode with Hebburn Helps, you can always listen to the full version for free on her website. 

[podcast clip]

NIKOL CHEN: And where do you see yourself in 10-years time? What do you see for the future of your research, or the future of your activism? 

ELIF TRUE: I think I would like to continue researching because I recently went to the sixth international conference on poverty and sustainable development in Sri Lanka and I met the most amazing bunch of people and a researcher who said to me “If campaigning is what you want to do and if trying to make a change is what you want to do, you should be a researcher.” Because it’s how you make change by presenting empirical research and saying “This is what you need to change” to governments and to lobbyists and to whoever, you know. So, maybe that. I see myself continuing to be angry in 10-years time, maybe at new things, maybe at the same things. But I think, yeah, definitely the passion that I have about poverty in the UK will not go away because the problem is not going away. So, yeah.

NIKOL CHEN: Could you tell me more about the conference that you went to?

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, so through the Laidlaw Scholarship I had the opportunity to go to the 6th International Conference on Poverty and Sustainable Development in Colombo, Sri Lanka. And I got to present my research and my podcast and it was amazing because the key to me going there was mainly listening to other people, I think, because in the UK we absolutely have extreme poverty, we do also have relative poverty which I think is probably the majority of poverty in the UK. But when it came to being in Sri Lanka and when it came to low income countries, like India and like Sri Lanka, and a lot of those countries were being represented and countries in Africa as well, and I think it was just incredible - the creativity that they had for solving problems such as one entrepreneur was trying to figure out how to create a bus route without being stampeded by elephants and I just think, you know, if they can overcome that issue, we can overcome speaking about poverty in a nicer way in the UK. And it was just really wonderful to be in a room with academics and researchers across the world and have their feedback on my research, which I just thought I would never have the opportunity to do and yeah, it made me really reflective and also just really happy.

 NIKOL CHEN: And what sort of things can people do, for example people listening to this podcast, what can they do to help fight poverty in the UK? 

ELIF TRUE: That’s a really good question. I ask myself that question a lot as well. I think if you work with children, I think be aware of poverty. I think my lens is constantly fixed on people in poverty and people not being able to afford things, so, for example, if I was going to ask my friends if we were going to hang out, my option would always be a free option, so that all my friends can come and nobody would have to feel stigmatised or nobody would have to feel like they can’t afford it. I think as well, just being open minded, being very aware of how the media focuses their attention on people who claim benefits in a way that is so demonising, and instead try to understand better why they’ve been put in that situation and the 14m people that are in poverty - they are not all in poverty because they all have bad budgeting skills. It is a structural problem, and it is a political choice for people in this country to be in poverty.

If you are concerned about poverty in the UK, donate to foodbanks. They need things like washing up liquid, like laundry detergent is really key, UHT milk. Because so many people are using foodbanks now and I think it’s really key that we as individuals take responsibility to help people who are in poverty when, as I say, maybe governments and people who have a bit more responsibility aren’t doing as much. 

NIKOL CHEN: And so, from your podcast, one of the things that I got away is that it’s a very intersectional issue, so, for example, you interviewed someone who is an LGBT officer at York, so could you explain the intersectional nature of poverty in the UK? 

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, definitely, I think like any social issue, I think it’s complicated and it involves many different spectrums. And I think Gemma’s episode, which is episode 5 and it’s called ‘The Queer Intersection of Poverty’, is a really great episode - it’s one of my favourites. It’s about how Gemma was homeless because she came out to her parents and just kind of how linked coming out is to finding yourself in very different circumstances. And I think many queer people and LGBT people in the UK take that risk. And I think when we look at things like poverty, when we look at things especially like homelessness, looking at it with a lens of the LGBT community - are homeless shelters acceptable conditions for trans people? You know, are they being right, I guess, gender dorms? These things are really relevant when it comes to poverty because I think they really affect people’s lived experiences. But yeah, poverty is intersectional in so many ways, I wish I could have included more people on the podcast - people with disabilities and how that affects them in poverty, people of colour and how that affects their experiences of poverty. Yeah, the LGBT perspective is really interesting as well and something that I think needs to be focused on a lot more by charities and by governments alike.

NIKOL CHEN: Here’s another soundbite from Elif’s podcast - this one is an interview with the LGBTQ+ Officer at University of York Gemma Card.

[podcast clip]

NIKOL CHEN: So now, let’s talk about the actual scholarship programme. Do you have a favourite part that you enjoyed the most?

ELIF TRUE: I don’t know if this is relevant but I really liked...University of York scholars, we did like a day in the community thing and it was really lovely because we went to this cemetery and we gardened for a day, and it was the best day. I still do it, well, when I lived in York because I study in Stockholm for a year now. When I lived in York I went every month afterwards because I loved being with the community and I loved putting something physically back into the earth. It was the Laidlaw Scholarship that kind of forced us all to get into the actual dirt and I’ve never gardened before in my life, so I really liked it. It was great. I don’t know if that’s what you were looking for [both laugh].

NIKOL CHEN: Definitely relevant! And on the other spectrum, is there something that you found particularly challenging? 

ELIF TRUE: I was going to say ‘all of it’ [both laugh]. I found having self-belief really challenging because I think poverty to me was such a person issue and when I was doing the research, when I was looking at the comments online and also when I was doing the podcast, I would need to go home and have a bath. Like every day. And just have to know within myself that I do have the right to talk about poverty. And the best person who can talk about your experiences of poverty are you. And I think believing that I had a right to talk about poverty was really important, because it is a really scary topic to talk about. And I didn’t want to perpetuate the stigma by talking about it, and I tried really hard to be mindful of the language that I used but it was really challenging that I was always saying and doing the right thing on the podcast. But ultimately I think the critiques that I got on the podcast have been really useful because it really helps you kind of go forward in what you’re trying to say, in what you’re trying to do. There’s a good quote that I like which is “Walk purposefully in the direction that you’re going” [paraphrased, the original quote is "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams" by Henry David Thoreau] and it’s kind of like, you don’t have to be there but you need to try and be there as fast as you can, which is I think what I’m trying to do with the podcast.

NIKOL CHEN: And what’s the most important lesson you’ve learn from the programme?

ELIF TRUE: Learn how to use the equipment before you use it [laughs]. Yeah, I think try to lift up people’s voices as well as your own. The podcast is really important to me because I want people to use it on their own CVs and I wanted people to be as proud of the research as I am. And I truly think that people are really grateful for that. So, yeah, I think try and lift up people’s voices as much as you are trying to make a voice for yourself. 

NIKOL CHEN: Can you name one or a few leaders that inspire you and why their inspire you?

ELIF TRUE: Oh, okay… I think I just want to namedrop Greta Thunberg right here, or as we say in Swedish, [in Swedish accent] Greta Thunberg. Because I think, since living in Sweden for my year abroad, she just comes up in almost every conversation and I think it’s really wonderful that she was just so angry and she took that anger and did something really purposeful with it. And I’m not trying to compare myself to Greta Thunberg in any way but I think being angry about something and instead of just wallowing in it, and being kind of deterministic about where you’re going to end up, trying to fight it, trying to make a positive change about something that is an injustice. So, I think she’s a really cool leader for that reason. And also she like changed her bio when Donald Trump called her out and I thought that was the baddest move. 

NIKOL CHEN: She’s such a badass.

ELIF TRUE: She’s so cool. 

NIKOL CHEN: How old is she? She’s like 15, right?

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, something like that!

NIKOL CHEN: 15 and taking on Donald Trump.

ELIF TRUE: Yeah, I know! Probably she’s the only person I can think of right now. 

NIKOL CHEN: She is enough. 

ELIF TRUE: She is enough, yeah. 

NIKOL CHEN: So, Greta Thunberg is actually 17. And she has changed her Twitter bio a few times to mock world leaders trying to take a swing at her. 

When Trump posted a video of her famous UN speech and sarcastically said “She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future,” Greta changed her bio to “A very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future”.

Then, in October 2019 she changed it to “a kind but poorly informed teenager”, which is how Putin described her. 

And in December 2019, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, whom we all love dearly, called her a ‘pirralha’, excuse my atrocious accent, which means brat in Portugese, so Greta changed her bio once again. 

And again in December, Trump threw a fit because she won Time Person of the Year 2019, and said that she has an anger management problem, that should go to "a good old fashioned movie with a friend", and that she should chill. So Greta changed her bio to “a teenager working on her anger management problem. Currently chilling and watching a good old fashioned movie with a friend”.

As Elif and I said, those are some badass moves and we are living for them.

NIKOL CHEN: Any bad leaders you want to mention?

ELIF TRUE: I think we mentioned one just now, didn’t we? Donald Trump - I don’t think we even need to discuss that [laughs].

NIKOL CHEN: Literally everyone I ask says Donald Trump.

ELIF TRUE: Well, I think that just people who don’t try and listen to other people and it’s so common within leadership. I saw a really interesting article and it was about why so many men who don’t listen get into leadership roles and it’s just like...it is quite baffling but I think that to be a good leader you have to try and listen to people who are without voices and why they are marginalised. I think Donald Trump is definitely one of those people who are not interested in the marginalised voices of his community. So, yeah, all we can do it try to lift up people’s voices. And hope for the best. I was going to say, like Greta does but she just lifts up the voice of Mother Earth [both laugh].

NIKOL CHEN: Is there anything you would like to add?

ELIF TRUE: I think that’s it. Please listen to my podcast? Nikol likes it and we like her opinions, so…

NIKOL CHEN: You should definitely go and listen to Elif’s podcast…

ELIF TRUE: Thank you 

NIKOL CHEN: ...which you can find at?

ELIF TRUE: deprivationdiscourse.com. It’s all on there, all 9 episodes, and you can download them for free. 

NIKOL CHEN: You also have your own blog on there. You have your own website. You are so proactive!

ELIF TRUE: Oh, stop! [both laugh] Yeah, you can read about the stuff that I get up to in my poverty endeavours and maybe learn a little bit about poverty in the UK. Which I think we should all learn more about.

NIKOL CHEN: Is there anything else that is exciting that’s coming up for you?

ELIF TRUE: I recently got listed as a resource on the Youth Orwell Prize, which is a prize named obviously after the Orwell, you know, 1984. And that was very exciting. And Greta Thunberg was slightly further up on that list, so I felt like I was getting closer to her in that way.

NIKOL CHEN: You were on the same list? Oh my god!

ELIF TRUE: Yeah! It was like ‘Things to Listen to’. That was really exciting because whenever someone who is not my immediate family listens to the podcast, I’m like shaking and I got a really lovely email from one of my favourite writers on poverty in the UK and he said “I listened to the podcast and I think it’s amazing” and it was really lovely. So now, I’m going to stop it now, you know what I mean? Nothing else can top Barry Knight saying that he liked my podcast. So, yeah. 

NIKOL CHEN: Are you planning on continuing it?

ELIF TRUE: I don’t know if I have the time or the resources anymore to be honest. I think the conversation that I started within my friends and within my family - I’m happy with that. You know, I think it doesn’t take a podcast for people to talk about poverty and I’m really glad that people have been talking about it because of the podcast. So, maybe, maybe not, but watch this space, as people say! [both laugh]

NIKOL CHEN: Follow Elif on Twitter to stay updated! What’s your Twitter handle?

ELIF TRUE: My Twitter is at Emma_ETrue and my Instagram, if you’re that kind of person, if you would like to see what I look like in real life, is elifemmatrue. That’s it! 

NIKOL CHEN: Alright, Elif, thanks so much for coming on the podcast!

ELIF TRUE: Thank you so much, I had a wonderful time! [both laugh] 

NIKOL CHEN: You can connect with Elif on the Laidlaw Scholars Network, and check out her website at deprivationdiscourse.com. She has also recently uploaded her podcast to Spotify, so you can find it there by searching for Deprivation Discourse. 

Follow the Laidlaw Foundation on Twitter and LinkedIn to find out when we release our new podcasts episodes, and if you would like to find out more about our programmes visit www.laidlawfoundation.com. 

Once again, you can find all the references, further reading suggestions and the transcript of this episode on the Laidlaw Scholars Network. Elif has kindly provided a list of further reading, so if you are looking to learn more about poverty in the UK, check it out. 

Our music is by Broke For Free and Tours. 

Thanks for listening.

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