The Ballad of Goodwill

The Ballad of Goodwill or The Lecturers Lament at the Demise of Goodwill in the Neoliberal University. The Ballad of Goodwill is a new workers ballad collectively written during a one-day singing symposium devised by Post Workers Theatre and hosted by the Allmänningen (The Common Room) at the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts, Gothenburg University (2021).

The symposium guests included: Professor Rajani Naidoo - Director, International Centre for Higher Education Management / Dr. Joanna Figiel - Researcher and activist, Centre for Cultural Policy and Management, University of London / Dr. Stevphen Shukaitis- Senior Lecturer at the University of Essex, Centre for Work and Organisation / Dr. Jenni Hyde- Ballad historian and precarious academic.

Symposium guests and invited speakers all contributed to the production of a ballad through retelling, scripting and discussing the often-hidden economies of goodwill in academic labour and life. Soprano and librettist Roxanne Korda, acted as the event's Troubadour, and sings the final recording of the ballad accompanied by a PWT modular synthesiser reimagining of the tune Packington's Pound, a popular broadside ballad tune before 1700. The Ballad of Goodwill revisits the social function of the broadside ballad for the contemporary workplace and considers the ballad's potential to create relationships across different institutions and professions that face growing pressure and precarity within marketized education.

The Ballad of Goodwill was organised as part of Post Workers Theatres residency within Allmänningen (The Common Room) at the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts, Gothenburg University. Allmänningen was a Vinnova funded research project from 2018-2021 developing and piloting alternative models for university usership and collaboration. The symposium was accessible for students and staff from the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts, Gothenburg University, Goldsmiths University and Birmingham City University.