Inexpert 2018 was a social experiment disguised as a conference. It took place on Friday May 11th 2018. A not-for-profit gathering in a sold-out 100 seater London theatre that celebrated the power of inexpertise and not knowing.
In a world pre-disposed to speaker events where we are invited to listen to those with knowledge and answers, Inexpert asked what would happen if we intentionally set out to do the opposite. To explore what happens when we gather together to listen to speakers giving talks they’ve never given before, on subjects that they have a mighty curiosity about but no expertise in. Think Portsmouth Sinfonia does TED! Where the audience experience moments of delight along with moments of confusion and dissatisfaction, leaving with more questions than answers, possibly knowing less than when they arrived.
This page is a scrapbook of what happened and will never happen again. A place for those who were there to make sense of the experiment and those that weren’t to feel like they were.
THE SPEAKERS
All the speakers at Inexpert 2018 had the same brief. Come along and do a talk on a subject matter that you are passionate about but have little or no expertise in. Prepare as much as you need to in order to be totally OK with not knowing. Beyond this, it was up to them. Talks ranged from 7 minutes to 20 minutes and came in a variety of formats. Below are all of the speaker videos for Inexpert 2018 that were filmed by first-time camera person Sophie Edwards who did a remarkable job. (Note: both Claire Genkai and Kiran Sondhi were unfortunately unable to speak on the day so their talks are obviously not included here but we would like to thank them greatly for being involved.)
Steve introduces Inexpert 2018
Kay Scorah
James Traeger
Meg Peppin
Deborah Henley
Ola Lagunju
John Smith/Rowan Gray
Mat Hayes
Hilary Gallo
The inexpert debate with Gary Aldam & John Doolan
Wildcard speaker: Paul Stanley
Rob Poynton
Doug Shaw
The best of Nick Parker & his trumpet
The Inexpert Art Exhibition with James Wilson
Steve closes Inexpert 2018
BLOGS ABOUT INEXPERT 2018
A number of ticket holders and speakers are writing blogs about their experience of the Inexpert 2018 experiment. As they are written we will add them below. If you are writing a blog about the event and would like it featured then please let me know.
Tabitha Beavan: “How do you know when you know?”
Hilary Gallo: “The silent talk”
James Traeger: “Celebrating the power of not knowing”
James Wilson: “Relfections on a job done quite well”
Emma Taylor: “Breaking the rules”
Nick Parker: “Playing with Inexpertitude”
Rowan Gray: “Not giving a fuck”
Steve Marshall: “Becoming Inexpert”
Deborah Henley: “Inexpert conference reflections”
Steve Chapman: “On doing something only once – why Inexpert can never be repeated.”
