Ben Hawkins
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Academic Writing
- New Labour’s Heart of Darkness: How a ‘criminal’ government made victims of Britain’s workers.
My undergraduate dissertation, which uses criminological and political theory to evaluate the employment policies of the New Labour government and their socio-economic effects on workers. [Completed April 2020 - Available on request]
Blog Posts & Articles
- Your order is on its way: Compulsive spending and mental health.
An article about the negative effects of online shopping, the compulsion to keep buying and our wellbeing in the current economic climate. I wrote this during the UK's second COVID-19 lockdown. [Posted Dec 2020]
- The Unbearable Uncertainty of Now
I wrote this post shortly after finishing university. It's an account of my mental health at the time and contains a lot of musings about what I wanted to do in the future. I've changed a lot since then but it's nice to look back at. [Posted Sept 2020]
Creative Writing
- Poetry
An assortment of poems I've written over the years.
- Diary of a star-bound interrailer
A work-in-progress fiction project in the style of a travel journal. [Note: Best viewed via desktop PC. Some readers may need to zoom in]
- 24♦ΔV
A further entry to the above project that I posted on Medium. [Posted April 2021].
Business Writing
- Volunteer Newsletters (2018-2019) - Third Sector Peer Support Service
Whilst working as an intern for a local mental health charity in Yorkshire, England, I re-designed (using a combination of Adobe Photoshop & Office 365) and distributed monthly email newsletters to a team of volunteers and the wider staff directorate. Content included an overview of service updates for the month, a highlighted group 'spotlight' (an original idea of mine at the time), information about upcoming sessions in need of volunteers & various announcements to do with volunteer recruitment. I also used my own photography as part of each month's design, as well as royalty-free images & embellishments. I also sought out stories for the newsletter each month by liaising with various members of the volunteer & staff team to find interesting article subjects. [Currently unavailable for confidentiality reasons]
Miscellaneous Writing
- Concrete Rebellion
A work in progress, this is a magazine-style web 'shrine' to Brutalist architecture. This is being coded and written by me & the header artwork was made by me using stock photos from Unsplash.