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Richard has worked in youth justice, youth and community work and education for 16 years. His experiences ranges from youth justice prevention, adult resettlement through to teaching on youth and community and education studies within higher education programmes. In recent years Richard has been working on his ongoing Doctoral study focusing on how education may take place within groups that are commonly described as ‘gangs’, with a specific focus on the role that social space may have within such educative processes.
Richard’s other research interests relate to informal educative practices and processes within groups that are identified or identify their self as being ‘outsiders’, as well as risk within research and researcher positionality. Currently working as an assistant researcher for MCYS, a centre which hopes to create youth-informed and you-led research.
PhD, Fully funded, Studentship at Sheffield Hallam
MA, of research method, education and social research institute, MMU
DHE, diploma of higher education, MMU
Youth and community associate lecturer BA, MMU
Practice background, worked in education, youth and community
Youth Justice
Urban Youth Language
Language and Identity
Youth Gangs and Violence
History of Youth
Youth Culture & Subcultures
Participatory Research
September 2014, Conference paper at EERA ECER (Universidade do Porto, Portugal). Paper given at main confernece wihin the ethnography strand on precarity and being inside and outside within gang cultures.
June 2014, Conference paper at BERA TAG (Newman College, Birmingham). Paper given focusing on informal pedagogy within ‘gang’ cultures.
May 2013, BERA TAG Conference paper given at BERA TAG (University of the West of Scotland). The paper focused on identities presented by ex-gang members working in the field of gang prevention
September 2012, Conference paper presented at BERA main conference. Joint paper given on notions of resistance and resilience in youth and community work.
July 2012, Conference paper given at BERA TAG (Brathay Hall). Paper given on outdoor education and ‘street’ philosophies.
2011 – 2012 (various dates), Representing Nacro in consultation with the Home Office with regard to the Ending Youth and Gang Violence strategy
April 2011, Conference paper presentation (BERA SIG) for one-day conference on radical histories in education (Manchester Metropolitan University)
February 2011, Conference paper given to Annual Research Enterprise Development Conference (Manchester Metropolitan University) on post-modern and anarchistic perspectives of moral panics in relation to youth (winning prize for best paper in section).
February 2011, Presentation to National Youth Agency and Beth Johnson Foundation Intergenerational Conference (Manchester).
2008 – 2009 – Involvement in advisory group for ExPAYP guidance (N.Y.A.).
Other
McHugh, R. (2016) ‘Anarchism and Informal Informal Pedagogy: ‘Gangs’, Difference, Deference’ i Springer, S., Lopes de Souza, M. and White, R. J. The Radicalisation of Pedagogy: Anarchism, Geography and the Spirit of Revolt Rowman and Littlefield
December 2009, Contribution toward Nacro’s Response to Independent Commission on ‘Responding to Youth Crime and Anti-Social Behaviour’ in the shape of researching a range of existing good practice in the field of Youth / Youth Justice orientated work.
Book review
December 2008, Youth Work Now – Publication of a book review on Chris Grover’s Crime and Inequality (Chris Grover is a criminology lecturer at Lancaster University).
In November, 2015 Richard was invited to lead a seminar at Sheffield Hallam University’s Institute of Education as part of their ESCR Festival of Social Sciences event entitled Dangerous Conversations. The workshop focused on the theme of ‘Gangs’ and risk in the context of youth and community work.
Presented a joint at the BERA TAG conference held at the University of Huddersfield. This paper was co-authored and presented with Professor Hannah Smithson and critically examined the concepts of ‘participation’ and ‘youth voice’. The title of the paper was Democracy, democracy and participation: Involving youth or youth voice as separation?
Current research Projects
Currently at MCYS I am working closely with two sets of research, which is the SEND Project – Supporting youth offending teams
http://www2.mmu.ac.uk/mcys/current-research--activities/send-project/
BMX and Skateboard Research Project
http://www2.mmu.ac.uk/mcys/current-research--activities/bmx--skateboard-research/