Kicking off our Autumn season and happening during the University of Sussex’s Welcome Week is A Mile in My Shoes - a collection of audio stories will explore how empathy can transform our personal relationships to tackle global challenges such as prejudice, conflict and inequality. We speak to Clare Patey, curator of this emotive project to learn more. Come and join us 14-23 September at the Empathy Museum - admission is free and stories last 15 minutes.

With the saturation of visual empathy in photographs and clips of human suffering in the media, do you think that having only audio stories of people can be more effective for recapturing human empathy?

I think that the power of A Mile in My Shoes comes from the combination of: intimate one to one listening, walking alone immersed in storytelling, and embodying a stranger by being literally in their shoes. It is the mix of the physical and empathetic journey that I think is effective.

How many audio stories are collected for A Mile in My Shoes? Were there any specific reasons for choosing these individuals?

A Mile in My Shoes tours both in the UK and internationally. We collect new stories and shoes from each place that we exhibit so that there is a representation of the local community within the walls of the museum. We try and collect as diverse a set of voices as possible and now have a collection of over 250 stories from all over the world. We have also done two themed exhibitions: one with stories from across the NHS and Social Care and one with stories of Migration.

In an advancing technological world where we are incessantly invaded by multiple voices, do you think that fully listening to a single human story produces a stronger empathy?

Although we think we listen to ‘multiple voices’, we tend to surround ourselves with people very similar to us! Online, at work and in our social lives our circles are very small and our assumptions and values are very rarely truly challenged. Taking the time to spend an intimate 15 minutes listening to a stranger’s story, perhaps a person you might not come across in your daily life opens you up to connect or be challenged in a unique way and has the potential to be a transformative personal and empathetic experience.

Do these human stories create a dialogue between them or are they discrete from each other?

Our collection of stories are individual first person narratives. Although the stories are from different parts of the world and include a florist from London, a sex worker from Australia and a dentist from Syria - all the stories explore common human experiences like: love, loss, grief and joy. It is in the listening and the connection with the stories that the dialogue begins as audience members return to the shoebox after their walk and share their thoughts, reactions, feelings and often their own stories.

For more information on this particular show visit here