New 'ground-breaking' human rights partnership for law students

A new partnership between Goldsmiths and human rights group EachOther promises to give law students invaluable hands on experience of communicating human rights while securing the future of a charity whose work has been instrumental in creating a culture of rights in the UK.

The Goldsmiths partnership provides the stability the EachOther needs to keep making a difference within a challenging funding climate for small human rights charities. While retaining its independence, its activities will be embedded in the course modules making up the Law degree programme.

Under the partnership, EachOther - which uses storytelling, filmmaking, and independent journalism to put the human into human rights - will supervise Goldsmiths law students’ contribution to EachOther’s platforms with their work being assessed as part of their degree. 

EachOther brings to the partnership an unrivalled multimedia archive designed to inform and inspire people about their rights. Half a million people visit its website each year, and with its social media followers at 100,000 and its YouTube videos receiving over a million views, the charity’s work has been an important component in building a rights culture in UK with almost one in ten visitors to its site saying their content had changed their mind on a human rights issue.

The partnership sees the charity revisiting its beginnings when, as RightsInfo, it worked closely with students and lawyers to produce content aimed at raising levels of public understanding and support for human rights.

Professor Dimitrios Giannoulopoulos, Goldsmiths Head of Law at said: “By bringing together the best of EachOther and Goldsmiths, we can expand the resources available for EachOther’s vital work, and, at the same time, give our students invaluable hands-on experience of public communications on human rights. Raising awareness about the risks of legal isolationism, the dismantling of fundamental structures of our liberal democracy and, ultimately, the pernicious ‘othering’ of those vulnerable communities most in need of protection, human rights awareness work could not be more urgently needed.”

Professor Giannoulpoulos continued: “This partnership will further strengthen a charity that is greatly respected for creative approaches that connect with ordinary people and have brought rights down to a human level. And it will prepare future lawyers to communicate their ideas and research more adeptly through digital technologies

Adam Wagner, Founder and Chair of EachOther’s Board of Trustees, said: “The funding environment which organisations like ours have had to navigate recently has been extremely difficult. This partnership safeguards the charity’s future. It means EachOther will continue to stand up in creative and compelling ways for our rights, which, once again, are under sustained attack.

As EachOther embarks on this next phase of its evolution, it will strive to find the right mix of continuity and change. Staying on is Emma Guy, who for the past year and a half has been EachOther’s Editor.

Mr Wagner continued: “This partnership safeguards the charity’s future. It means EachOther will continue to stand up in creative and compelling ways for our rights, when, once again, they are under sustained attack, for example the recent high-profile calls for the UK to leave the European Convention of Human Rights.”