Rupert Read, Noora Firaq, Will Goldring & Minna Salami | Bridging Divides in the Climate Movement

This video contains content from the Bridging Divides, Loving Earth Conference, a 1-day event exploring the intersection of climate and peace, held at St Ethelburga’s Centre for Reconciliation and Peace on the 12th of July 2023.

Noora Firaq grew up on the frontlines of climate change – in the Maldives – one of the most climate-vulnerable countries in the world due to the country’s natural land scarcity and low-lying geography. She has lived experience of how climate change shapes socio-economics, psychology and the security of communities. After Business and Law School in the UK, she has worked in charities, co-operatives, and ethical finance in the UK. Noora is currently Deputy Chief Executive Officer at Climate Outreach, an organisation working to create a social mandate for climate action.

Will Goldring is a former scientist who dropped out of a neuropharmacology PhD at University College London to devote his entire life to mobilising people to come together in civil resistance against government inaction on climate breakdown. Will has been arrested seven times and charged with criminal damage at universities which refuse to divest from fossil capital, with breaking into fuel terminals and shutting them down, with blocking roads in London, and with causing two hundred and thirty thousand pounds of criminal damage to petrol pumps on the M25. For the last charge, Will is facing a Crown Court Trial in 2024 with a likelihood of a prison sentence if found guilty by a jury (up to maximum of ten years in prison).

Minna Salami is a Nigerian, Finnish, and Swedish feminist author and social critic. She is the Programme Chair of Black Feminism and the Polycrisis at The New Institute. Her research focuses on Black feminist theory, contemporary African thought, and the politics of knowledge production. Minna frequently speaks at international platforms including TEDx, Oxford University, Yale University, Oxford Union, Cambridge Union, the European Parliament, and the Singularity University at NASA. She is a BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt Responsible Leader and sits on the council of The Royal Institute of Philosophy. She is an Associate with Perspectiva and sits on the boards of The African Feminist Initiative at Pennsylvania State University and the Interdisciplinary Journal for the Study of the Sahel.