'Activist academic' Siân Prime named on the Diversity Powerlist

Selected for the Diversity Power List 2025/26, Siân Prime reflects on a career dedicated to academic activism, widening access, and building futures where creativity and enterprise belong to everyone.

We’re proud to announce that Siân Prime, Co-Head of ICCE, Goldsmiths’ Academic Lead for Enterprise, and Co-Director of the Migrant Futures Institute — has been named on the Diversity Power List 2025/26. 

‘My work isn’t finished…’ 

When Siân learned of the recognition, her first reaction wasn’t celebration — it was discomfort. 

“I felt dismayed,” she says. “My work isn’t finished. It can’t be completed. There is always someone else who needs a door opened.” 

It’s a typically humble response from someone whose life and career have been shaped by a deep awareness of barriers, of class, gender, heritage, and migrant identity, and by a long-standing commitment to widening access and helping people who “don’t fit” find where they do. 

Across 17 years at Goldsmiths, Siân has become known for what she calls entrepreneurial and academic activism: teaching and leading with cultural insight, justice, and the belief that ideas thrive when people are pushed into the room, not out of it. 

Alongside her work in ICCE and Synapse, Siân is Co-Director of the Migrant Futures Institute (MFI), Goldsmiths’ pioneering new research hub exploring migration through creative and community-led practice. 

Q&A with Siân Prime 

Q: You’ve said you felt ‘dismayed’ at being included in the Diversity Power List. Why? 
 
Aren’t prizes and accolades usually bestowed for a ‘’job, well done’? I can never think of my work as something that can ever be completed or ‘done.’  I’ve spent my life watching people I love, and people I teach, facing barriers that shouldn’t exist. Recognition is such a lovely thing but really, I’m still in the middle of the work. There’s always someone else to support or another system to challenge. 

Q: Your family history seems woven through everything you do. How has it shaped your understanding of enterprise? 

I’ve often wondered if enterprise is wired into my DNA! My maternal grandfather was a Polish-Jewish tailor who arrived in Britain as a child, when his father died, he took over the family business at twelve.  

In some ways, I mirrored that in my own childhood. My mum was a distinguished ballerina and teacher, and when the family needed support, I helped run her dance school. It wasn’t ambition, nor did I question it. We just understood limited access: limited borrowing power, limited opportunities, limited recognition. Looking back, I wonder if those early experiences sparked an awareness, though it was certainly unconscious back then, that enterprise starts with people’s cultural realities, not abstract models. 

And what strikes me now is how little has changed… 

Q: You grew up around immense creative talent. Did you ever see yourself as a performer? 

I knew very early that performing wasn’t my path. But that clarity gave me something else: an understanding of how many talented people never get the chance to fulfil their potential. That’s why I’ve always been drawn to roles that open doors for others… 

Q: You describe yourself as an ‘entrepreneurial activist academic.’ What does that look like? 
 
It means enterprise is as much about culture, justice, and belonging as it is about finance. My earlier work with Nesta showed me how hard it is for graduates to turn creative thinking into entrepreneurial action when systems aren’t built for them. 

So many of the tools and templates that shape enterprise, especially financial ones are designed to protect the lender, not empower the founder. They’re built to detect risk for the institution, not possibility for the individual. And let’s be honest: historically, most were created within a white, male, patriarchal framework. 

If you don’t fit that template, culturally, socially, or financially, you’re seen as a risk, even when your idea is brilliant.  

That’s why I teach enterprise differently: starting from people’s realities, not from models that were never designed for them. 

Q: Much of your work focuses on people who feel they ‘don’t fit.’ Why is that so central to you?  

Because I’ve seen so many extraordinary people fall through the gaps. I’ve been blessed to have some brilliant artists, performers and entrepreneurs who were told, sometimes quietly, sometimes explicitly, but often through silence too, that they just didn’t belong. They felt it. They feel it. For some, the pathways simply just aren’t there. The doors are closed. They just don’t have safety nets or support systems to catch them. 

My instinct is always to push people ‘into the room’, not out of it, or build a new room. Nobody should have to contort themselves to fit a model that was never designed for them.  

But ‘not fitting’ can be a strength, a source of originality, agility and creative power… 

"We all need to find people who see our value. And if you haven’t found them yet....come find me."

About the Diversity Powerlist:

The 2025/26 Diversity Power List celebrates individuals across the UK who are driving inclusion, equity, and social impact; from high-profile advocates to community champions working at grassroots level.  

This year’s list recognises people addressing the nuanced challenges of intersectionality, social mobility and inclusive innovation, honouring those whose work removes barriers and expands opportunity. Named alongside figures such as Jordan Stephens, Jo Malone CBE, and Goldsmiths alumnus Kae Tempest.  

Siân Prime is recognised for her leadership in women’s enterprise, inclusive entrepreneurship and community-centred economic innovation.