2025 Speakers

Joelle Taylor is an author of 4 collections of poetry who has won various awards such as 2021 T.S Eliot Prize, and the 2022 Polari Book Prize for LGBT authors. Joelle has performed internationally and uses their personal experiences to tell stories.

Athian Akec is a 21-year-old activist, former youth MP, an educator and a published writer. His multidimensional work ranges from speeches to essays to guest lectures. Athian focuses on providing young people with perspective in order to navigate the future. Over the past few years, he has produced the “Beyond Black history month” series with i-D magazine, spoken in the House of Commons and been published by Penguin with an essay on the political potential of Black culture.

Christina Adane is a 21-year-old purpose-led social activist. Her work originated through her experiences with food campaigning, and now she looks at the intersections between youth culture and social justice. 

Kwajo Tweneboa is a 24-year-old social issues campaigner from south London, who uses social media to give a voice to a variety of issues. Most notably, he has challenged authority in fighting the housing crisis, experiencing eviction at only 12 years old and fighting the landlords who moved his father into an insect-infected property. With extreme passion, Kwajo employs short and plain language to effectively criticise Britain on its social housing.