Culture Matters Co-operative is a collective of writers, artists and activists who work together to promote cultural democracy. For us, that essentially means the application of democratic socialist principles of shared ownership and control to all kinds of cultural activities. We define culture to include all learned human activities, including the arts like literature, film, theatre, music etc. but also sport, the media, eating and drinking, religion, science and technology.
For us, culture matters! It is a vital and fundamental part of human life, bringing us all kinds of entertainment, enlightenment and enjoyment. So the various ways in which cultural activities and experiences are created, distributed and consumed are essential for human development, wellbeing and happiness.
Cultural experiences in class-divided societies like ours are often compromised and commercialised, twisted and manipulated to serve the need for dominant classes to justify and maintain their exploitative and oppressive social structures. We want to see culture democratised – owned, managed and enjoyed by working people, so that we have full and fair access to all kinds of cultural experiences.
We work to promote cultural democracy in several ways. We run this website, which publishes creative and critical material to reflect our mission. We publish books – mostly poetry, short stories and children’s books – and have so far published around 50 titles, including books by award-winning poets like Fran Lock, Fred Voss, Martin Hayes, Jane Burn and others.
Together with trade unions, we also run the annual Bread and Roses Poetry Award, which seeks to encourage and support new working-class writers of poetry. And we also work with trade unions to support the cultural education of their members, and to campaign for better representation of the labour movement on relevant cultural decision-making bodies.
Our current team of Associate Editors and support staff is as follows: Alan McGuire, Kevin McCann, Jim Aitken, Attila Ajtai, Dennis Broe, Jenny Farrell, Sally Flint, Martin Gollan, Judith Gordon, Gillian Grant, Brett Gregory, Michael Jarvie, Mike Jenkins, Fran Lock, Rebecca Lowe, Alan Morrison, Nick Moss, and Mike Quille.
Submissions are always welcome, from anyone who has something to say about culture and politics which contributes to our aims. Please write as clearly, concisely and accessibly as possible, avoiding footnotes. We are currently unable to pay for material, unfortunately, and submissions are subject to editing. Please provide brief notes and a jpeg of yourself, any preferred accompanying images, and send material to info@culturematters.org.uk. If we wish to publish your work, we’ll be in touch, otherwise please assume we don’t wish to publish it. Comments and suggestions on our work are also always welcome.
We rely totally on donations and income from book sales to keep going, so if you have enjoyed visiting the website, you can support us by buying our books or making a donation here.
