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Decolonising the Academy: Education, Power and Social Change

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Venue: Online

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  • Please note: this event will be hosted digitally via Microsoft Teams. A link to join will be sent to attendees on Wednesday 20th January, 2021
  • Please note: this event will be recorded

2020 was a momentous year, where anti-racist and decolonial activism came to the fore in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. However even as Colston’s statue was toppled and Donald Trump defeated, a senior Government minister has attacked Critical Race Theory and universities UK report states that UK higher education institutions are guilty of institutionalised racism. So how are higher education institutions going to move beyond mere paper pushing exercises and performative gestures to really address the legacies of empire and the contemporary practices that continue to have an adverse impact on global black and brown majority communities? What is the role of the role of education in bringing about academic and societal transformation in relation to the vexed issue of racial justice? And can the academic space be a site for change?

To answer these questions and to kick off Birkbeck’s decolonising the academy’s collective series we have invited two brilliant activist intellectuals who are the cutting edge of decolonial thought to get us started. Kehinde Andrews is Professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University and author of the forthcoming The New Age of Empire: How Racism and Colonialism Still Rule the World. (February 2021) he will be joined by Nadine El-Enany Senior Lecturer in Law and author of (B)ordering Britain: Law, Race and Empire.

The Decolonising the Academy Collective at Birkbeck is a new initiative emanating from the Birkbeck Institute for Social Research, which builds on the earlier work of the Decolonising the Curriculum Working Group at Birkbeck. Our aim is to develop creative, innovative and transformative learning spaces tasked with liberating the academy from the legacies of colonialism and empire.

  • Dr William Ackah Chair and Hub Leader Research
  • Elizabeth Charles Hub Leader Resources
  • Dr Jan Etienne Hub Leader Student Experience
  • Dr Kerry Harman Hub Leader Teaching and Learning

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