In late April 2026, Katarina Hovden travelled to the University of Southampton for a two week research trip. During her time, she participated in workshops, presented her PhD research, and ran a final year law class on the rights of nature. In addition, she participated in the first writing retreat of the Home in Crisis project.

We had an ambitious plan for the writing retreat: the team would set aside five days for collaborative writing at the end of which we would have a new paper. This goal was not meant to be punishing but rather we saw it as a methodology for collaborative writing, a way to overcome the complexities of pulling together lots of ideas, visions and understandings into one compelling, clear and impactful piece of writing. The basic method was: keep going. Rather than negotiating everyone’s views or seeking perfect consensus, we looked for ways to expand and include. We spoke, we listened, we read, we shared and then we wrote. We sat quitely together in one room (a hybrid room) and all worked together on one document. At the end of a period of writing, we paused to try and pull the pieces together into an outline, a structure, a narrative. The conversations got richer, converged, our ideas started building onto each other instead of standing in contrast to each other. Our ideas moved from one brain to the next, growing, adapting, evolving.

On day one we thought to ourselves: this might be too much. Elated by the collegiality of sitting together, working side-by-side, we were hopeful but cautious. But then, slowly over days two and three, we began to see it – one rich, deep, wide paper. By the end of day four, we had an outline, an argument, a narrative, case studies! On day five, we realised it was five papers.

And that is how you write five papers in five days.