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University of Westminster - student led Podcast

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University of Westminster - student led Podcast

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This tool aims to centre discussions on topics such as anti-racism and decolonisation as a means of exchanging and generating pedagogical practices and remedies. Appreciating the knowledge that we gain through storytelling, reading, asking questions and listening, this is an offering for those looking for conversations about educational justice, transformation and change. We acknowledge these processes can only be done effectively when done collaboratively, so we invite students, lecturers and external speakers from our communities in order to hear their voices, center their knowledges and ensure that they are leading change.

Episode 1: Jennifer Fraser and Fatima Maatwk

Hosted by Kyra Araneta. In this episode, project members Jennifer Fraser (University Director of Student Partnership in the Centre for Education and Teaching Innovation) and Fatima Maatwk (Student Partnership Lecturer in the CETI) discuss where the project situates itself within anti-racist and decolonial work, how it came to be, and why student-staff partnership is pivotal to any effort towards social justice in HE.

Episode 2: Yahlnaaw - Indigenous worldviews, language revitalisation and Psychology as a colonial discipline

In this episode of the podcast, our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Yahlnaaw (she/her) as she speaks to her experiences as a woman who holds the identities of being Indigenous, Queer, and Transgender while encompassing the epistemologies (ways of knowing), ontologies (ways of being) and axiology (values) that accompany her intersecting identities. Yahlnaaw delves into navigating Indigenous identity while being submersed in colonial social systems and revitalizing her Indigenous language as a second language learner and how it has influenced her master's thesis research. Yahlnaaw offers possible avenues for communities to utilize in the de-constructing processes of oppressive and colonizing frameworks and systems.

Episode 3: Lubaba Khalid - Multiraciality, the attainment gap and student unions

In this episode of the podcast, our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Lubaba Khalid. Lubaba has been involved in numerous projects during her time at Westminster, from being a co-author on the "What is the attainment gap?" report as a student, a BAME representation officer, and her most recent position as former Vice President of Welfare in the Student Union. In this interview, we delve deeper into her background and identity, as well her journey into becoming the leader, activist and role model she is today.

Episode 4: Deanne Bell - Decolonial atmospheres, retrospective autoethnography and decolonising Psychology

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Deanne Bell, Senior Lecturer in the School of Social Sciences at Nottingham Trent University - with specialities in liberation psychology and decolonisation. Some of her most recent work focuses on building decolonial atmospheres and developing imaginings of a new university that exists outside of the colonial forms of knowing and being that are still deeply entrenched in the system. In this interview, we delve deeper into Deanne's upbringing in Jamaica and how she came to understand her identity and positionality, her recent paper on retrospective autoethnography and what she thinks can be done to decolonise psychology as a discipline.

Episode 5: Episode 5: Tanveer Ahmed: Decolonising Fashion Design and shifting the Western canon

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by PhD student and visiting lecturer at the Royal College of Art, Goldsmiths and University of London, Tanveer Ahmed to discuss what it means to teach and think critically about Fashion Design (FD). Some of her most recent work focuses on how representations of the Other are reinforced in in FD curricula as well as how Black feminist literature can aid our understanding and help educators to develop anti-racist and culturally progressive FD pedagogy. In this interview, we delve deeper into Tanveer's academic background and how she came to understand the Eurocentric, capitalistic, patriarchal, colonial nature of the fashion industry and why this space continues to disadvantage Black and Brown students of fashion design.

Episode 6: Lubna Bin Zayyad: Representations in the media and decolonising Journalism

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Lubna Bin Zayyad, who recently graduated with a Masters in Broadcast Journalism at the University of Westminster. As well as playing a key role in the Pedagogies for Social Justice steering group and glossary, Lubna's writing is mainly centred around deconstructing colonial and racist beliefs and representations in the media - in particular, on the areas of the Middle East and Islamic History. In this interview, we delve deeper into Lubna's upbringing and experience of multi-raciality, on top of how she came to understanding her identity/positionality through media. Lubna then offers her thoughts on how we might begin to decolonise not only the media itself, but the way in which it is taught and understood in curricula.

Episode 7: Dibyesh Anand - Colonial rule in China, securitization and Decolonising International Relations

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Dibyesh Anand, a Professor of International Relations (IR) and the Head of the School of Social Sciences at Westminster. Dibyesh is widely recognised for his research on topics including politics and international relations of Tibetans under Chinese rule, Islamophobia in India, the politics of security and representation, the emergence of China and India as major non-Western powers, and the contested nature of nation-state formations in Asia. In this interview, we delve deeper into Dibyesh's recent work on securitization and how it relates to the modern Chinese colonisation of Xinjiang and Tibet. We also discuss the ways in which IR is still a colonial discipline and how we might begin to decolonise the study on a pedagogical level.

- Listen to this podcast Transcript [PDF] - Read Dibyesh's article

Episode 8: Olimpia Burchiellaro - LGBTQ studies, queer politics and coloniality

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by Olimpia Burchiellaro, a post-doctoral research fellow in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Westminster. Some of her recent work focuses on issues of inclusion/exclusion and the transformative potential of queer activism. In this interview, we explore themes of identity, queerness, Eurocentrism and whiteness, as well as how we might begin to decolonise the IR canon and adopt decolonial/anti-racist pedagogies.

Episode 9: Tamara Reid - Inclusion, student partnership and decolonial work in higher education

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by Tamara Reid, Lead of the Inclusive Curriculum Consultants Programme at Kingston University, London. With a wealth of experience in stimulating student engagement, EDI work and partnership, Tamara sheds light on the complexities of these areas - particularly the tensions between decoloniality, anti-racism and inclusion. In terms of moving forward in our efforts towards decolonising higher education, we discuss how lecturers can help themselves to approach the topics of race and coloniality in educational spaces and more.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 10: Mrinalini Greedharry: 'The limits of literature as liberation' and Decolonising English Literature curricula

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Mrinalini Greedharry, a Professor at Laurentian University in the land we now call Canada. Mrinalini's research is largely anchored in English, developing to include interests in historical and organizational questions about English as an academic discipline. In this interview we delve deeper into Mrinalini's upbringing, her experiences of teaching in Canada, Finland and the UK, her recent article, and how we might begin to decolonise English curricula.

Listen to episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 11: Raidat Suleiman: The "angry Black woman" stereotype, attacks on Critical Race Theory and decolonising Sociology

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Westminster alumni Raidat Suleiman. In this episode we delve into Raidat's experience of growing up in London, how she came to understand matters of race, and how this led her to focus her dissertation on the experiences of young Black women dealing with stereotypes. As a graduate of Sociology, Raidat comments on the recent government attacks on Critical Race Theory and concepts such as 'white privilege', as well as the implications. Looking forward, Raidat proposes how we might begin to decolonise Sociology as a discipline and manage micro-aggressions in the classroom.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 12: Catherine Charrett: Settler colonialism, sovereignty and decolonising International Relations

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Catherine Charrett, a lecturer in International Relations and Politics at the University of Westminster. Her research explores sovereignty in IR and Political Theory through indigenous and anti-colonial struggles, particularly in regards to the Palestinian liberation movement. In this interview we discuss settler colonialism and sovereignty, COVID-19, her recent paper on Palestine and how we might begin to decolonise International Relations as a academic discipline.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 13: Moonisah Usman: Student partnership, anti-racist approaches to Biomedical research and decolonising the Life Sciences

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Moonisah Usman, a lecturer at the Centre for Education and Teaching Innovation at Westminster. Moonisah also has an academic background in the Life Sciences but generally has a strong commitment to Biomedical research, student partnership and supporting foundation learning. In this interview we discuss the 'Students as Co-Creators' program at Westminster, decolonial and anti-racist approaches to Biomedical research and how we might begin to decolonise the Life Sciences.

Listen to the podcast - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 14: Cheyenne Holborough: Creative writing as a tool for activism and decolonising English Literature

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Cheyenne Holborough, a third year student of Creative Writing and English Literature at Westminster. Cheyenne also plays an important role in the Pedagogies for Social Justice steering committee as well as a co-creator of the project's glossary. In this interview, we discuss creative writing as a tool for activism, the School of Humanities New Writing Festival, her role as an EDI rep and how we might begin to decolonise English Lit and Creative Writing.

Listen to the podcast - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 15: Tamara Naouri: "All the spaces within counselling Psychology have been colonised"

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by Tamara Naouri, a Jordanian trainee counselling psychologist in the UK. In this episode, we discuss the summer of 2020 related to the Black Lives Matter movement, the unlawful killing of George Floyd, and the impact of these events on ethnic minorities in the workplace. Tamara offers insight into her educational journey, her sense of identity and how her upbringing has influenced her work and understanding today.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 16: Samir Pandya - 'Equity', Diversity and Inclusion and decolonising Architecture curricula

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Samir Pandya, an architect and Assistant Head of the School of Architecture at our university. Samir's research largely focuses on the relationship between architecture and identity to examine questions relating to design, representation and power. In this interview we delve into Samir's academic journey, his role as Director of International and Strategic Lead for Equality, Diversity & Inclusion, and how we can begin to decolonise Architecture curricula.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 17: Aishwarya Tiku - The British curriculum in an African context and decolonising Business management studies

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by Aishwarya Tiku, a researcher in the field of knowledge management practices in higher education. In this interview, we delve into Aishwarya's educational journey across Africa and the UK, her experience of studying under the British curriculum in these contexts, and her ability to navigate her identity and sense of belonging. Aishwarya shares her thoughts on what it means to decolonise management studies, particularly the importance of anti-racist and decolonial teacher training, and shifting the hierarchal nature of the academy itself.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 18: Kyra Araneta - Sociology to International Relations, decolonising the social sciences and working in partnership

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by our co-host Kyra Araneta, a student of International Relations (IR) at Westminster and a research assistant on the Pedagogies for Social Justice (PSJ) project. In this interview, we delve into Kyra's educational journey - particularly her shift from studying Sociology to IR, her understanding of the British curriculum, and her experience of trying to navigate her multi-racial identity and sense of belonging in this time. Kyra also shares her thoughts on student-staff partnership whilst unpacking her work on the PSJ project.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 19: Eddie Bruce-Jones - Research on race in higher education and decolonising Law curricula

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Dr. Eddie Bruce Jones, a legal academic and Head of the Department of Law at Birkbeck College, London. Eddie's research and writing largely focuses on topics such as racism, colonialism, state violence and citizenship, though he also plays directorial roles in organisations such as the Institute of Race Relations, Rainbow Migration, and the Journal of Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Law, and more. In this interview, we delve into Eddie's upbringing and academic journey, his role at the Institute of Race Relations, educational research and how we might begin to decolonise Law curricula. Towards the end, Eddie shares some insight into the postgraduate course he designed and currently teaches at Birkbeck, called 'Race Law and Literature'.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 20: Zahra Butt - Student Unions, political activism and decolonising the curriculum

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Zahra Butt, President of the Westminster Student Union. In this interview we discuss Zahra's academic journey at Westminster, her involvement in the Union leading up to her campaign, as well as unpacking the points of her manifesto. If you wish to get involved or find out more about the Student Union, feel free to visit the link in the description on our website.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 21: Séagh Kehoe - The media as a colonial force, online politics of representation and decolonising Chinese studies

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Dr. Séagh Kehoe, a Lecturer in Chinese Studies in the School of Humanities at Westminster. In this interview we discuss Seagh's academic journey and the focus of their PhD. We also unpack Chinese media representations and the impact they have on both people and politics. Towards the end, Seagh shares some of their ideas and methods for decolonising the Chinese studies/Humanities classroom.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 22: Derin Fadina - "Unsettled Subjects" and decolonising Architecture

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Westminster alumni, Derin Fadina, who recently graduated with a Master's in Architecture. In this interview we delve into Derin's academic background, what drew him to Architecture as both an art form and discipline, and his experience of studying it as an undergrad and postgrad. We reflect on his work on our project's reading lists as well as his involvement in the 'Unsettled Subjects: Confronting Questions' project in the School of Architecture. Towards the end, Derin also shares how lecturers can begin to decolonise their pedagogy and practice.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 23: Remi-Joseph Salisbury - Critical Race Theory in the UK, decriminalising the classroom and decolonising educational research

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Dr. Remi-Joseph Salisbury, a Presidential Fellow in Ethnicity and Inequalities at the University of Manchester, whose interests lie particularly in racism and anti-racism in the contexts of education and policing. In this episode we delve into Remi's academic background in the social sciences and where his anti-racist thinking and work began. Remi offers insight into the history of tension between the UK government and Critical Race Theory as well as the implications of attacks on CRT and the discourse of "the forgotten White-working class". We then have the opportunity to discuss his report called "Decriminalise the classroom" which looks specifically at the effects of police presence in Greater Manchester schools. And finally, Remi gives us some ideas on how we might begin to decolonise educational research.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 24: Tino Rwodzi - Identity work, Black women in STEM and dismantling racist assumptions in Biomedical science

In this episode of the podcast our host Fatima Maatwk is joined by third-year Biomedical student, Tino Rwodzi - who is also a member of our project steering group as well as a lead speaker in the DAR (decolonisation and anti-racism) study group. In this interview we delve into Tino's academic background and her experience of navigating her a sense of identity in university. We consider her journey into the Life Sciences and how she came to develop a critical understanding of the discipline in terms of being a Black woman in STEM. She points out some of the discriminatory assumptions that continue to plague Biomedical Science and the social constructs that the discipline and science itself tend to overlook. And finally, Tino sheds lights on how we might move towards dismantling racist perceptions and assumptions in science, particularly through interdisciplinary methods involving social scientists, historians and more.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 25: Lola Olufemi - Feminism Interrupted, PhD research and thinking about higher education through a feminist lens

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by with black feminist writer and Stuart Hall Foundation researcher, Lola Olufemi. In this interview we discuss Lola's journey into feminism and how she came to start thinking critically about race and gender, but also liberal feminist theory and action. As she carries out her PhD at Westminster, we discuss the focus of her research and the research process so far. This leads us to unpack the writing behind her book 'Feminism Interrupted: Disrupting Power' and finally to thinking about decolonising the university through a feminist lens.

Listen to this episode - Transcript [PDF] - Lola's website

Episode 26: Ipshita Basu: "Politics of a New Normal", decolonial storytelling and academics in social justice work

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Westminster Senior Lecturer in International Relations, Ipshita Basu. In this interview we discuss Ipshita's background and academic journey from India to the UK. We talk about her new blog which consists of original thought pieces on topics such as the politics of infrastructure, urbanisation and technology. We then move on to the performative workshop that Ipshita co-created called 'Sharing Untold Stories of Postcolonial Journeys' and what it means to foster a decolonial space in the institution. Finally, we consider the experience of being an academic who is involved in activism and social justice work, as well as the challenges they often face.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 27: Fatima Maatwk: Student-staff partnership in the university and decolonising Business studies

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by lecturer at Westminster Business School, Fatima Maatwk. Fatima is engaged in a number of research projects on partnership at the university, including the Pedagogies for Social Justice project. In this interview, we discuss Fatima's journey from studying Business and Economics in Egypt, Germany and the UK - and how this influenced her understanding of race and coloniality. We then go on to ask for her thoughts on student-staff partnership and the importance of utilising it in the classroom, before we get into some of the ways we might begin to decolonise the Business School.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 28/29: Kate M. Graham: Black History Year, white allyship and decolonial pedagogy in English Literature

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Westminster Lecturer in English Literature, Kate M. Graham. In this two-part interview we discuss Kate's upbringing and how it shaped her understanding of race and sense of identity. We talk about her academic journey across her Bachelor's in English, and her two Master's in Cultural and Critical Studies and Text and Performance Studies . We then move on to think about decolonial and anti-racist projects within the university, specifically the Black History Year initiative at Westminster - before finally considering what it means to foster decolonial pedagogy in English Literature.

Listen to Part 1 - Transcript for Part 1 [PDF]

Listen to Part 2 - Transcript for Part 2 [PDF]

Episode 30: Christopher Newfield: American schooling, Critical University Studies and decolonising university funding

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by the Director of Research at the Independent Social Research Foundation in London and the newly appointed Presidentof the Modern Language Association, Christopher Newfield. With a background in English Literature, his central interests also include critical university studies, management theory, fiscal control and more. In this episode, we discuss his academic journey, Critical University Studies as a school of thought, and the ways in which university funding sustains coloniality.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF]

Episode 31: Stephanie Davis: Critical Psychology, queer activism and "Intersectional Richness"

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by author, educator and activist Dr. Stephanie Davis, based at Nottingham Trent University. Starting things off with growing up as a teen in 90s Britain, Stephanie opens up about the representations she was exposed to and the influences that helped her to construct her identity. We reflect on her journey into Critical Psychology and radical organising before Stephanie discusses her PhD research and her interests in the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality and subjectivity, and how we might start off a conversation about decolonising gender and sexuality. We also have the honour of speaking to Stephanie about her new book ' Queer and Trans People of Colour in the UK: Possibilities for Intersectional Richness', which explores the meanings of Queer and Trans People of Colour (QTPOC) activist groups in the UK, considering the tensions around inclusion and belonging across lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and queer (LGBTQ) and of colour communities and wider British society.

Listen to the episode - Transcript [PDF] - Stephanie's website

Episode 32: Drea Asibey: The Black Experience at PWIs, student organising and youth activism

In this episode of the podcast our host Kyra Araneta is joined by Drea Asibey. Drea is a Ghanaian-British-Canadian Cultural Producer, Curator and Educator with an interest in celebrating and championing Black stories, cultures and histories. She works in a museum as a Youth Programme Producer and is also currently pursuing a Master's degree in Black Humanities at the University of Bristol. Drea completed a Bachelor's in Classics and African Studies at McGill University in Montreal, QC, Canada. In the episode, we discuss her academic background in particular, the experience of being Black in predominantly white institutions in the UK and the land we now call Canada. She also shares some insight into her time at the National Union of Students on the Decolonise Education Campaign before opening up about how we can empower young people to participate in political activism.

Connect with her on LinkedIn at Andreann Asibey, Instagram @dreaasibey and on Twitter @maameafiadwumaa

Listen to episode - Transcript [PDF]

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This tool aims to centre discussions on topics such as anti-racism and decolonisation as a means of exchanging and generating pedagogical practices and remedies. Appreciating the knowledge that we gain through storytelling, reading, asking questions and listening, this is an offering for those looking for conversations about educational justice, transformation and change.

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Doherty et al (2020) Went to Decolonsie but got Double Speak Diversity instead

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Doherty et al (2020) Went to Decolonsie but got Double Speak Diversity instead

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Abstract
UK Higher Education is characterised by structural and institutional forms of whiteness. As scholars and activists are increasingly speaking out to testify, whiteness has wide-ranging implications that affect curricula, pedagogy, knowledge production, university policies, campus climate, and the experiences of students and faculty of colour. Unsurprisingly then, calls to decolonize the university abound. In this article, we draw upon the Critical Race Theory method of counter-storytelling. By introducing composite characters, we speak back to assumptions that universities are race-neutral, meritocratic institutions. We illustrate some of the key themes that shape the experiences of faculty of colour in UK Higher Education: institutional racism, racial microaggressions, racial battle fatigue, and steadfast fugitive resistance. We argue that, despite the paradox of working under (what purports to be) a 'decolonial' agenda, widespread calls to decolonize our universities have further embedded rather than dismantled whiteness, thus continuing to characterise the careers, wellbeing, and daily lives of faculty of colour.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dr. Nadena Doharty is a sociologist of education working for the School of Education at the University of Sheffield. Nadena read her undergraduate degree in Sociology and Politics and postgraduate degree in International Relations at Goldsmith's College, University of London. After a PGCE specialising in Sociology and Politics, Nadena earned her PhD at the University of Keele. Nadena's areas of research and publications include: the Sociology of Education, Black History, inequalities in education, racialised identities in schooling, Critical Race Theories, and critical/anti-racist pedagogies.

Dr. Manny Madriaga is a native Californian who conducted PhD research on whiteness and American national identity at the University of Sheffield with support from a UK Universities Overseas Scholarship Award and a Sociological Studies Graduate Teaching Assistantship. His research interests include: 'race' and education, inclusive practice, disability and education, whiteness (critical race theory) and inequalities and disadvantage. Manny has published widely in these areas and is an active participant in the BME Staff Network across Sheffield Hallam and the University of Sheffield.

Dr. Remi Joseph-Salisbury completed his PhD at the University of Leeds in 2016 before working as a Senior Lecturer at Leeds Beckett University for two years. In 2018, Remi moved to the University of Manchester to take up the position of Presidential Fellow in Ethnicity and Inequalities. Remi's first book 'Black Mixed-Race Men' was published by Emerald in 2018, and was awarded the British Sociological Association's Philip Abram's memorial prize for the best first and sole-authored book. His co-edited collection 'The Fire Now: Anti-Racist Scholarship in Times of Explicit Racial Violence', was published in November 2018. Remi has published in national and international journals on topics covering his broad interests including race, racism, anti-racism, the 'post-racial', mixedness, masculinities, and education. As well as his academic outputs, Remi writes regularly for media outputs and is the 'Race and Resistance' columnist at Red Pepper Magazine.

Notes

1 Beginning at Harvard, before spreading to campuses across the US and the UK, 'I too am...' was a campaign in which students 'held up boards that quoted or described their daily experiences of racial microaggressions... As the [Harvard] campaign's Tumblr Page suggests, 'I too am' emerges from a collective sense that Black student voices 'often go unheard' on campus, their 'experiences are devalued', and their 'presence is questioned'. The campaign represents a 'way of speaking back' (Tumblr, 2014, no page).' (Joseph-Salisbury, Joseph-Salisbury, R. (2019a). Institutionalised whiteness, racial microaggressions and black bodies out of place in Higher Education. 2019a Whiteness and Education, 4(1), 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1080/23793406.2019.1620629 , 10).

2 Not all universities are members of the Charter and of the 56 members of the scheme, only 12 institutions have managed to demonstrate a 'bronze' level of commitment to race equality. None have achieved silver or gold (Advance HE, Advance HE. (2019). 2019 Race equality charter members and award holders. https://www.ecu.ac.uk/equality-charters/race-equality-charter/members-award-holders/ )

3 Buckaroo is a children's game in which the aim is to pile as many items onto the mule without causing it to buck all of the items off. The winner is the one who has achieved this.

4 Further information can be found here: https://www.ecu.ac.uk/equality-charters/race-equality-charter/about-race-equality-charter/

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The university went to 'decolonise' and all they brought back was lousy diversity double-speak! Critical race counter-stories from faculty of colour in 'decolonial' times

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Abstract UK Higher Education is characterised by structural and institutional forms of whiteness. As scholars and activists are increasingly speaking out to testify, whiteness has wide-ranging implications that affect curricula, pedagogy, knowledge production, university policies, campus climate, and the experiences of students and faculty of colour. Unsurprisingly then, calls to decolonize the university abound.

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United States university internationalisation practices and policies reproduce and reinforce cultural and social racism, according to a recent study based on the experiences of Sub-Saharan African students.

"Rather than 'enriching' our campuses with 'diverse' groups who all experience 'dignity and respect' at the university, we find the policies and practices around internationalisation on campus are 'not only unhelpful but actually exacerbated the very conditions' around exclusion, discrimination, and the inequity they ostensibly seek to redress," the study concludes.

It finds that internationalisation policies appear to be empty concepts with positive biases.

"They are laden with liberal ideals of 'dignity and respect' but pivot quickly to neoliberal notions of 'enrichment' and economic gain" and position international students and scholars as 'assets of the neoliberal agenda' tasked with adding 'special richness' to positively influence the university's brand and marketability."

The study, 'International students and the neoliberal marketplace of higher education: the lived experiences of graduate students from Sub-Saharan countries in Africa of a US university's internationalisation policy', was written by Nyaradzai Changamire and Jacqueline Mosselson at the US-based University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Chrystal George Mwangi at George Mason University, US, and published in the Higher Education Journal on 20 November.

"When we couple the analysis of the policies with the lived experiences of students, faculty and administrators on campus, we expose an undergirding of neoracism impacting all facets of the students' experiences and interactions," the authors noted.

"Through a small-scale study of the experiences of graduate students from Sub-Saharan African countries, we see evidence of material and discursive representations of race that produce material inequalities that are then used to legitimise racial formations."

The home countries of the graduate students included Malawi, Nigeria, Rwanda, Zimbabwe, Ghana, and Senegal.

Programmes 'perpetuate white superiority'

The authors say they have demonstrated ways in which the implementation of campus internationalisation programmes is "part of the larger discourse of racism on both the national and international arenas, perpetuating white superiority and implementing policies that reproduce the inequities that reify and legitimise neoracism".

Graduate students from Sub-Saharan countries described experiencing disrespect based on neoracist assumptions of national origin and skin colour. "Rather than feeling part of the institution, they are marginalised as instruments to enrich the campus," the US study noted.

"There are multiple examples of this, from a policy that considers them as 'assets' in service of the university to lack of understanding and outreach to them once they arrive on campus," the study added.

"It paradoxically positions them as tools through which the neoliberal university can market itself as a progressive entity while simultaneously reifying neoracist attitudes towards their abilities, needs, and socioeconomic statuses."

Elizabeth Buckner, assistant professor at Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto in Canada, told University World News: "This seems like an important study, as lots of academic research has pointed out that international students are often celebrated for their diversity in the abstract, with less attention paid to their lived experiences of racism, discrimination, economic exploitation and marginalisation."

She said lots of research has shown that university campuses in the US "remain spaces where white, middle-class, Christian, monolingual English-speaking, citizen students are treated as the norm - and students who do not fit this perceived norm face racism, discrimination, or are treated as 'others'.

"This definitely needs to change," Buckner said.

Beyond US universities

However, she added that this is not only an American story. "Racism, colourism and other forms of ethnic, religious or linguistic discrimination are found in different ways in every country and every higher education system, and so it is important for institutions everywhere to see how they can do better to make their institutions more inclusive," Buckner pointed out.

Buckner is the lead author of the 2021 Canadian study entitled 'Diversity without Race. How university internationalisation strategies discuss international students'.

That study found that institutional strategies of 62 higher education institutions in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom connect international students to an abstract notion of diversity, using visual images to portray campus environments as inclusive of racial, ethnic and religious diversity. Yet, strategy documents rarely discuss race, racialisation, or racism explicitly, despite the fact that most international students in all three countries are non-white.

Also, results from a British study, involving interviews with black African international students studying in 10 different UK-based universities located in eight English cities, indicated that racism and 'othering' pervade all aspects of their lived experiences, both inside and outside the university. That study, 'Racism and Othering in International Higher Education: experiences of black Africans in England', was published in April 2021.

Assessing racial justice at universities

Higher education expert Magdi Tawfik Abdelhamid, at Egypt's National Research Centre in Cairo, told University World News that he would like to see the establishment of a global ranking system for anti-racist higher education institutions "to help institutional leaders in developing racial justice in their universities as well as addressing the multidimensional aspects of racism in university community and society and to act as a guide for foreign academic and student communities for selecting hosting universities".

He said such a ranking system could be based on assessing campus climate, institutional culture, community partnerships, student enrolment, staff hiring and retention practices, and curriculum design along with institutional strategy, policies and operations through a racial justice lens, "including racial diversity, equity and inclusion efforts institution-wide".

Towards ethical internationalisation

Despite strong and growing presence of students from countries in Sub-Saharan countries in Africa enrolled in US universities, which reached approximately 42,000 students prior to the coronavirus pandemic, little research exists focusing on their experiences of education in the US, according to the American study.

It calls for future research to examine how university internationalisation plans can engage more ethically to better meet the needs of all students, "particularly those from whom it expects so much but provides so little".

"Academia must be accountable for the differential impact of race on the experiences of students," the study said.

The study calls for more critical work on the students' experiences as they navigate a "paradoxical US system in which they are intersectionally marginalised while simultaneously accessing the benefits the US system affords them and contributing to the dominance of the system they have opted into for graduate education".

"Racism is not new in universities anywhere in the world," Buckner said.

"These are deep-seated problems rooted in colonisation, expansionism, and Euro-centrism, and there are no easy answers or quick fixes."

She said higher education institutions and faculty need to start with educating themselves about the realities and consequences of racism, colonisation and American hegemony in the world.

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US international HE 'reinforces racism', study finds

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United States university internationalisation practices and policies reproduce and reinforce cultural and social racism, according to a recent study based on the experiences of Sub-Saharan African students.

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Diversifying Physiology Case Study (p.28)

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Diversifying Physiology Case Study (p.28)

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Affiliations

1 Q.G. Eichbaum is professor of pathology, microbiology and immunology, and director, Vanderbilt Pathology Program in Global Health, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, as well as professor of medical education and administration, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee.

2 L.V. Adams is associate dean for global health, associate professor of medicine and epidemiology, and director, Center for Global Health Equity, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1303-2154.

3 J. Evert is assistant clinical professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California, and executive director, Child Family Health International, Oakland, California; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3669-7693.

4 M.-J. Ho is professor, Department of Family Medicine, Georgetown University School of Medicine, associate director, Center for Innovation and Leadership in Education, Georgetown University Medical Center, and director of education research, MedStar Health, Washington, DC.

5 I.A. Semali is senior lecturer, Epidemiology, Hubert Kairuki Memorial University, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

6 S.C. van Schalkwyk is professor, Health Professions Education, and director, Centre for Health Professions Education, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1596-6791.

Affiliations

1 Q.G. Eichbaum is professor of pathology, microbiology and immunology, and director, Vanderbilt Pathology Program in Global Health, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, as well as professor of medical education and administration, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee.

2 L.V. Adams is associate dean for global health, associate professor of medicine and epidemiology, and director, Center for Global Health Equity, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1303-2154.

3 J. Evert is assistant clinical professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California, and executive director, Child Family Health International, Oakland, California; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3669-7693.

4 M.-J. Ho is professor, Department of Family Medicine, Georgetown University School of Medicine, associate director, Center for Innovation and Leadership in Education, Georgetown University Medical Center, and director of education research, MedStar Health, Washington, DC.

5 I.A. Semali is senior lecturer, Epidemiology, Hubert Kairuki Memorial University, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

6 S.C. van Schalkwyk is professor, Health Professions Education, and director, Centre for Health Professions Education, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa; ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1596-6791.

Abstract

Global health often entails partnerships between institutions in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) that were previously colonized and high-income countries (HICs) that were colonizers. Little attention has been paid to the legacy of former colonial relationships and the influence they have on global health initiatives. There have been recent calls for the decolonization of global health education and the reexamination of assumptions and practices under pinning global health partnerships. Medicine's role in colonialism cannot be ignored and requires critical review. There is a growing awareness of how knowledge generated in HICs defines practices and informs thinking to the detriment of knowledge systems in LMICs. Additionally, research partnerships often benefit the better-resourced partner. In this article, the authors offer a brief analysis of the intersections between colonialism, medicine, and global health education and explore the lingering impact of colonialist legacies on current global health programs and partnerships. They describe how "decolonized" perspectives have not gained sufficient traction and how inequitable power dynamics and neocolonialist assumptions continue to dominate. They discuss 5 approaches, and highlight resources, that challenge colonial paradigms in the global health arena. Furthermore, they argue for the inclusion of more transfor mative learning approaches to promote change in attitudes and practice. They call for critical reflection and concomitant action to shift colonial paradigms toward more equitable partnerships in global education.

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References

Koplan JP, Bond TC, Merson MH, et al.; Consortium of Universities for Global Health Executive Board. Towards a common definition of global health. Lancet. 2009;373:1993-1995

Guinto R. #DecolonizeGlobalHealth: Rewriting the narrative of global health. International Health Policies. https://www.internationalhealthpolicies.org/blogs/decolonizeglobalhealth.... Published February 2019. Accessed March 25, 2020.

Wa Thiong'o N. Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. 1994, Nairobi, Kenya: East African Publishers

Khan R, Hodges B, Martimianakis MAT, Cole D. Twelve tips for undertaking reflexive global health experiences in medicine. Med Teach. 2017;39:1023-1028

Whitehead C, Wondimagegn D, Baheretibeb Y, Hodges B. The international partner as invited guest: Beyond colonial and import-export models of medical education Acad Med. 2018;93:1760-1763

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developing countries / statistics & numerical data

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health education / legislation & jurisprudence*

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international cooperation / legislation & jurisprudence*

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national center for biotechnology information

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Decolonizing Global Health Education: Rethinking Institutional Partnerships and Approaches - PubMed

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Global health often entails partnerships between institutions in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) that were previously colonized and high-income countries (HICs) that were colonizers. Little attention has been paid to the legacy of former colonial relationships and the influence they have on ...

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Decolonising Psychology curriculum Leeds Beckett University

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Decolonising Psychology curriculum Leeds Beckett University

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Decolonizing Psychology Curricula: Why, what and how?

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Uncovering the decolonizing ghost in the colonizing machine

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Let's Do Diversity: University of Amsterdam (2016)

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Let's Do Diversity: University of Amsterdam (2016)

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HEPI paper 23 Liyanage Miseducation: Decolonising Curriculua

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HEPI paper 23 Liyanage Miseducation: Decolonising Curriculua

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Pimblott (2019) Decolonising the University: The Origina and 

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Pimblott (2019) Decolonising the University: The Origina and 

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Sultana (2019) Decolonizing Development Education and hte Pursuit of Social Justice

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Sultana (2019) Decolonizing Development Education and hte Pursuit of Social Justice

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Black Studies as a Science of Liberation

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Black Studies as a Science of Liberation

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'Black Studies as the Science of Liberation'   (Professor Kehinde Andrews)

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University of Birmingham: Decolonising Modern Languages

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University of Birmingham: Decolonising Modern Languages

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Dr. Emanuelle Santos: 'Decolonise the curriculum: beyond the buzzword toward actual change.'

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UWE Bristol recording: Decolonising in film studies

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UWE Bristol recording: Decolonising in film studies

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The Guardian: A new student's guide to campus activism

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The Guardian: A new student's guide to campus activism

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Clearing 2020

In March 2015, a protester named Chumani Maxwele threw a bucket of faeces over a statue of the British imperialist Cecil Rhodes, outside the University of Cape Town. The fallout sparked further demonstrations by students in South Africa, spreading to the UK and, before long, campuses across the world.

What became the Rhodes Must Fall movement was by no means the beginning of anti-racism campaigns among the student community, but it did mark a significant shift in the narrative surrounding colonisation - and the historical context many university degrees are rooted in.

In June, it was finally announced that a long-contested statue of Rhodes outside Oxford University's Oriel College would be taken down. The move signified a real moment of victory for equality campaigners - as well as further proof of the power of the student body in inciting change.

Oxford's U-turn was influenced by the wider Black Lives Matter demonstrations, which have shone a spotlight on systemic problems with diversity. Combined with student-led decolonisation campaigns such as UCL's Why is My Curriculum White? and the University of Huddersfield's Broaden My Bookshelf, this activism is finally filtering through to university curricula. Increasing numbers of staff and students are questioning the lack of content from black, Asian and ethnic minority (BAME) writers, as well as LGBT+ authors, on degree course reading lists and in libraries - and universities are listening.

And yet stark inequalities remain in the BAME attainment gap and a lack of diversity within the university staff body. According to research by the University and College Union last year, 93% of university professors in the UK are white, with black academics particularly underrepresented.

"The changes have been positive, but there's still a long way to go," says Fope Olaleye, the National Union of Students black students' officer. In her role championing diversity and inclusivity on campus, Olaleye takes part in campaign work and staff training workshops countrywide. Where once these events had just a handful of attendees, now they're packed out, she says.

"It's clear that universities are becoming more willing to have difficult conversations about race and inequality," she says, but there is a big difference between proactively supporting positive change and ticking boxes. "Decolonisation isn't just about slapping a couple more BAME authors on a reading list, it's about transformative change. It's about asking questions such as: how do we learn? How do we run our lectures and seminars? How do students engage with our tutors? Is the way we teach great for disabled students? Can they access the rooms?"

A new concern is that the coronavirus pandemic will add to existing challenges faced by marginalised student groups. An inquiry by the Equality and Human Rights Commission last year found about a quarter of BAME students (including non-British white students) had experienced racial harassment on campus, and anecdotally Olaleye believes the problem has heightened, especially for Asian students. "The troubling thing is that most students don't have enough trust in their institutions to report incidences in the first place," she adds.

"The pandemic will accentuate structural inequalities that already exist," agrees Kalwant Bhopal, professor of education and social justice at the University of Birmingham. Bhopal urges students "to speak out and continue to fight for issues of social justice", but cautions that this shouldn't be seen as their responsibility alone.

She has called for university funding to be tied to institutional efforts to address the underrepresentation of BAME staff - but notes that students can support the change by joining uni groups that campaign for such initiatives. "The student voice on these committees can be hugely powerful and as such they can demand change to make a difference," she says. "It's important for everyone to continue to disrupt, dismantle and question inequalities, and make people feel uncomfortable, and make them think about their own privilege," says Bhopal. "Only then can we move towards thinking about a socially just society."

While universities are increasingly discussing race and inequality, they must do more to tackle harassment and improve BAME representation on the staff and curriculum

Campaigns explained
Decolonising the university
A call for universities to equip students with the skills to think critically about where knowledge comes from. This means understanding that it's not objective, but rather shaped by the experiences and nationalities of the people who produced it. Fope Olaleye of the NUS says: "A lot of these conversations will be framed around supporting marginalised students or students of colour, but decolonising the learning experience will be beneficial for everyone."

Broadening the bookshelf
A campaign to increase the range of books in university libraries and on curriculums by marginalised authors. Historically, university libraries have been dominated by books written by white men from Europe. Initiatives like the University of Huddersfield's Broaden My Bookshelf aim to increase the range of books written by BAME and LGBT+ authors, among other underrepresented groups. In 2017, the university allocated £20,000 to purchase books suggested by staff and students.

BAME attainment gap
The difference between the proportion of white and BAME students who graduate with a first- or upper second-class degree. Research undertaken by Universities UK and the NUS last year found evidence of a 13% gap across UK universities, furthering calls for a review of the way in which grades are awarded and support offered.

Ethnicity pay gap
Analysis by the University and College Union in 2019 found a 9% pay gap between BAME and white academic staff, while a BBC study that year suggests a pay gap as high as 26% for black and Arab staff compared with white British peers, based on the average salaries earned at Russell Group unis. Experts attribute the pay gap differences to underrepresentation of BAME staff in senior (better-paid) academic roles alongside a lack of support for career progression for individuals.

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Decolonising the university: a new student's guide to campus activism

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Clearing 2020 In March 2015, a protester named Chumani Maxwele threw a bucket of faeces over a statue of the British imperialist Cecil Rhodes, outside the University of Cape Town. The fallout sparked further demonstrations by students in South Africa, spreading to the UK and, before long, campuses across the world.

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SOAS Decolonising Learning and Teaching for Modul Convenors

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SOAS Decolonising Learning and Teaching for Modul Convenors

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The Decolonising SOAS Working Group has developed the Learning and Teaching Toolkit for Programme and Module Convenors. This toolkit is intended to act as a briefing for programme and module convenors on what 'decolonising' learning and teaching might entail.

As teachers, we want to think about how to overcome the intellectual limits and structural disadvantages embedded in current curricula and pedagogies. At its root, decolonisation is about making what we teach and how we teach it more responsive to the problems of colonial and racialised privilege and discrimination within our teaching practice. The toolkit is also available for download as a PDF.

Here you can find other resources on decolonising learning and teaching, including how-to guides, academic literature and blog posts.

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The Decolonising SOAS Working Group has developed the Learning and Teaching Toolkit for Programme and Module Convenors. This toolkit is intended to act as a briefing for programme and module convenors on what 'decolonising' learning and teaching might entail. As teachers, we want to think about how to overcome the intellectual limits and structural disadvantages embedded in current curricula and pedagogies.

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The University-led plan is overseen by the Race Equality Charter Self-Assessment Team Co-Chairs, Dr Ray Amith and Professor Shane O'Neill as well as the Race Equality Officer, Hinna Sheikh. The Decolonise Keele Network (DKN), a consortium of staff and students, are working at the grass-roots level to embed DTC within Schools.

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Adam (2020) Between Social Justice and Decolonisation

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Adam (2020) Between Social Justice and Decolonisation

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Abstract

As social justice and decolonisation discussions fill the physical and virtual corridors of universities in South Africa, educators, and in this case, MOOC designers, are inevitably influenced by them. They are prompted to reflect on such topics, whether in agreement or with scepticism. Provoked by one interviewee's comment that 'you could decolonise and still have an enormous amount of injustice', this paper investigates how South African MOOC designers conceptualise (in)justice, and how they attempt to address these injustices in and through their MOOCs. As notions such as 'social justice' and 'decolonisation' have multiple meanings and connotations, a framework was created to unpack the 'Dimensions of Human Injustice' namely, material, cultural-epistemic, and political/geopolitical injustices. These dimensions of injustice were used to analyse semi-structured interviews with 27 South African MOOC designers. MOOC designers who stressed cultural-epistemic injustices, focused on relevance, inclusive processes and the geopolitics of knowledge production. Those who stressed material injustices, focused on socio-economic disparities, infrastructural inequalities and the need to tackle these systemic problems at a societal level. Through illustrating that MOOC designers attempt to address injustices based on their different conceptualisations of (in)justice, this study argues that a multi-pronged approach to tackling the various dimensions of injustice perpetuated in and through MOOCs can lead to more holistic justice-oriented MOOCs that better enable learners. Additionally, justice-oriented efforts by South African MOOC designers, highlighted in this paper, can be seen as a guide for the MOOC space in general to take greater strides in creating MOOCs in more justice-oriented ways.

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Between Social Justice and Decolonisation: Exploring South African MOOC Designers' Conceptualisations and Approaches to Addressing Injustices

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As social justice and decolonisation discussions fill the physical and virtual corridors of universities in South Africa, educators, and in this case, MOOC designers, are inevitably influenced by them. They are prompted to reflect on such topics, whether in agreement or with scepticism.

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Adam (2019) Digital Neocolonialism and Massive Open Online course (MOOCs)

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Adam (2019) Digital Neocolonialism and Massive Open Online course (MOOCs)

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ABSTRACT
Through evaluating dominant MOOC platforms created by Western universities, I argue that MOOCs on such platforms tend to embed Western-centric epistemologies and propagate this without questioning their global relevance. Consequently, such MOOCs can be detrimental when educating diverse and complex participants as they erode local and indigenous knowledge systems. Arguing that the digital divide is an exacerbation of historical inequalities, I draw parallels between colonial education, specifically across Sub-Saharan Africa, and 'digital neocolonialism' through Western MOOC platforms. I analyse similarities in ideology, assumptions, and methods of control. Highlighting evolving forms of coloniality, I include contemporary problems created by neoliberal techno-capitalist agendas, such as the commodification of education. Balance is needed between the opportunities offered through MOOCs and the harms they cause through overshadowing marginalised knowledges and framing disruptive technologies as the saviour. While recommending solutions for inclusion of marginalised voices, further problems such as adverse incorporation are raised.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Taskeen Adam is a Cambridge-Africa Scholar pursuing a Ph.D. on 'The role of African Massive Open Online Courses in supporting the most marginalised'. Taskeen pioneered Solar Powered Learning in South Africa and Mobile Education for Smart Technologies in India. She was chosen as one of M&G top 200 Young South Africans.

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Digital neocolonialism and massive open online courses (MOOCs): colonial pasts and neoliberal futures

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ABSTRACT Through evaluating dominant MOOC platforms created by Western universities, I argue that MOOCs on such platforms tend to embed Western-centric epistemologies and propagate this without questioning their global relevance.

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Singh 2021, Reimagining Assessment from an Anti-Colonial Lens

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Singh 2021, Reimagining Assessment from an Anti-Colonial Lens

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Against Intelligence: Reimaging assessment from an anti-colonial lens: A provocation Gurnam Singh

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Anti Racism Lecture Series DMU: Against Intelligence: Reimaging assessment from an anti colonial lens; A provocation by Gurnam Singh 24th Nov 2021

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Image created by TierneyMJ via Shutterstock

What is Decolonising and What is Learning Technology?

This part is easy. Learning technology, the phrase adopted by the Association for Learning Technology (ALT), embraces digital learning, e-learning and online learning, formal and informal, intended, spontaneous or accidental, but also the pedagogies, philosophies, theories and cultures that surround and inform them. It is also educational technology or 'edtech' but this and perhaps the other terms all have assumed connections and associations with formal education systems, and we need to bear.

This part is less easy. Here goes. A manifesto from students at Keele University (2021) provides us with a working definition. "Decolonization involves identifying colonial systems, structures and relationships, and working to challenge those systems. It is not "integration" or simply the token inclusion of the intellectual achievements of non-white cultures. Rather, it involves a paradigm shift from a culture of exclusion and denial to the making of space for other political philosophies and knowledge systems. It's a culture shift to think more widely about why common knowledge is what it is, and in so doing adjusting cultural perceptions and power relations in real and significant ways." (Sadly and ironically, this uses the American English spelling.)

This sounds both highly political and fairly abstract however, events at the universities in Cape Town and Oxford, tagged as #RhodesMustFall, make it clear that feelings run high. Recent news about the repatriation of 'Elgin Marbles' - to use the colonialists' terminology - and the Benin Bronzes and the simmering discontent about the appropriation of indigenous knowledge from cultures as diverse as the Sami and the San by pharmaceutical companies round out this picture.

A recent newspaper article entitled 'Lecturers are key to ending colonial epistemicide ' (University World News 2021) provides an excellent and more accessible overview, saying "The simplest definition of decolonisation of the African university is the process of undoing all legacies of colonialism." Understandably, given the African university context, the article does not focus on the legacies of colonialism within UK universities or the colonisers more widely. We must recognise that there are multiple experiences that learning technologists can help to decolonise, the Punjabi student in an English university, the Aboriginal student in an Australian university, the Kikuyu student in a Kenyan university, the Kabyle student in an Algerian university, the Basque student in a Spanish university and so on.

The first of three ALT webinars on the topic provided some other contributions saying, 'Great to see a more detailed definition of decolonisation. Not just making space for minorities/ migrant communities, but highlighting colonial structures, and challenging them. As much as we wish, technology is rarely neutral (or neutrally used). 'and talking of 'undoing all legacies of colonialism.'

There are also movements to 'decolonise the curriculum' and moves to 'decolonise research' but what exactly might it actually mean? And given the moves to decolonise the curriculum, what should technologists do to decolonise learning technology before handing it on to curriculum professionals?

The Implications of Decolonising Learning Technology

The forthcoming #LTHEchat will help develop an improved understanding of the implications of 'decolonisation' for us all whether we are learning technologists, academics, allied professionals and/or researchers who use learning technology, and especially 'edtech'. Decolonising is about combating the ways in which learning technology represents and reproduces the ideas and values of the dominant white anglophone majority. There is clearly a resonance between a mission to decolonise learning technology and a mission to decolonise the curriculum. Educators are not learning technologists and so the role of learning technologists is to decolonise learning technology before handing it onto curriculum specialists.

The topic had been on my mind for quite a few years in different forms. I wrote a paper five years ago (Traxler 2017) that implicitly tackled one aspect of it, namely the technology itself. I asserted that digital technology was instrumental in increasing the disadvantage of peoples, communities and cultures that were different and distant from the norms, values, habits, styles, languages and cultures of the global and national mainstreams. Specifically those distant and different from the dominant global Anglophone digital corporations. These represented the dominant largely white, European, metropolitan and bourgeois ethos of the colonial and post-colonial education systems and subsequently the neo-colonial global digital corporations, agencies and foundations. Digital technology in education was re-arming forms of colonialism or perhaps arming forms of neo-colonialism.

This happened in a multitude of ways. I can think of many but perhaps the emergent 'decolonising learning technology' community can add many more. Some include:

Digital technology as a conduit to access knowledge and information

Technologies of search (eg Google)

Digital technology changes many aspects of language and of learning

'Official' languages used by the education system's learning technology

Critique the research that underpins digital learning and learning technology.

What emerges is the possibility of a simplistic but structured approach to decolonising learning technology. Working upwards and outwards from:

Hardware

Operating systems and system software

Applications especially browsers, web2.0, social media and open source, interfaces and interactions

Dedicated educational technologies especially MOOCs, VLEs and the surrounding and supporting software systems such as plagiarism detection, learning analytics and automated assessment

Procurement, deployment, training, support, management and maintenance

Buildings and architecture

Curriculum design

Edtech policy and guidance and

Cultural and societal expectations

We need to be asking at each level, where is the colonialization, how does it happen and what should we do?

There are risks of course. Firstly, that any of these levels, decolonisation will degenerate into targets, objectives, percentages and tick lists. Secondly, that it will be seen as offering something extra or remedial or palliative to minority communities rather than offering something enriching to everyone. Thirdly, efforts at decolonisation will be driven by members of the majority community and inevitably seen through the lens of their (mis)understanding and privileges. Lastly, decolonising learning technology and decolonising the curriculum can somehow happen without decolonising the institutions and organisations.

Pragmatically and operationally, any process of change must appeal to managers, shareholders and the rank-and-file of any organisation as well as its ideologues, liberals and progressives. This division sounds like a categorisation from the Diffusion of Innovations frameworks, a rephrasing of, for example, 'innovators' and 'early adopters'. Certainly any organisational transformation needs a Theory of Change and the Diffusion of Innovations provides at least a practical workable outline. It suggests working with early adopters and innovators supporting and encouraging the development of examples and pilots, working with opinion-formers and gate-keepers before moving onto increased institutional programmes and only lastly resorting to regulation and enforcement, but most of all recognising that at every step these are issues of 'hearts and minds'.

References and Further Reading

Adams, R. (2021). Can artificial intelligence be decolonized?. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 46(1-2), 176-197.

Elers, S. (2014). Maori are scum, stupid, lazy: maori according to Google. Te Kaharoa, 7(1).

Hall, R. (2013) On the Secular Crisis and a Qualitative Idea of the University. Available online: http://www.richard-hall.org/tag/history/page/4/ (accessed on 13 October 2021).

Keele (2021) Keele's Manifesto For Decolonising The Curriculum? Available online at http://www.keele.ac.uk/equalitydiversity/equalityframeworksandactivities/equalityawardsandreports/equalityawards/raceequalitycharter/keeledecolonisingthecurriculumnetwork/

Mail & Guardian (2012) available at https://mg.co.za/article/2012-12-27-zumas-dog-comments-meant-to-decolonise-the-african-mind/ accessed 13 October 2021

Meier, A., Goto, K., & Wörmann, M. (2014, June). Thumbs Up to Gesture Controls? A Cross-Cultural Study on Spontaneous Gestures. In International Conference on Cross-Cultural Design (pp. 211-217). Springer, Cham

Millwood, R. (no date) available online at https://www.teachthought.com/learning/a-visual-summary-the-most-important-learning-theories/ and elsewhere, accessed 18 October 2021

News24 (2013) Available online https://www.news24.com/news24/Technology/News/Mxlish-the-12th-official-SA-language-20130328, accessed 13 October 2021

Traxler, J. & Lally, V. (2015) The Crisis and the Response: After the Dust Had Settled, Interactive Learning Environments 24(5), pp1016-1024

Traxler, J. (2017) Learning with Mobiles in Developing Countries -Technology, Language and Literacy, International Journal of Mobile & Blended Learning, 9(2): pp1-15

Traxler, J. (2018) Learning with Mobiles: the Global South, Research in Comparative and International Education, Vol. 13, Number 1, pp 152 - 175

Traxler, J. (2018), Digital Literacy: A Palestinian Refugee Perspective, Research in Learning Technology, Vol. 26, pp1 - 21 https://journal.alt.ac.uk/index.php/rlt/article/view/1983

Traxler, J., Khlaif, Z., Nevill, A., Affouneh, S., Salha, S., Zuhd, A., & Trayek, F. (2019). Living under occupation: Palestinian teachers' experiences and their digital responses. Research in Learning Technology, 27. https://doi.org/10.25304/rlt.v27.22

World University News (2021) Lecturers are key to ending colonial epistemicide, World University News, available online at https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20211006114502190

Biography

Professor John Traxler

John Traxler, FRSA, @johntraxler is Professor of Digital Learning in the Institute of Education at the University of Wolverhampton and UNESCO Chair: Innovative Informal Digital Learning in Disadvantaged and Development Contexts. He has extensive experience developing e-learning and mobile learning capacity amongst university teachers. Over the last five years, he has become involved in policy and strategy. He is a frequent international keynote speaker, and has worked with a number of international agencies and international corporates.

Q1. How do the technologies we use in our work represent, reinforce and reproduce the ideas, concepts, images and values of particular countries, communities and cultures?

Q2. Do educational technology systems embody the teaching, learning and assessment ideas of mostly one community and culture?

Q3. Do the theories of e-learning come from one particular cultural and pedagogical tradition?

Q4. Which communities or cultures are different and distant from those represented by our technologies?

Q5. How would you define decolonisation? Who would benefit?

Q6. How is decolonising our work supported and/or constrained by our institutions, our IT and our curriculum colleagues?

https://wke.lt/w/s/ZKV_t3 via Wakelet

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#LTHEchat 220: Decolonising Learning Technology. Led by Professor John Traxler @johntraxler

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Image created by TierneyMJ via Shutterstock What is Decolonising and What is Learning Technology? This part is easy. Learning technology, the phrase adopted by the Association for Learning Technology (ALT), embraces digital learning, e-learning and online learning, formal and informal, intended, spontaneous or accidental, but also the pedagogies, philosophies, theories and cultures that surround and...

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Heriot Watt University: Decolonising the Curriculum

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Heriot Watt University: Decolonising the Curriculum

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Decolonising the Curriculum in a Time of Pandemic - Learning and Teaching Academy

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The QAA Collaborative Cluster on ’Decolonising the Curriculum in a […]

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School of Informatics: Decolonising the Curriculum

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School of Informatics: Decolonising the Curriculum

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The School of Informatics is committed to making its curriculum and learning experience as inclusive as possible.

The University of Edinburgh is taking action against racism in its various forms - personal, cultural and institutional. Silence and inaction makes an institution complicit in systemic racism; promoting inclusion, respect and dignity and stressing a zero-tolerance approach to any form of discrimination is a necessity.

The University's Anti-Racist Action Plan for 2020/21 sets out steps that will be taken to tackle inequalities, racism and racial prejudice on an institutional level. It is recognised that we must challenge and rework the current pedagogy, which was rooted in imperial and colonial ideas about knowledge and learning, and make the syllabus more diverse, more international or more inclusive.

To address this, working groups around the University have been set up with a focus on Decolonising the Curriculum. Vijay Nagarajan, the Director of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion leads the Informatics working group.

Decolonisation is the disruption and dismantling of colonial structures and behaviours. It is open to interpretation what "decolonising" means in a discipline that was invented largely after the colonial age, but we are taking it to be an opportunity to re-examine what we teach so that we can identify and remove any barriers to participation, making the curriculum and learning experience as inclusive as possible.

The working group has run workshops with teaching staff to start this conversation. See below for the report on the activities towards decolonizing the Informatics curriculum so far (as of July 2021).

A Q&A session about decolonising the Informatics curriculum with the Head of School was also run for students.

Related links

Inclusion at the University of Edinburgh
Race equality at the University of Edinburgh

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The School of Informatics is committed to making its curriculum and learning experience as inclusive as possible. The University of Edinburgh is taking action against racism in its various forms - personal, cultural and institutional. Silence and inaction makes an institution complicit in systemic racism; promoting inclusion, respect and dignity and stressing a zero-tolerance approach to any form of discrimination is a necessity.

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CABS: Decolonising the curriculum: Addressing the miseducation of buisness and managment 

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CABS: Decolonising the curriculum: Addressing the miseducation of buisness and managment 

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Chartered Association of Business Schools

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A few weeks ago it was my honour to chair the CABS workshop, ' Decolonising the curriculum: A toolkit for business & management educators '. Responding to requests from our community, the recently formed Race Equality Action Group (established by the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee) hosted one of the most insightful and powerful sessions I have participated in for quite some time.

The combination of speakers and contributors provided a powerhouse of knowledge, experience and insight (thanks to Dr Sola Adesola, Rachael Carden, Dr Sadhvi Dar, Dr Angela Martinez Dy, Dr Kendi Guantai, Corinna Hattersley-Mitchell, Dr Vanessa Iwowo and Professor Stella M. Nkomo).

However, as chair and co-organiser, it struck me that our panel members were all women of colour which immediately raised the question of who is doing the work here? Who is raising the alarm? To bring about long lasting and meaningful change in our academy, this must be a shared and collaborative endeavour, especially when the "future of the world is at stake" (Professor Nkomo).

The workshop was planned around some key questions: why, what, who and how? Why is curriculum decolonisation such an important priority for business schools? What do we mean by decolonising the curriculum? Who needs to be involved in achieving meaningful change and how do we get people to act? In building a community-authored resource, we have started to build a 'go to' source of help for anyone who has ever asked 'how can I better communicate the importance of curriculum decolonisation to my colleagues and get buy-in senior stakeholders/colleagues?'; 'what specific actions can I take to start decolonising my modules?'; 'what are the measures of success?' and 'how can curriculum decolonisation be explicitly embedded into my business school's strategy?'.

Decolonisation and dismantling much of what we have known cannot be a simple 'tick list' or neat toolkit, but it is hoped that the resource we initiated during the day provides somewhere we can all go as we seek to shake up a system and 'disrupt the scaffolding' (Dr Iwowo).

As chair of the event, I wanted to offer some reflections and hint at some of the incredible resources that were shared. I hope my 'seven Cs' might capture some of our conversations and help frame the call to action. It is not an exhaustive list, but I hope it might aid people on their journey.
Challenge
Firstly, comes challenge. Change doesn't happen without disruption and sometimes outright insurgency. Many of our school missions seem to champion engagement with responsible business agendas and seek to advance social justice, so it is imperative that we address what Professor Nkomo highlights as the continuing "miseducation of our students".

This is no easy task given it is about making ourselves vulnerable and taking a leap of faith (often through waves of resistance). Professor Nkomo's powerful questioning of the very foundations of our business systems and knowledge made me question and reassess my own views. Her call to challenge Eurocentric "non-inclusive universalisation" (Nkomo, 1992) and capitalistic ways of managing, leading and doing business as superior and universal must lie at the centre of this decolonising work.

It is incumbent on us all to counter some commonly held views that suggest the world's history of colonialism, imperialism, and slavery are not relevant to contemporary business management knowledge and processes. We cannot claim our organisational practices are race neutral - they are not. It is this misleading sense of the neutrality of knowledge production we must challenge. As we tackle what Professor Nkomo calls "global intersecting viruses" (i.e. Covid19, racism, environmental degradation, economic inequality, rising nationalism) we need to challenge and then transform the very places, power and practices upon which we have built our business schools (this must be beyond pulling down a statue or two, or renaming our buildings).
Consciousness
In her opening remarks, Dr Vanessa Iwowo quoted an Igbo (Nigerian) proverb, "A person who does not know where the rain began to beat him cannot know where he dried his body" - an important starting metaphor. Her warning of not "cloaking over issues" and homogenising challenging areas that might alienate the very groups which we are looking to support e.g. the artificial categorisation of 'BAME' was insightful.

I was struck by how vital self-reflection is and the value of pursuing our "own internal journey" (Dr Angela Martinez Dy) in the hierarchy and history of business education. It is perhaps only when we challenge ourselves (a deeply uncomfortable process) that we begin to see decolonisation as a centre of knowledge production. It has been this approach that I found particularly challenging as a business school leader.

I have often reflected on my own positionality and how my teaching might have been colonised by accepted (and unquestioned) ideologies, but I've never really thought about how this then must create spaces for imagining a new university. As Dr Iwowo urges, "Build your own consciousness which will in turn create new knowledge", and this will lead to the development and construction of new teaching content, methods and pedagogy.
Construct (after deconstruction)
My doctoral disciplinary subject area was tourism and a previous colleague called tourism "the violence-rendering rhetorical instrument of imperialism" (Hollinshead 2004: 31), I wonder if the same might be said of business education?

Before we can construct a new curriculum, we must break down systemic barriers and inequities, and challenge its violence rendering power and influence before we are able to rebuild and construct a more inclusive and equitable educational system. As one workshop delegate put it, "it's not just about content, but about a new process and way of doing everything', and another suggested, it is the "removal what has been embedded in the system for centuries".

The important work of BARC collective presented by Dr Martinez Dy is an incredibly useful resource to help us engage in activism and create those spaces by thinking about what decolonising is not, as well as what it is to "disrupt white rationalities by centring the feelings and emotions in the room". I was also struck by the way Dr Iwowo asked us to reflect on the ideological violence done to the 'Other', echoing Professor Bannerjee's (2021) plea for us to move beyond the "epistemic blindness that make invisible alternate ways of knowing and being".

The business school is an important component of the intellectual economy that upholds the system; it is the 'how exactly it does this' that we need address. As many reflected during the day, it is difficult to entertain the 'otherwise' and unlearn much of what we have learnt, but if we can't as an academic community, then what hope is there for other sectors and organisations?
Co-conspirators
The activism that must happen must not lie solely with people of colour. This is perhaps why the panel membership both inspired and concerned me. All too often I have called out for champions and allies, but it was Professor Nkomo's call for 'co-conspirators', rather than allies, that struck me as a powerful and important step change.

The change will only come through committed collaboration and collective buy in, but this must happen by meeting people where they are and drawing them in to this endeavour. However, delegates noted community building is not without its issues, as one recalled, "As much as our colleagues are open minded and progressive, understandings of colonialism/ decolonisation are not uniform by any means. Often people think about diversity instead. I think it is a very difficult conversation and the way to start is by educating our colleagues".

One of our most powerful co-conspirators are our students, working with us in proactive anti-racist work. Increasingly projects to decolonise the curriculum with students are gaining traction and impact. It was, after all, students who fuelled the 'decolonising the curriculum' agenda when the 'Rhodes Must Fall' movement saw students demanding the removal of Cecil Rhodes. We see the power of student collation in initiatives such as the University of Brighton's Curriculum Advisers Scheme (Hall et al. 2021), Kingston University's Inclusive Curriculum Framework and the UCL student campaign, ' Why is my curriculum white'? As Felix and Friedberg (2019) note "academics must be ready to learn from students too, rather than assume they know best". We need to do this in collaboration through open and brave conversations.
Conversations
We need to share stories to prevent us from cloaking issues. Change comes when people are aware and heard; it needs more than tick lists, isolated events, and audits. Blogs such as the Decolonsing Alliance have led this work, but it must also happen at a more local faculty and department level. For example, faculty-run book clubs on key texts have been reported as high impact occasions for triggering important conversations and discussions. Moreover, Dr Iwowo urged us to never lose sight of how we have got here in the first place (the rise of Empire requiring ideological substitution) and consequently, the marginalisation we see today. Decolonisation must reverse gross epistemic injustice, yet before this can happen, we have to reflect, discuss and engage in difficult conversations.

In the work to decolonise, we cannot avoid the psychological and emotional labour that is required. It is also impossible to 'un-do' what has been embedded without a consciousness and conversation about 'what exactly was done' and to whom. Another approach has been to organise university and school-level conversations. In my own institution, the 'Conversations about Race' have been powerful vehicles to bring students and staff together in safe and brave spaces - sharing stories and lived experiences. Community organising techniques and external facilitation approaches surfaced numerous reflections and questions that had not been previously communicated.
Communication
Decolonisation is not just a social media campaign during Black History month or the occasional mention in faculty newsletters. In their powerful article ' The business school is racist: Act up!' Dar, Liu and Dy (2020) stress the need for collective action to dismantle racialised power structures. Their argument could not be clearer, and yet how has this call permeated our local faculty communities? I was struck by how powerful the conversations were during the workshop, but we need to find ways to replicate this same openness, transparency and visibility in our Schools.

It is only by mainstreaming these issues that changes will come and we shift beyond by what Jammulamadaka et al. (2021) refer to as "the periphery of debates about decolonising higher education". In my own university, I have become increasingly concerned that the 'decolonisation' has become a synonym for diversification and 'adding' more resources, rather than dismantling structures. - it is not the same. As Banerjee further notes (2021) on Decolonizing Management Theory , we need to "explicit acknowledgement of the colonial basis of knowledge whereby only a Western knowing subject can produce histories and knowledge about the Other".
Curriculum
Finally, we come to the curriculum! Despite the workshop being focused on the curriculum, it struck me that it is only after we engage in the debates summarised above that we can even think about what we teach, how and why. Dr Sadhvi Dar highlighted that our business curriculum remains stubbornly uniform and fails to engage with the kinds of critical debates which characterise other disciplines. Dr Dar reminded us we need to create more porous boundaries in our discipline, making our own discipline vulnerable to being overturned and challenged. As another delegate notes, "it's about rewriting narratives, redefining knowledge, and challenging norms put forward based on colonisation, imperialism and radicalisation" which is so much more than adding a black or brown author to a module's Reading List (although this is a step in the right direction).

The re-emphasis that Dr Sola Adesola placed on not just 'adding' decolonisation to the agenda is an important one given the levels of intervention must be multiple, across the university and outside the formal classroom. Meaningful change will require transformation of society and the breaking down of structural inequalities, and this work will then start to flow into our curricula. I am concerned we might have this the wrong way around; we seek to change the curricula but ignore the structures and deep injustices behind their very creation.

Securing the active engagement of colleagues and senior teams in this decolonisation work is a challenge that must be pursued by us all. The current practice where colleagues from non-white populations take the lead in advancing an anti-racist agenda is unjust, unfair and ultimately not sustainable. We need to create spaces that acknowledge the cultural, colonial and race history which has informed our curriculum to date and capitalise on the multinational character of the Business School. Students seek learning and knowledge to help them in the labour market so we need to be seeking alternative models to engage our communities (re)shape our pedagogies. Audits may well be one short term task necessary to kick off this change (but what do arbitrary metrics do apart from pressurise people?). Perhaps it's better we work with colleagues and students in a common and shared endeavour in this place of resistance and activism - ensuring they have the resources, the recognition, support and the power to make the changes we all seek to make. I look forward to continuing this endeavour with the Chartered ABS community.
Professor Sally Everett is Vice Dean (Education) at King's Business School, King's College, London References
Arday, J.and Mirza, H. S. (Eds.) (2018). Dismantling race in higher education: Racism, whiteness and decolonising the academy. London: Palgrave Macmillan

Banerjee, S. B. (2021). Decolonizing Management Theory: A Critical Perspective. Journal of Management Studies (published online), doi:10.1111/joms.12756.

Bhambra, G.K., D. Gebrial and K. Nişancıoğlu (eds.) (2018) Decolonizing the University. London:Pluto Press

Building the Anti Racist Classroom (BARC) (2021). Workshop Guide. Accessed at: https://barcworkshop.org/workshop-guide/

Felix, M. and Friedberg, J. (2019) To decolonise the curriculum, we have to decolonise ourselves. WONKHE 9/4/19. https://wonkhe.com/blogs/to-decolonise-the-curriculum-we-have-to-decolonise-ourselves/

Hall, J., Velickovic, V., & Rajapillai, V. (2021). Students as Partners in Decolonising the Curriculum. The Journal of Educational Innovation, Partnership and Change 7(1).

Hollinshead, K. (2004) Tourism and new sense. In C.M. Hall and H. Tucker (ed) Tourism and postcolonialism: Contested discourses, identities and representations. London: Routledge. pp. 25-42.

Jammulamadaka, N., Faria, A., Jack, G., & Ruggunan, S. (2021). Decolonising management and organisational knowledge (MOK): Praxistical theorising for potential worlds. Organization 28(5), 717-740.

Nkomo, S. M. (1992) The Emperor Has No Clothes: Rewriting Race in Organizations. Academy of Management Review 17(3): 487-513

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Decolonising the curriculum: addressing the miseducation of business and management - Chartered Association of Business Schools

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A few weeks ago it was my honour to chair the CABS workshop, ' Decolonising the curriculum: A toolkit for business & management educators '. Responding to requests from our community, the recently formed Race Equality Action Group (established by the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee) hosted one of the most insightful and powerful sessions I have participated in for quite some time.

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Begum and Saini (2018) Decolonising the Curriculum

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Begum and Saini (2018) Decolonising the Curriculum

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Attempting to break the chain: Reimaging inclusive pedagogy and decolonise the curriculum within the academy

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Attempting to break the chain: Reimaging inclusive pedagogy and decolonise the curriculum within the academy

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Wonkhe article: How not to Decolonise the Curriculum 

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Wonkhe article: How not to Decolonise the Curriculum 

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The recent Sewell report on Race and Ethnic Disparities in the UK warns against "negative" demands to decolonise the curriculum, but the authors of the report seem to have a somewhat narrow conception of what this actually involves.

"Banning white authors' is mentioned alongside "token expressions of Black achievement", while a proposal for a new "inclusive" curriculum - one which firmly places the UK at the heart of everything - is presented instead.

Confused? You're not alone. From the title of the report ("The Report") right through to the rousing call for "British optimism and fairness" in the closing paragraph, this document is packed full of ambiguities, hidden agendas, omissions and wilful misinterpretations.

In the second edition of our book An A-Z of Creative Teaching in Higher Education we explore some of the concepts involved in the "decolonising" debate, and here we present three brief step-by-step guides - how to tell if the curriculum has been colonised, traps to avoid when decolonising the curriculum, and what to aim for when decolonising it.

How to tell if the curriculum has been colonised

Most traditional school, college and higher education curricula in Europe, North America - and the countries previously colonised by them - are already well and truly saturated with colonial content and values. Our checklist below allows anyone to measure the extent of this within their own subject discipline and the courses they teach or study on.

Does the curriculum:

Centre on the UK and "Britishness" at the expense of other interpretations of the world?

Draw only on British or European perspectives in relation to the history and theory of the subject discipline?

Omit to mention non-European cultures or groups, or else speak of them only in deficit, tokenistic or stereotypical terms, treating them as "exotica" or curiosities?

Claim a national monopoly on certain moral principles or values?

Fail to interrogate how issues of power, privilege and oppression have developed historically in relation to the subject area?

Assume that the "British" way of thinking within the subject discipline is universal, neutral and value-free?

If the honest answer to most of these questions is "yes" then it's safe to assume that the curriculum has been well and truly colonised.

Colonisation happens in all subject disciplines - from Hairdressing to History, from Physiotherapy to Philosophy. Curiously, the "Making of Modern Britain" syllabus advocated in the Sewell Report also fits these criteria. The report recommends a focus on the "influence of the UK, particularly during the Empire period" and it speaks of other nations and cultures only in terms of what they have contributed to Britain and "Britishness". Ironically, it's the very model of a colonised curriculum.

Traps to avoid when decolonising the curriculum

Having identified that the curriculum has been colonised, how do we go about decolonising it?

Clearly nobody should remove authors from reading lists simply because they are White. We don't actually think anyone would, but the authors of the Sewell report are clearly afraid of this happening.

Decolonising is not about replacing one source with another. It's about interrogating the current canon and the positionality of the key voices within it, looking at whose words are privileged and whose are missing. It's about developing these critical literacy skills in students and finding ways for them to access previously unheard perspectives.

On the Education courses we run, we have expanded our Theories of Learning content to include a focus on learning through stories, something that is practiced in many, many different cultures and communities around the world, but which is largely missing from textbooks on adult education.

It's important to think about learning aims and objectives and why we might choose to include or omit certain content on courses. The Sewell report warns against tokenism but then exhibits exactly this by giving examples such a learning pack celebrating the achievements of "important" and "inspirational" Black people in the UK.

Why have this as a stand-alone resource, devoid of any context, its' only agenda being to show that "Black people are important, too!"? When teaching the history and theory of a subject discipline, a diverse range of contributors should be presented as part of the overall narrative. The purpose here is then to broaden and deepen students' subject knowledge by looking at a range of perspectives on it, by telling as full a story as possible.

On our courses in Education, we discuss the influence of Buddhism on reflective learning theorists such as Dewey - we look at concepts of knowledge across a range of societies, and what learning behaviours are valued in different cultures, and we look at how education has been used to oppress and subjugate over time and place, as well as to liberate and empower. The diversity is embedded in the subject content as a means of enriching it. It's not an afterthought or an add-on.

What to aim for when decolonising the curriculum

The steps we have presented are in part a tongue-in-cheek response to the many misconceptions apparent in the Sewell report. However, we do not wish to give the impression that by following these steps you can then sit back and say "Hurrah! I have now Decolonised my Curriculum! Time for a cuppa and a nap!"

Decolonising is an ongoing process that occurs at many levels - it is a journey of transformation, for teachers, researchers, students, departments and institutions alike. And, in spite of Sewell's recommendation for a government-sourced national resource bank for schools, there is no "one-size fits all" blueprint for decolonising. It may involve lots of different processes:

Deconstructing ourselves. Who are we? Where do our roots lie? What privileges and disadvantages have we experienced in our own lives? Whose knowledge do we value? Whose perspectives have we ignored or dismissed? What do we fear (in the case of the authors of the Sewell report, a great deal)?

Deconstructing our subject discipline. What does the accepted canon of knowledge in our subject area look like? How has it varied over time and place? What's missing? Might there be alternative canons? Is the very concept of an unchanging, "sacred" canon of knowledge becoming redundant in our subject area? Should our subject area even be a distinct discipline on its own? Are there different, more helpful ways of categorising knowledge?

Deconstructing our institution. What does it stand for? Who is let in, and who is kept out? Who stays, and who drops out? Who achieves and who scrapes by? What assumptions are made about students' prior cultural capital, expectations and potential? What assumptions are made about higher education traditions? Can these be broken down and reinterrogated? How might it be different? An example is what counts as valid knowledge - peer-reviewed journal articles only, or in a fast-changing world, can we teach our students to draw from a wider range of sources, applying their own critical analysis to what they find?

Deconstructing our students. This is work that should be done with them rather than to them. Who are they? What's important to them? What are their interests, goals, values and fears? What kind sense of entitlement do they have about being in higher education, or do they suffer from imposter theory, waiting to be found out? The Sewell report talks of giving students a sense of "Britishness", a shared heritage, in order to help them feel like they belong, but this feels to us to be in danger of producing the opposite effect and simply alienating them further. How about simply listening to what they have to say, and starting from where they're at?

Exploring our curriculum. When looking at the history of our subject can we find other sources of knowledge? How might our course content be reconceptualised in order to reflect wider global and historical perspectives? How might it be taught in a way that enables students to think for themselves and to evaluate and debate current cultural norms and traditions? How can we work with our students to help them shape their own educational experiences?

This is not a definitive list - it's just the beginning. But when government guidance is about shutting down debate, ignoring statistics, teaching jingoistic content and denying the existence of structural racism, it's time to start pushing back.

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How not to decolonise your curriculum | Wonkhe

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Anti-racist curriculum reform isn't about "banning white authors". Rachel Stone and Sylvia Ashton on the how, what and why of decolonisation.

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The Guardian article: Academics it's time to get behind Decolonising the Curriculum

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The Guardian article: Academics it's time to get behind Decolonising the Curriculum

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tudents at British universities are increasingly calling for their reading lists to include more black and minority ethnic (BAME) writers. But four years after the first Rhodes Must Fall protest in South Africa, the campaign for decolonising the curriculum still faces scepticism and resistance.

While Meghan Markle recently came out in support of the campaign, not all academics are on board. Doug Stokes, a lecturer at the University of Exeter, has claimed that calls to decolonise the curriculum are "a big mistake" since "the last thing our universities need are to have 'male, pale and stale' voices sidelined."

This narrow view has become a common complaint of those who feel threatened by recent challenges, yet what these critics miss is that decolonising universities is not about completely eliminating white men from the curriculum. It's about challenging longstanding biases and omissions that limit how we understand politics and society.

Many advocates of decolonisation don't want to abolish the canon; they want to interrogate its assumptions and broaden our intellectual vision to include a wider range of perspectives. While decolonising the curriculum can mean different things, it includes a fundamental reconsideration of who is teaching, what the subject matter is and how it's being taught.

Far from being a meritocratic system, academia is still struggling to overcome ingrained structural inequalities. Only two weeks before Stokes's article, a report from the University and College Union found that black female professors in the UK faced systemic racism, bullying and discrimination.

To put things in perspective, the report states that in the 2016-17 academic year just 25 black women were recorded as working as professors compared to 14,000 white men. Despite outnumbering black women as professors at a rate of 560 to 1, some white men believe they are the ones under threat.

There has been little change over the past decade, despite the well-documented nature of the problem. Decolonising universities involves reviewing hiring and promotion practices to correct the current biases that discriminate against BAME academics. As a white man, it would be easy for me to assume that my successes were solely a result of my hard work, and ignore the structural biases that advantage me at every step of my career.

Students are also concerned about the narrowness of their curriculums. Here it is also important to consider the facts. Most reading lists in my discipline of political science and international relations consist of an overwhelming majority of white male authors. This introduces a systematic distortion to the material and ignores excellent scholarship produced by BAME scholars.

When we offer white male-dominated reading lists we also teach students the wrong lessons about who is an intellectual authority and deserves our attention. BAME students need to see themselves reflected in the curriculum as legitimate creators of knowledge.

The demand for greater representation from non-European writers need not involve burning copies of Plato and Shakespeare's texts. We can still teach authors like John Locke, but we should note that he was a liberal political philosopher deeply enmeshed in American slavery - including investing in the slave-trading Royal African Company and co-authoring the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina, which enshrined chattel slavery.

The issue is complex, but to overlook this ignores the fundamental role that slavery and colonialism played in the development of modernity.

It is not simply about the token inclusion of a few BAME writers, but an underlying transformation from a culture of denial and exclusion to a consideration of different traditions of knowledge. To diversify our curriculum is to challenge power relations and call for deeper thinking about the content of our courses and how we teach them.

Critics claim that the perspectives of race and gender are not relevant to certain subject matter. Why decolonise a module on American foreign policy, for example? The answer is that you can't properly teach such a module without incorporating these perspectives into the curriculum.

Decolonisation asks us to consider how the location and identity of an author shape their perspective. Designing modules entails narrating stories and we need to reflect more critically on how these stories are told. Which actors are privileged and placed at the centre? Whose voices are authoritative and considered as part of the canon while others are left at the margins?

Sceptics should realise that the campaign is not a witch hunt, but a legitimate concern about addressing how the forces of racism and colonialism have shaped our past and present. This is a campaign that all academics should be actively promoting in their departments - as many already do.

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Academics: it's time to get behind decolonising the curriculum

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tudents at British universities are increasingly calling for their reading lists to include more black and minority ethnic (BAME) writers. But four years after the first Rhodes Must Fall protest in South Africa, the campaign for decolonising the curriculum still faces scepticism and resistance.

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Opinion Pieces

Elizabeth Charles, Assistant Director of Library Services Birkbeck, University of London, United Kingdom

Abstract

The term 'decolonizing the curriculum' is of high currency in higher education in the UK and in local students' unions at these institutions. This article seeks to give a very brief history and context for why this is fundamental for academic institutions and what role libraries and the scholarly communication sector can play in this movement. I look at why this is so important for black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) and othered (otherly minoritized, e.g. disabled, LGBTQ, etc.) students and what steps some libraries have already taken. One of the themes of the UKSG 2019 Conference was 'diversity and change'; decolonizing the curriculum is exactly that if done correctly. Two presentations from the plenary session provided a good starting point and the article touches on how decolonizing the curriculum may impact research/researchers. It concludes that there is a need for academia to now move past just identifying that there are issues about retention and progression of BAME and othered students and staff, and for both the library and information and scholarly communication sectors to act to address this now.

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The term 'decolonizing the curriculum' is of high currency in higher education in the UK and in local students' unions at these institutions. This article seeks to give a very brief history and context for why this is fundamental for academic institutions and what role libraries and the scholarly communication sector can play in this movement.

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Online Services - The University of Sheffield

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Guardian Article on Decolonising the Curriculum

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Guardian Article on Decolonising the Curriculum

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Only a fifth of UK universities have committed to reforming their curriculum to confront the harmful legacy of colonialism, an investigation by the Guardian has found.

The disclosure comes as universities are under pressure to modernise their syllabuses to address the attainment gap between white students and those from black and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds.

The campaign to give a fuller version of British history that reflects injustices and lauds the contributions of black British people has also won widespread support from the Black Lives Matter protesters.

Academics and students said the Guardian's findings reflected a reluctance in British higher education towards addressing the impact of colonialism on present day racism.

They said many universities apparently failed to grasp that "decolonising the curriculum" went beyond adding black and non-western scholars to reading lists, arguing that reform should involve challenging and remaking the current pedagogy, which was rooted in imperial and colonial ideas about knowledge and learning, at an institutional level.

Responses to freedom of information (FoI) requests from 128 universities found only 24 said they were committed to decolonising the curriculum. Of those, 11 were committed to reform across the whole institution, with most efforts confined to a few departments, or just one, or a handful of academics and students.

Queen Mary's University of London, said decolonising was confined to the school of English and Drama, while Newman University said one course in the English department explicitly referenced decolonising the curriculum.

The University of East London reported it had run decolonising workshops in the school of art and digital industries.

Only nine of these universities had put their commitment to decolonise in writing, with just two, including Bristol University, mentioning it in their core strategic plan and another two noting it in their main curriculum framework.

Educational experts said the findings showed that little progress had been made in decolonising higher education since the Rhodes Must Fall campaign - to demand the removal of a statue of the Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes from Oxford University's Oriel college - began in 2015.

Fope Olaleye, black students' officer at the National Union of Students, said the lack of progress was "shocking". "Decolonising the curriculum means providing an accurate portrayal of history and providing students and staff with the tools to critically identify [how] the university reproduces colonial hierarchies. This will empower them to confront and reject the status quo and ensure knowledge production reflects our diverse society."

Prof Kalwant Bhopal, the director of the centre for research in race and education at Birmingham University, said the sector should be ashamed of the findings. She added: "Every university should have this as a priority. If it's not in the strategic plan, it's not considered important to the university."

Sunny Singh, professor of creative writing and inclusion in the arts at London Metropolitan University, one of the universities committed to decolonising, said: "Despite the small pockets of resistance, as a sector, higher education in the UK is unconcerned or not bothered, if not actively hostile, to the idea of decolonisation.

"I'm very glad I work in a university that has for the last year and a half been happier and more supportive of my efforts. But I can also say that we're an exception."

A further 84 universities said they were committed to other kinds of curriculum reform - making the syllabus more diverse, more international or more inclusive.

Of the 106 universities committed to decolonising and other forms of curriculum reform, only 35 said BAME students were formally engaged in some way in this work, although the degree to which varied widely.

Race equality specialist Sofia Akel, who last year wrote a report on racism at Goldsmiths, University of London, raised concern that universities were often leaving such curriculum reform to BAME students.

"Some universities are saying they're doing work, but what they really mean is the students are doing the work for them for free," she added. "And often they're met with hostility from senior members of staff."

Only 36 universities said they were providing relevant staff training on designing and teaching more inclusive and diverse courses - with just nine of those providing dedicated training, and three institutions making this training mandatory.

Rebecca Long-Bailey, Labour's shadow education secretary, said: "Black and Asian people and their history are hugely underrepresented in academia and throughout our education system. Understanding the breadth of Britain's history is crucial to tackling the injustices and racism in our society and around the world that persist today."

Twenty universities declared that they were currently doing no formal work to reform their syllabuses in this manner.

Akel said: "I think the universities that have just outright said no were probably the ones being the most honest because when you really drill down, it can come down to one or two academics, or a humanities subject, usually sociology, maybe anthropology."

Some universities that said they were making their curriculum more international based this on having an overseas campuses. Heriot-Watt University said students on its campuses in Dubai and Malaysia were taught the same programmes as those in the UK. A spokesman added: "This means we are more attuned to the different cultures and cultural assumptions in the programmes we teach."

Heidi Mirza, visiting professor of race, faith and culture at Goldsmiths, said the findings showed "a poverty of understanding" of what decolonisation entailed: "We've still got archaic, anachronistic tutors and curricula that's never changed. I'm shocked at how stark this is."

Mirza said other approaches, such as internationalising or diversifying the syllabus, often were a watered down approach to reform. "You can have an overseas campus but it doesn't mean you're changing your curriculum," she said. "Are you including Chinese philosophy or just a white western knowledge you're imparting in an imperialist way. It's a tourist approach to the curriculum."

The Guardian asked students involved in campaigns to decolonise the curriculum on their first thoughts to these figures.
Sabrina, 21, studying international relations, Decolonise S oas

It doesn't surprise me. It's not in the universities' interest and nationally people don't want to see this kind of discussion take place because it requires us to revisit the UK's relationship with empire and have an honest conversation about race construction and racism which is very different than what we are told and taught. The British empire and European imperialism was founded on a white supremacist ideology which exploited the bodies and labour of Black and brown people in the colonies.

Decolonising is about de-centring Eurocentric knowledge production. It's acknowledgement of alternative forms and centres of knowledge and contribution to the world, especially from revolutionary academics and thinkers who aren't old white, middle-aged men. This is more than just about reading lists and racism.

Critics suggest that by decolonising you're erasing history, but in fact you are just accurately portraying history. If you look at the way in which the British nation has been constructed, it's very much been an exclusionary space, an exclusively white space.

Fides Dagongdong, 24, studying law and politics, Decolonise Keele
Sumayyah, 21, religion, politics and society, Decolonise Kings College London

It's very hard to not just convince, but to attempt a new conversation on this issue. So the data is what I expected it to be. You can see it with the BLM protests. A lot of the comments were, like, I don't understand why these statues are being either forcibly removed or crowds are gathering, protesting for its removal.

Other students think decolonising is about completely eradicating the current system, which is not the case at all, we just want to make it more inclusive.

Why is it that in the UK in most history curriculums it's usually an elective to learn about colonisation? It's very strange considering colonising was major part of British history. When I was a teenager, I was taught about American history, but nothing about British colonialism.

I think many institutions see it as a lot of work for something they don't really care about - that's why such initiatives are usually only responses to student demands, when the work to silence these students becomes more than the work to engage with them. Also, our entire education system, and even our concept of what knowledge is, cannot be untangled from its colonial roots and once we start looking at the curriculum, we provide non-white students with the power to demand more change and more justice.

Most people I know can point to a text that they read that empowered them to advocate for change - by including such texts and ideas in the curriculum, universities know that they're placing their power structures at risk and they refuse to do that.

Attempts by universities to 'decolonise the curriculum' will always be performative without a proper confrontation of how white supremacy and colonialism continue to manifest within academic institutions. The curriculum is a product of its environment and starting and ending our work with the curriculum will not create lasting change.
Additional reporting by Aamna Mohdin

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Only a fifth of UK universities say they are 'decolonising' curriculum

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Only a fifth of UK universities have committed to reforming their curriculum to confront the harmful legacy of colonialism, an investigation by the Guardian has found. The disclosure comes as universities are under pressure to modernise their syllabuses to address the attainment gap between white students and those from black and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds.

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University of Edinburgh Decolonising resources

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University of Edinburgh Decolonising resources

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Decolonising the Curriculum - Sharing Ideas: The Podcast Series

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Welcome to this podcast series produced by The Race Equality and Anti-Racist Sub-Committee (REAR) at The University of Edinburgh in collaboration with Teaching Matters where we hear from different academics at the University about what Decolonising the Curriculum means for them and how they have put this into practice in their learning and teaching or research.

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Future Learn Cours - Decolonising Education: Theory to Practice

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Future Learn Cours - Decolonising Education: Theory to Practice

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Learning on this course

On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you'll be able to...

Demonstrate an understanding of the history of colonialism and colonial thought with respect to the development of the university and other educational institutions

Explain to your colleagues and peers the critical importance of decolonial approaches in creating a fully inclusive educational learning environment

Identify and engage with the distinct legacies of colonialism across a range of disciplines in the social sciences, STEM and arts and humanities

Identify and assess appropriate actions and approaches that would be effective in developing decolonial practices in your own educational setting

Design and lead a change process that includes students, colleagues and other stakeholders in a joint programme of decolonisation.

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Decolonising Education: From Theory to Practice - Decolonial Theory Course

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Learning on this course On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments. By the end of the course, you'll be able to...

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Keele University Staff Guide on Decolonising the Curriculum

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Keele University Staff Guide on Decolonising the Curriculum

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Decolonising Identity, What is in a name?

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Decolonising Identity, What is in a name?

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Doharty (et al. 2020) University went to Decolonise, all they brought back was lousy diversity speak

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Doharty (et al. 2020) University went to Decolonise, all they brought back was lousy diversity speak

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The university went to ‘decolonise’ and all they brought back was lousy diversity double-speak! Critical race counter-stories from faculty of colour in ‘decolonial’ times

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UK Higher Education is characterised by structural and institutional forms of whiteness. As scholars and activists are increasingly speaking out to testify, whiteness has wide-ranging implications…

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Introduction: diversifying reading lists, decolonising the curriculum

Across the world, the impetus to develop diverse and inclusive reading lists in our universities is growing, but the drivers have varied. In former colonies in the Global South, such as South Africa, reading lists have been reviewed as part of a wider effort to decolonise the university (Heleta 2016; Luckett and Shay 2017; Le Grange 2016). In this context, the university curriculum constitutes a fruitful site, but not the only one (Pillay 2018), for challenging entrenched colonial structures. Calls for decolonisation highlight the dominance of Eurocentric curricula which 'reinforce white and Western dominance and privilege while at the same time being full of stereotypes, prejudices and patronising views about Africa and its people' (Heleta 2016: 2). Whilst these demands have a long history, it is recent student protests, such as #RhodesMustFall, that have reignited these debates (Le Grange 2016; Mngomezulu and Hadebe 2018). In this setting, the university curriculum represents a necessary opportunity to deliver change in higher education and beyond, as 'a microcosm of and impetus for broader societal transformation' (Le Grange 2016: 3. See also Heleta 2016; Luckett and Shay 2017).

In the UK, calls for an inclusive curriculum were initially driven by the growing internationalisation of the university body (Hubble and Bolton 2018) and the widening participation agenda. Initiatives seeking to increase the numbers of UK domiciled students from under-represented groups have been expansive (Donnelly and Evans 2018) and have had some, albeit uneven, success (Whitty et al. 2015; Equality Challenge Unit 2017b). Within this context, an inclusive curriculum was considered central to delivering equality for, and representation of, a diverse and international student body (HEA/ECU 2008; Hockings 2010). A diverse curriculum has also been aligned with attempts to address the attainment gap between Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) students and their white peers (Stevenson 2012) (BAME students are less likely to attain a 'good', first or upper second-class, degree compared to their white peers. See Equality Challenge Unit 2017b). It is only more recently that the interrogation of curricula in the UK has been linked to the broader movement to decolonise the university and transform the knowledge base, rather than adding token diversity (Andrews 2019). Student protests, inspired by campaigns in other parts of the world, have questioned the whiteness of the curriculum and dominance of Eurocentric, Western thought, e.g. Rhodes must fall Oxford; 'Why is my curriculum white?', #LiberateMyDegree (Bhambra et al. 2018). Based on such movements, students have developed their own tools to broaden the range of perspectives on their reading lists (see the Alternative Reading List Project https://thealternativereadinglistproject.wordpress.com/).

Situated within these debates, UK universities are beginning to recognise that 'the content of university knowledge remains principally governed by the West for the West' (Bhambra et al. 2018: 6) with reading materials constituting a pertinent focus for reform (Stevenson 2012: 18). Yet, the sector does not have data about the authors included on programme/module reading lists as such empirical analysis is extremely rare. This article aims to ascertain whether there is empirical evidence to support claims that UK universities need to diversify their reading lists. In doing so, the article considers the meaning of diversification by reflecting on who and/or what requires better representation in our reading lists. Two core subject areas, one in the sciences and one in the social sciences, in a leading UK university, will be interrogated in an attempt to establish whether white, male and Eurocentric authors dominate university reading lists. This type of enquiry represents a crucial step towards developing and transforming our curricula in response to the global decolonisation agenda.

Reading lists and/as representation

Reading lists in higher education are representation devices, serving to reflect particular perspectives and knowledge. Pitkin's ( 1967) concept of descriptive representation is helpful for unpacking this representative function and the normative justifications for an inclusive and diverse reading list. Descriptive representation refers to the premise that a representational artefact should resemble the community from which it is drawn. The representational function 'must be intentional' (Pitkin 1967: 68), although not necessarily accurate, where the representative 'stands for' the wider community.

Descriptive representation of the student body

Within both Global South and North settings, critiques of the curriculum have highlighted the failure of reading lists to reflect or resemble the student body. The colonial curriculum in Africa, for example, is considered 'disconnected from African realities' (Heleta 2016: 4) and BAME students in the UK feel 'under-represented' as 'their histories and ancestral narrative [are] omitted from mainstream discourse' (Abou El Magd 2016). Seen through a lens of descriptive representation, the reading list becomes a tool to represent student perspectives, histories and interests. This would respond to concerns identified above (Abou El Magd 2016; Heleta 2016; Wolff 2016) and facilitate student belonging and engagement (Burke 2018; Hoffman et al. 2002). More broadly, a reading list that directly connects with student histories and experiences could be aligned with pedagogical shifts towards student-centred education where 'learning dwells within the student' (Neumann 2013: 164). As learning contexts become centred in students, reading lists could arguably serve to instil and represent the perspectives of the student body.

Descriptive representation of the scholarly community

Shifts towards inclusive curricula therefore offer transformative potential (Luckett and Shay 2017) that 're-conceptualizes the field in light of new knowledge, scholarship, and new ways of knowing' (Kitano cited in Cohn and Mullenix 2007: 16). The development of a diverse reading list would necessarily build on and critique the canon (Wolff 2016). In post-colonial contexts, this requires greater representation of perspectives, histories and approaches of scholars of the country (Le Grange 2016; Mngomezulu and Hadebe 2018) to 'build a knowledge base that takes learners and teachers beyond colonialist habit' (Phillips and Archer-Lean 2018). In other settings, calls for an inclusive reading list seek to recognise the contributions of historically marginalised groups by granting, for example, 'access to historic and contemporary narratives about women in STEM' (Blackburn 2017).

Seeking to develop a reading list that is descriptively representative of the scholarly community, however, is challenging. On the one hand, curricula could aspire to resemble the scholarly profile of each discipline as represented through professional disciplinary associations e.g. American Sociological Association (Bonilla-Silva 2017) or teaching departments in universities (e.g. Colgan 2017). Yet, disciplines vary according to how homogenous they have become (Altbach 2016) so descriptive representation may not be desirable in subfields with low diversity or female representation (Sumner 2018). On the other hand, drawing the reading list from the global scholarly community may provide a more holistic picture of the discipline but lack relevance to local scholars and their specialisms.

Methodology

Two small projects were undertaken to examine whether there is empirical evidence that white, male and Eurocentric/Western authors dominate reading lists in the UK context. This provides a lens through which to reflect on the meaning of a diverse curriculum and examine whether reading lists are descriptively representative of staff or students. The projects aimed to develop a method for auditing the authors on reading lists and apply this to two case studies.

The case studies

Each of the two projects undertook a case study so that, altogether, two module reading lists were analysed. Whilst work to decolonise reading lists has focused predominantly on the humanities and social sciences, the readings in science have remained almost entirely unexamined, and their perceived neutrality is less likely to be challenged (Last 2018). Therefore, an undergraduate science module on genetics methodology and a postgraduate social science module on research methods were selected for analysis. The setting of the work was a research intensive university in the UK, with the projects constituting part of, and funded by, the local 'Liberating the Curriculum' initiative (a staff and student group working to advance the inclusive curriculum). The two case studies were carried out separately, each by project teams comprising one British member of staff and one international student. As white women, the staff members were mindful of their own and others' racialized, gendered and ranked positionality in order to anticipate dangers that may emerge in the research process. In practice, this meant engaging in open reflection with colleagues and students to explore different interpretations of the data during its collection and analysis (Milner 2007).

The projects were undertaken in two inter-related stages. The first stage involved searching for literature to identify existing approaches for analysing reading lists. The second stage drew upon this literature, where possible, to develop a method of data collection and analysis.

Stage 1

Literature reviews were undertaken to identify existing studies, in any discipline, that have analysed authorship of academic research publications and/or university reading lists. The separate studies were identified and integrated across the projects. The search strategy included Google Scholar, pearl growing techniques (using key words drawn from relevant publications to search for further references), and citation checking (identifying references that cite, of have been cited by, key publications).

Stage 2

Informed by the literature identified in stage 1, methods were developed to examine the reading lists. The process of data collection for each project began with the creation of a spreadsheet that contained all of the references from each reading list. Each author was given an individual ID and for each multi-authored item, their place in the order was noted. The gender, ethnicity and geographical/institutional affiliation of each author was identified using information available about the author on institutional Web sites, profiles on other online platforms (such as LinkedIn) and biographical details included on the publication/journal article itself. Authors were grouped according to the categories listed in Table 1. In line with previous studies (Schucan Bird 2011; Dickersin et al. 1998; Eigenberg and Whalley 2015), the gender of the author was categorised as female, male or unclear and deduced from the first name, pronouns or photos. To identify the ethnicity/race of the author, the case studies experimented with different methods. The social science project used broad categories, based on the UK Institute of Race Relations definition of Black or Minority Ethnic (BME): 'terminology normally used in the UK to describe people of non-white descent'. The science case recorded the information as used in the data source and then grouped according to the categories afterwards. To assign a geographical area to each author, the institutional affiliation was identified by examining the details reported on the publication or the institutional Web site of the author. Although all data was from publicly accessible sources, the completed spreadsheets included assumptions about named individuals and were therefore held securely according to data protection principles.

Table 1 Categories used for data collection

Data analysis was undertaken in multiple stages. First, a descriptive overview of the gender, ethnicity/ race and geographical affiliation of all authors was created for each reading list. Second, single and multiple authored publications were analysed separately. The position of authors, and their demographic characteristics, in multiple authored papers was examined. Whilst there are different approaches to attributing credit to authors on publications, typically the most significant contributor is the author listed first in social science (Endersby 1996) and last in science (Tscharntke et al. 2007). Third, the findings were compared to local, national and international data on the student and staff bodies of the disciplines. This served to consider whether the reading lists were descriptively representative.

Findings

Stage 1

Stage 2

Table 2 Author demographics for social science and science

Social science

The reading list comprised 57 journal articles, book chapters or online reports specified for required and further reading. There were 144 different authors (see Table 2) with the number of authors ranging from one to 15 per publication. Teams of two or more authors wrote the majority (83%) of the publications on the reading list.

Gender

There were an equal proportion of female and male authors. The majority of co-authored papers (75%) included teams of men and women but the lead author was more likely to be male (55% led by men compared to 43% led by women). Further, teams of male authors were three times as common as female collaborations. Only one of the single author publications (10%) was written by a woman.

The reading list provides descriptive representation of female academic staff at levels greater than their proportion in the field of social science. The percentage of female authors listed on the reading list (50%) is higher than local (38%, University Staff statistics 2018) and national levels of female academic staff (46%, Equality Challenge Unit 2017a). The postgraduate student population, however, is not as well represented in terms of the national level population of 'social studies' at 66% (HESA 2019) or the local department of social sciences, at 73%.

Ethnicity

The majority of authors (90%) were identified as non-BME with four authors coded as unclear. None of the single author publications were written by a BME author. Of the co-authored publications, only 2% ( n  = 1) had a BAME lead author. A small proportion of the co-authored reports, 13%, included a BME author so the majority were written by teams of non-BME authors. Three percent of the total authors were BME and female, writing four publications (2%) on the reading list.

Compared to the proportion of BME academic staff in the social sciences, the reading list is descriptively representative. With 7% of authors coded as BME, the list mirrors levels of staff in these disciplines both locally (9% University Staff Statistics 2018) and nationally (10%, Equality Challenge Unit 2017a). Based on university wide statistics (2018/19), rather than specific social sciences data (which is not available), the proportion of BAME students ranges from 39% (UK domiciled) to 75% (non-UK domiciled) suggesting that the reading list fails to represent this student body.

Geography

The vast majority of the authors, 99%, were affiliated to universities in Europe, North American or Australasia. There were only two authors affiliated to institutions outside of these geographical areas, representing Brazil and Lebanon. These were listed in co-authored articles, as fourth author on a list of six (Brazil) and 13th on a publication with 14 authors (Lebanon). This meant that only 4% of all publications on the reading list included an author from the Global South.

There is no known data on the geographical affiliations of social science scholars around the world. Although limited in scope, there is some data on the nationalities of academics where 14% of staff in the UK report as non-EU nationals (UUK report). With 16% of authors affiliated to non-European universities, the reading list would arguably be descriptively representative of academic staff. The postgraduate student body in social science, however, is composed of 67% of 'overseas' (i.e. non-UK), of which 69% are from non-European countries (University Student Statistics 2018/19).

Science

The reading list comprised 68 individual articles, book chapters and Web-based data sets, with 146 authors. The number of authors per publication ranged from one to 23. The majority of the publications, 65% ( n = 44), were written by teams of two or more authors. This meant that just over a third of the reading list (35%, n  = 24) was written by a single author.

Gender

The majority of the authors on the reading list, 70%, were male. The gender of the authors of single-author publications ( n = 24) broadly reflected this ratio (62% male and 21% female). However, of the co-authored publications ( n = 44), 89% were led by male authors ( n  = 39). This included 12 publications written by the same team of male biologists.

In terms of descriptive representation, the proportion of female authors on the reading list (30%) fell short of the female student population at institutional level which is 67% for the biosciences. Nationally the proportion of female students is almost as high (Universities UK 2018). The reading list more accurately reflects the gender balance of staff in the local department, where women constitute 40%. There is a lack of data on the gender of academic staff in the biosciences nationally and internationally, but there is evidence of a steep decline in the number of women between researcher level and principal investigator in the life sciences (Lerchenmueller and Sorenson 2018).

Ethnicity

The majority of authors, 65%, were classified as white. Of the remaining authors, 18% were identified as Asian and 17% were unclear. Similarly, white authors (75%) wrote the majority of single author publications. Of the co-authored papers, 55% of the teams included at least one Asian author and 39% were led by an Asian author.

The high proportion of unclear information about ethnicity means that it is difficult to examine whether the list is descriptively representative.

Geography

The majority of authors, 90%, were from European, Australian or North American universities. Many of these authors were affiliated to universities in North America ( n = 91) or Europe ( n  = 35), with the latter group representing ten different European countries. Three countries in Asia (China, Singapore and The Philippines) were represented by ten authors who constituted 7% of authors. Of the publications on the reading list, 24% included an author from the Global South.

As with social science, there is no known data about the geographical affiliations of scholars. 32% of students at the local university are from outside the European Union.

Science and social science compared

The number of authors in both Social Science and Science reading lists was similar ( N = 144; N  = 146). Science had a lower proportion of female authors than social science with mixed findings regarding women's role in authorship. There were a higher proportion of female authors of single publications in science yet there were fewer female led co-authored papers compared to social science. Across both case studies, the majority of authors were identified as non-BAME/white and few authors were from Global South contexts (ranging from 4 to 7%). The number of individual authors on the science list for whom it was not possible to find gender and/or ethnicity data was significantly higher than for the social science list. Both lists were more representative of the local academic community than they were of the student body, which is much more diverse ethnically and more predominantly female.

Discussion

The findings suggest that there is empirical basis for claims that university reading lists in the UK context are dominated by white, male and Eurocentric authors. These conclusions are qualified by a couple of findings: the equal proportion of male/female authors on the social science reading list, and almost a third of authors on the science list identified as Asian. Analysis indicates that whilst these authors are descriptively representative of the local/national scholarly community, as far as we can know it, the demographic characteristics of the authors diverge from those of the student body. This discussion will consider how to interpret these findings. Firstly, reflections will be made on why descriptively representative reading lists matter. Secondly, the discussion will consider the conceptual and methodological challenges that hinder and potentially undermine the interrogation of reading lists. Thirdly, a set of recommendations for future research will be identified.

Descriptively representative reading lists: why do they matter?

Descriptive representation of local scholars, however, arguably remains problematic. The homogeneity of particular disciplines remains unchallenged and may not be compatible with local efforts to diversify the curriculum. Further, within the wider decolonisation agenda, descriptively representative lists need to acknowledge the global reach of the discipline which, due to lack of data, currently remains unknowable. Going forward, reading lists, as representational artefacts, can serve to highlight the constructed and partial nature of our disciplines. The boundaries of disciplines are, after all, contested and/ or fluid at national and international levels (e.g. see Leftwich 2004 for a discussion of political science). The creation of a reading list therefore enables lecturers to 'imprint and construct their values and identity and beliefs into a given programme' (Stokes and Martin 2008: 121). In this sense, aspiring to be descriptively representative will inevitably entail a device that 'presents a part of the world as being or looking a certain way' (Pitkin 1967: 70). This should serve to acknowledge inequalities in global knowledge production (Altbach 2016) and offer opportunities for staff and students to critique and deconstruct disciplinary boundaries (Luckett and Shay 2017). This would serve to counter the distinctively unrepresentative nature of the reading lists in relation to the student body. Whilst reading lists do not necessarily need to mirror student experiences to be legitimate (Wolff 2016), representation and recognition of student perspectives are essential for genuine parity of participation in higher education (Burke 2018; Luckett and Shay 2017).

Conceptual and methodological challenges

In the process of developing and applying a method for interrogating reading lists, this project unearthed a range of potential conceptual and methodological pitfalls for such an endeavour. These are considered below.

Categories of diversity

This project principally used three dimensions, gender, ethnicity, and geographical affiliation, to assess diversity within the readings lists for two subjects. These dimensions of difference seem to be most highly considered in the literature, i.e. 'decolonizing' or 'gendering' the curriculum. Whilst this represents a useful starting point, there remains a range of other categories that could be potentially interrogated. The Equality Act (2010) in England and Wales identified eight characteristics that warrant protection from discrimination and harassment in higher education (age, disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation). Should the diversity of a curriculum/ reading list be assessed against all eight characteristics? Would it be possible to access such data? There are examples within the literature that suggest that perspectives of these groups require particular attention too. Critical disability studies (Goodley 2013) and queer theorists argue for a more inclusive framing of our disciplines (e.g. Smith and Lee 2015). There could be further characteristics, such as social class, that also warrant exploration. A robust theoretical framework, drawing on social and educational theory, is needed to justify the selection of particular characteristics. Such considerations seem lacking in the current moves to decolonize the curriculum.

Even with a strong rationale for selecting particular categories of difference, there are difficulties relating to their operationalization within the research process. The classification of ethnicity, for example, was distinguished in two different ways: common groupings (such as 'white' or 'Asian' in science) and broad categories ('non-BME' and 'BME' in social science). Both approaches suffer drawbacks, as there is no consensus on the appropriate terms to use for the scientific study of ethnicity and race (see Bhopal 2004). On the one hand, the use of 'BME' is seen as a somewhat 'blunt' instrument that attempts to be inclusive without taking into consideration the nuanced, locally defined populations (Bhopal 2004; Song 2018). On the other, large categories such as 'white' conceal heterogeneity, shifting demographic patterns and growing numbers of multiracial people (Song 2018). Further, there is virulent debate about whether a terminology of 'race' should also be used to meaningfully measure difference (Roth 2016; Song 2018). Similar debates about identity and classification continue to take place with regard to other variables such as gender and sexuality (e.g. Hines 2006). Again, deeper reflection is encouraged to create a framework for analysing reading lists that can be meaningful and theoretically justified.

In focusing on author demographics as static characteristics, projects to decolonize the curriculum arguably re-inscribe categories of difference. Concurrently, sociological theories recognize that, for example, 'ethnicity is imprecise and fluid' (Bhopal 2004; Roth 2016) that changes over time and context. Whilst seeking to incorporate fluid understandings of identity categories, these projects inadvertently re-affirm rigid and static categories of difference.

Data collection

This project used information available in the publications together with internet sources to collect data about authors on the reading lists. This presented a number of challenges including an absence of information and implicit/hidden forms of data. Researchers were required to extrapolate and draw inferences about author demographics, often based on photographic images. Whilst extrapolating demographics from photographs is relatively unproblematized in other studies (e.g. Eigenberg and Whalley 2015), this approach meant that the findings were mainly based on demographic proxies, with limited possibilities for ensuring accuracy (Sloan 2017; Mügge et al. 2018). The intersection of such proxies can generate further uncertainty unless, for example, gender detection methods are tailored to geographic and ethnic contexts (Karimi et al. 2016). Triangulating proxies with other methods may serve to validate the data by asking the individuals themselves (Sloan 2017) or asking scholars in the same field (Dickersin et al. 1998). Some familiarity with the scholars in the fields of study was helpful but validation of data was not systematically carried out and the accuracy of the data remains problematic.

Data analysis

The nature of the data collection presented a number of opportunities and challenges for the data analysis. First, data was collected at two different levels: for each author and per publication. The analysis needed to interrogate and draw inferences from both metrics. Whilst there are examples of studies that have integrated both levels of data (e.g. Crow and Smykla 2015), greater consideration is required to recognize the relative contribution of each level of analysis to the overall conclusions. Second, the analysis aimed to acknowledge and explore demographic characteristics and how they related to sole/multiple authorship. This meant, for example, examining whether women were evenly represented across the author positions (as sole or co-authors) (West et al. 2013). The practice of authoring papers and attributing authorship, however, varies across disciplines and so comparison remains difficult (Helgesson and Eriksson 2018). Further, in multiple author publications, authorship and author order remains a 'vexed issue' (McCann and Polacsek 2018) with no consensus on how scientific merit is attributed to individuals (Helgesson and Eriksson 2018). Therefore, without clear guidance on how to interpret authorship order, it remains difficult to draw inferences on the intersection of author contribution and demographics. Third, data was collected on a number of demographic factors which provided an opportunity to analyse intersectionality and authorship. The intersectional analysis, however, was limited by the small numbers of authors for each category of difference and an inability to address the normative underpinnings of such analysis (Hancock 2007). Fourth, attempts to compare the demographic characteristics of the authors on the reading lists with wider student and staff bodies, i.e. analyse descriptive representation, were hampered by difficulties in identifying and accessing data on these populations.

Ethical issues and data protection

Collecting personal data from online sources generates a number of ethical and legal concerns pertaining to informed consent, privacy and anonymity (Wilkinson and Thelwall 2011). Informed consent for research participants is a fundamental element of science/social science research but is this necessary when interrogating author demographics from module reading lists? On the one hand, the researcher is collecting personal data and making judgments about individuals. On the other hand, there are conditions in which informed consent may not be necessary for documents, text or observations taking place in public online space (Hudson and Bruckman 2004; Wilkinson and Thelwall 2011). As Convery and Cox ( 2012) propose, a form of 'negotiated ethics' may be necessary which means that particular types of data collection, such as author's geographical affiliation, may not require informed consent because such information is intentionally public (Willis 2017). Categories of gender and ethnicity, however, are not explicitly presented as public data and so may arguably require consent from the participants for research use and analysis.

The issues of privacy and anonymity are complex in this project given the central role played by identity in the data collection and analysis. Nonintrusive research may not raise privacy concerns but the collection and analysis of implicit data requires further consideration. As Wilkinson and Thelwall ( 2011) suggest, revealing the identity of an individual may simply involve the transference of identity from one public space (online) to another (academic publication). This may, or may not, be potentially sensitive so good practice procedures for data protection should be followed to ensure that data about individuals remained confidential. The legal framework in the UK changed after the research was carried out, and the GDPR needs to apply to all future work (UKRI 2018). This may influence requirements for consent and anonymity.

Recommendations for future research

The paucity of research examining authorship and reading lists (Piscioneri and Hlavac 2013) suggest that there are key strands of work that need to be progressed in order to understand and develop inclusive reading lists in universities. First, there is a lack of research examining student views of reading lists. Qualitative research is required to uncover student expectations of reading lists and their reactions to diversity in the curriculum (Wolff 2016). This should necessarily consider students from different disciplines, where expectations and views are likely to differ. Second, more research is needed to identify staff views of reading lists and to re-examine the role of reading lists in higher education (Stokes and Martin 2008). Third, normative and empirical work is required to fully unpack the conceptual and methodological issues involved in reviewing the diversity of reading lists. With the university sector prompting their staff to develop more 'inclusive' reading lists (Stevenson 2012), further work is needed to reflect on the challenges of doing so and then provide ethical and rigorous tools to perform such a task. Fourth, further research needs to explore reading lists as artefacts of substantive representation: do author identities influence the type and content of their research? Finally, more extensive and global data is required to detail the number and characteristics of staff and students in our disciplines. Current knowledge is incomplete.

Conclusions

This article provides empirical support for diversification of reading lists in higher education but also highlights a number of challenges that need careful consideration so as not to undermine the endeavour. There are a range of implications.

First, universities need to engage in a transparent and informed discussion about what a 'diverse/inclusive/decolonised' reading list actually looks like. This process needs to engage with a range of stakeholders, including staff and students, to ensure clarity and commitment to the agenda (Whitsed and Green 2016). These discussions should be context-sensitive (Wolff 2016) and be founded on an understanding of the relevant theoretical, methodological and ethical debates (such as those discussions raised in this article).

Second, higher education institutions and agencies (such as Advance HE in the UK) need to develop coherent and consistent strategies that can move the sector towards more inclusive and diverse programmes of study. Current approaches focus on individual responses in a single classroom or module (Sleeter 2016) but a strategic, sector-wide response is required. To meet the aims of the global decolonisation agenda and strive for genuine inclusivity of students, these approaches need to be 'transformative' (Luckett and Shay 2017; Kitano cited in Cohn and Mullenix 2007; Sleeter 2016) where 'universities must completely rethink, reframe and reconstruct the curriculum' (Heleta 2016: 5).

Third, academics and lecturers should not wait for institutional responses but engage with the debates raised here and begin to critically reflect on their own reading lists (Heleta 2016). However, further analytical and methodological work needs to be undertaken to develop a toolkit for teachers to review their own curriculums. Universities need to invest in research to develop and trial methods for interrogating diversity in module reading lists. Some tools are beginning to emerge (e.g. UCL Inclusive Curriculum Healthcheck 2018; Sumner 2018), but there is a lack of research evaluating their relevance, implementation or outcome. More detailed, step-by-step instruction, based on evidence, would help to support teachers in higher education to start the process of analysing their modules through a critical, 'transformative' lens (see Cohn and Mullenix 2007).

Fourth, sector-wide strategies should recognise the structural challenges that face the global agenda to decolonise/diversify reading lists. The nature of academic publishing, for example, means that the dominance of the Global North necessarily shapes the landscape for research and knowledge production (Collyer 2016). The development of more diverse reading lists will therefore need to be accompanied by a range of initiatives to challenge inequalities in knowledge production and bring marginalised perspectives into the centre (Altbach 2016; Tickner 2013).

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the UCL Liberating the Curriculum Working Group for the grants that enabled us to carry out the original projects; to our research assistants, Mahmoud Arif and Jin Gao for their hard work; and to Dr Hazel Smith of the Faculty of Biosciences and Dr Alison O'Mara-Eves of the Department of Social Sciences at UCL, who volunteered their modules for analysis. The constructive feedback from the two anonymous peer reviewers was invaluable in allowing us to develop our ideas.

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Department of Social Science, UCL Institute of Education, 18 Woburn Square, London, WC1H 0NR, UK

K. Schucan Bird

London, UK

Lesley Pitman

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Schucan Bird, K., Pitman, L. How diverse is your reading list? Exploring issues of representation and decolonisation in the UK. High Educ 79, 903-920 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-019-00446-9
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Keywords

Reading lists

Inclusion

Diversity

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Decolonizing the curriculum

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How diverse is your reading list? Exploring issues of representation and decolonisation in the UK - Higher Education

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There is a growing impetus, from university students and administrations, to decolonise the curriculum and develop diverse reading lists. Yet, there is limited theoretical or empirical analysis of the authorship of current reading lists to justify this imperative.

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Author: Amrita Narang Decolonisation of curriculum What is decolonisation of curriculum? Why are we talking about it?
Educational spaces are powerful sources of knowledge creation, production, and, re-production. For centuries, education has and still does, play a vital role in forming socially constructed and accepted norms that govern our thoughts, feelings, attitudes, values, and beliefs. Therefore, it is not surprising to see that foundation of education philosophy, which we see and read today, is mostly created by white men, those belonging to the western world, propagating their way of understanding the world as the right way.

Decolonisation of curriculum sits within the larger premise of curriculum transformation. Transformation entails a gradual process of growth, by re-thinking, re-framing, and re-constructing the current design and principles of the curriculum. Curriculum transformation is shifting contours of practice and relations of all those involved in the process, and those will who benefit most from the outcomes of it. Therefore, one may say that the primary need is to recognise transformation and decolonisation entails change in consciousness that prepares leaders, academics, academic developers, and students to dismantle any dominant hegemony or hierarchies in education theory and practice (Gorski, 2008). It is about considering how different frameworks, traditions and knowledge projects can inform each other, how multiple voices can be heard, and how new perspectives emerge from mutual learning (Keele University Manifesto, 2019)

Decolonising the curriculum, therefore, is a complex process- intellectually and institutionally, requiring continuous adaptations to ever changing landscape of our knowledge space, and student diversity. Broadly speaking, decolonisation of curriculum is one aspect of decolonising the university space. Decolonisation of curriculum requires academics and academic developers to challenge Eurocentric conceptual frameworks whilst confronting practices that mirror global inequities. This will allow for creating space for non-dominant forms of knowledge. Describing the project of decolonising as one committed 'to dismantling dominant hegemony, hierarchies, and concentrations of power and control', Paul Gorski stresses that 'good intentions' do not necessarily prevent the replication and reification of dominant hegemonies (2008). Decolonisation needs to be seen as a process that is intrinsically troubling process, about asking uncomfortable questions that interrupt entrenched ways of thinking, knowing, pedagogical practices, and curriculum designs.

Policy attention to decolonisation within the curriculum has mostly been in the name of inclusive practices, internationalisation, and embedding multi-culturalism. Although all of these are pertinent, with some overlap with decolonisation, decolonial practices promote critical, culturally responsive and equity-sensitive curricula with the subject field. Internationalisation of curriculum often run the risk of homogenising effect, in a way emulating ways of dominant knowledge. On the contrary, decolonisation is not about taking any knowledge out of the bigger picture; instead it is about creating an equal space for representing voices of knowledge production that have long been in the margins.
What can I do to support course teams to start thinking about and supporting decolonisation?
As academic developers, one is entrusted to support implementation of the education strategy of the university. This implies providing enhancement workshops, course team support, and teaching of postgraduate courses on advance practices within higher education. Each of these are opportunities to re-consider how one can work in productive ways, in partnerships with lecturers to decolonise cultures and practices within and outside the classrooms.

However, one needs to bear in mind that the endeavour of decolonisation and to decolonise comes with its own invisible challenges. Academic developers and academics in historically white institutions may be predominantly white; schooled in and taught in western traditions, they may continue to have a congruent experience of the university space. Thus, they may not have felt the need to re-structure curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment practice. As a result, the discourse of decolonisation will need to be careful with a consultative approach.

To begin with, consider designing workshops that lead to creating awareness about decolonisation. This may offer a safe space for academics to explore what decolonisation means to them, and to their specific subject areas.

Whilst designing the workshops you may want to reflect on -As an ED/ AD-

how do I support course teams to design a curriculum that focuses beyond Euro-centric knowledge?

how do I support academics to think beyond the 'white supremacy' in their own practice?

how do I support academics to nurture a 'sense of belonging' for ALL students on their program? ( this has an overlap with Inclusive Practice)

how do I support reflective and reflexive approach in my own practice and in those on teaching teams

Are there any examples of good practice out there? What other scholarly resources may I refer?
The article explores what is the meaning of decolonisation, what does it entail, why is the need for the decolonisation, the importance of rethinking how curriculum is conceived, and outlining some possible ways of decolonising the university curriculum. The purpose is not to provide a set of answers but to open up ways of (re)thinking the university curriculum.

Guess, T. J. (2016). The Social Construction of Whiteness: Racism by Intent, Racism by Consequence.Critical Sociology, 32(4), 649-673. https://10.1163/156916306779155199
Although set in an American context, understanding of whiteness alludes to what does one mean by 'white' in the curriculum.

Vorster, Jo-Anne & Quinn, Lynn. (2017). The "Decolonial Turn": What Does It Mean for Academic Staff Development?. Education as Change. 21. 31-49. 10.17159/1947-9417/2017/853.
A powerful paper that explores the task of decolonisation of knowledge, power, and being including university spaces; and what does it mean for academic developers and academics - who may need to re-think their practice as teachers.

NUS (2011). Race for Equality - A report on the experiences of Black students in further and higher education. https://www.nus.org.uk/PageFiles/12350/NUS_Race_for_Equality_web.pdf

NUS (2015). Why is my curriculum white?.https://www.nus.org.uk/en/news/why-is-my-curriculum-white/

Finally, decolonising the curriculum is about reflecting on our shared assumptions about how the world operates around us. Racial hierarchies in the past have informed many of our practices, and this clearly needs to be interrogated. Second, decolonisation also emanates from location and identity of the writer and frameworks used. Thus, one needs to re-consider how this influences the perceptions and perspectives of each generation of students. This implies that academics should broaden the scope of engaging with many perspectives and not just what have been prescribed by a selected few. Decolonisation of curriculum will allow for diversified knowledge and intellectual rigour.
References
Keele University (2019). Keele decolonising the curriculum network. https://www.keele.ac.uk/equalitydiversity/equalityawards/raceequalitycharter/keeledecolonisingthecurriculumnetwork/#keele-manifesto-for-decolonising-the-curriculum

Gorkski, Paul C. (2008) 'Good Intentions Are Not Enough: A Decolonizing Intercultural Education' Intercultural Education 19 (6), 515-525.

Narang, A. (2020) Expanding notions of pedagogy to empower change: https://www.advance-he.ac.uk/news-and-views/expanding-notions-pedagogy-empower-change?_cldee=c2FyYWgud2FsbXNsZXlAYm9sdG9uY2MuYWMudWs%3d&recipientid=contact-34c1ccd7c3d5e711bf4b00505689a200-cca3e56cd5a34020ad6c888bc78b52a8&utm_source=ClickDimensions&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Consultancy%20-%20Race%20Equality&esid=bd34c89e-0371-eb11-a812-0022481a641b
Resources
Bird, S. (2021) Padlet collection of resources on decolonizing the curriculum https://padlet.com/sara2_bird/wshifciwuvo2

The Dark Side of British History- George Monbiot

Charles, E. (2019) 'Decolonizing the Curriculum'. Insights 32 (1): 24. https://insights.uksg.org/articles/10.1629/uksg.475/

The Decolonize University of Kent Collective (2020) Towards Decolonizing the University: a kaleidoscope for empowered action. https://counterpress.org.uk/publications/towards-decolonising-the-university/

Hinton, D. (2021) Blog/Twitter thread https://twitter.com/hintondm/status/1169614377034690560?s=21

Muldoon, J. (2019) 'Academics it is time to get behind decolonizing the curriculum', The Guardian, March 2019 https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/mar/20/academics-its-time-to-get-behind-decolonising-the-curriculum

Swain, H. (2019) 'Students want their curriculums decolonized: are universities listening?', The Guardian, January 2019 https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/jan/30/students-want-their-curriculums-decolonised-are-universities-listening

University of Victoria (n.d.) Decolonizing in an Educational Setting https://www.uvic.ca/research/centres/youthsociety/assets/docs/briefs/decolonizing-education-research-brief.pdf
https://cris.brighton.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/6443632/Decolonising_the_curriculum_MONCRIEFFE_32_pages_4th_July.pdf https://cris.brighton.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/7753714/University_of_Brighton_Decolonising_the_curriculum_Issue_2_December_2019_Moncrieffe_et._al..pdf
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9 The Real Deal

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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Author: Amrita Narang Decolonisation of curriculum What is decolonisation of curriculum? Why are we talking about it? Educational spaces are powerful sources of knowledge creation, production, and, re-production. For centuries, education has and still does, play a vital role in forming socially constructed and accepted norms that govern our thoughts, feelings, attitudes, values, and beliefs.

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"I wanted to meet Chinua Achebe, the young Nigerian novelist whose two novels, Things Fall Apart and No Longer at Ease, seem to herald the birth of a new society in which writers, freed from the burden of political protests and jibes at a disintegrating colonialism, can cast an unsentimental eye at human relationship in all its delicate and sometimes harsh intricacies" my father, then going by the name James Ngugi, wrote after the African Writes of English Expression conference in 1962.[1]

But when he revisited that same conference in his book Decolonizing the Mind 26 years later, his tone was markedly different. Noting the exclusionary nature of the conference boldly stated in its title, he wrote, "Now looking back from the self-questioning heights of 1986, I can see this contained absurd anomalies. I, a student, could qualify for the meeting on the basis of only two published short stories . . . But neither Shaban Robert, then the greatest living East African poet with several works of poetry and prose to his credit inn Kiswahili, nor Chief Fagunwa, the great writer with several published titles in Yoruba, could possibly qualify."[2] The 1962 Conference had come to represent a major contradiction: European languages had become the default vehicles for African literature. The term "African literature" meant African literature in English, French or Portuguese. Those writing in African languages had to justify their use of their mother tongues.

To be clear, the language question did not begin with my father. Immediately following the conference, literary critic Obi Wali had raised the questions that Ngugi would later revisit. In his essay "The Dead End of African Literature,"[3] Wali argued that African literature in Western languages would become "a minor appendage in the main stream of European Literature. He noted that in Nigeria, only "one percent" of the population could be able to read Wole Soyinka's Dance of the Forest. To address the diversity and multiplicity of African languages, he called for translation. He mused, "one wonders what would have happened to English literature for instance, if writers like Spenser, Shakespeare, Donne, and Milton, had neglected English, and written in French or Latin simply because these classical languages were the cosmopolitan languages of their times."

On the other side of the question were writers like Chinua Achebe (who went on to help the young Ngugi publish his first novel, Weep Not Child through the Heinemann African Writers Series in 1964). Achebe, writing in reply to Obi Wali, argued that English allowed for communicating across the different African languages while also reaching wider audiences in the West; that it was the language of power; that English could be Africanized so that it carried the African experience.
"The term 'African literature' meant African literature in English, French or Portuguese. Those writing in African languages had to justify their use of their mother tongues."
South African writers and intellectuals writing in African languages were getting translated into English as early as the late 1800s and early 1900s. Thomas Mofolo's Moeti oa Bochabela was published in 1907 and later translated into English as Traveler to the East in 1934; Chaka was written in 1909 but published in 1925. And if we take into account writing in Amharic, Arabic or Hausa, African literature in African languages, or in non-European languages stretches back to the 1200's.[4]

In other words, the language debate and writing in African languages had been going on for a long time. What, then, did Decolonizing the Mind, bring to the table? For one it tied language and culture to the material work of both colonization and decolonization. "The bullet was the means of the physical subjugation. Language was the means of the spiritual subjugation" Ngugi wrote. It also examined the close relationship between language and culture. For him "language carries, and culture carries, particularly through orature and literature, the entire body of values by which we come to perceive ourselves and our place in our world."

Written in the 1980s at the height of the cold war and during Moi dictatorship, the book also captured the contradictions of neocolonialism throughout Africa and the global south. Inherited colonial inequalities were becoming more entrenched, the security apparatus more brutal, and economies were pried open by Western countries, leaving the most vulnerable without access to health care or education. Decolonizing the Mind also demonstrated the way western cultural and linguistic superiority were emphasized while African cultures and languages were debased.

The concept of decolonizing the mind also applies to other areas of our lives away from immediately recognizable power relationship between the colonizer and colonized, or oppression and avenues of resistance. Writing for the African Journal of Reproductive Health, Nombuso Dlamini et al. ask the question: "What Does a Decolonizing/Decentralizing Methodology in Examining Sexual Lives Entail?" [5] In the essay, the authors examine their experiences researching "the state of, and teach about, sexual health and HIV/AIDS in Edo State." Decolonizing the Mind became useful as a conceptual tool through which to understand the ways in which power imbalances were practiced as culturally encoded automated reflexes. According to Health, Nombuso Dlamini et al, "to decolonize one's mind is a life-long process, as well, systems of domination and subordination are not necessarily easy to identify when situated within unofficial cultures, that is, in interpersonal politics (within the negotiation of relation of power by individuals in interaction."

Today, we have decolonial/decolonization movements in campuses around the world (but most vocally in South Africa). Cornell University's Carole Boyce Davies put it well when she said that Decolonizing the Mind

has always been a staple required or "go to" text for the discussion of the nexus between language and coloniality. It was for years one of the only texts, in the face of postcolonial theory, before this new wave of decolonial discourse to address the need for continuing to address what Biodun Jeyifo called "arrested decolonization."[6]

In short it remains a book of our times. History moves on, theories of liberation march alongside it, but without our languages we will remain trapped within what literary critic Adam Beach calls the English metaphysical empire.

As a scholar and writer of African literature, it has been useful to me to compare my father's colonial education and my own neocolonial education. He could write that in his community, "we spoke Gikuyu as we worked in the fields" and "in and outside the home" before the "harmony of language, culture and education was broken by colonial education." My generation cannot make the same claim. Some of us, especially those who grew up in urban areas, cannot speak their mother tongues. When they visit their grandparents in the rural areas, they need someone to serve as translator. Many of our parents, having grown up under colonial rule, did not find any value in speaking in their mother tongues. They too, like the schools ran English only households, and speaking of mother tongues frowned upon.
"History moves on, theories of liberation march alongside it, but without our languages we will remain trapped within what literary critic Adam Beach calls the English metaphysical empire."
There was another similarity: like my father before me, I was caned if found speaking my mother tongue and forced to wear a sign with the words "I am an Ass" written on it. For my generation, how well you spoke English was not just a marker of intelligence but also class. If your English was "broken," fellow students took to shaming you. To be called a "shrubber," meaning that you confused L and R sounds, was social death, and it even affected your dating life. English was not just a language of communication, or a language that helped one climb out of poverty and into power and wealth, it was the language of the cultured.

In 2017 my wife, daughter and I visited my former primary school. By each classroom door I saw a list of 19 rules, with the second rule being "Vernacular Speaking is PROHIBITED."

For my father's generation and mine, what was supposed to enlighten only tightened our bond to the English metaphysical empire. In 2017, my father was conferred an honorary doctorate by Yale University alongside with the singer Stevie Wonder, Congressman John Lewis, and the native American language warrior Jessie Little Doe Baird. His conversations around language, identity and culture Baird remain the most memorable for me, meeting Stevie Wonder and the Congressman notwithstanding. They had so much in common that it was a wonder they had not met before. Or it wasn't a wonder: They had been formed by the English metaphysical empire and found their way out through their respective languages. Now, they were engaged in a battle to decolonize minds and institutions.

*

For my father, the work of liberating Africans out of the English metaphysical empire and neocolonialism had to be done in African languages. Pro-people and revolutionary literature could not contribute to decolonization if written in a formerly colonial language the people could not understand. And nowhere was the practice of this more evident than in his 1977 play, Ngahiika Ndenda ( I will Marry When I Want). Co-authored in Gikuyu with Ngugi Wa Mirii, the play was staged at the Kamiriithu Cultural Center, right in the heard of Kamiriithu village. This was the village from which the nearby Bata shoe Company and tea plantations drew their labor. It was a village of exploited and peasant workers. And it was they who helped in fleshing out the play, who acted in it and comprised the majority of the audience. The play itself was a dramatization of their exploitation and resistance.

But practicing the politics of language came with a personal price. The play was promptly banned by the Kenyatta government and led to my father being detained without trial for one year. I was six, and today I can never be sure whether I really witnessed his arrest, or if the subsequent conversations amongst my family members and his recollection of the arrest in Detained made an imagined memory feel real. In a 2001 poem titled, "Recipe: How to Become an Immigrant and an Exile" I captured his arrest this way:

Silent duels. And so when the police with guns and big black coats
came for my father, it must have been a dream I dreamt. That
night-pills with no water but morning tea still found a newspaper
damp with dew[7]

In 1982, my father attempted to resurrect the Kamirithu Theater. The then Moi government banned the play, burned the compound to the ground, and forced him into political exile. The government would not give passports to my older siblings or allow them to find meaningful jobs. Once in the 1980s, we held a Christmas party that got raided by the police. Everyone in attendance lost their jobs shortly afterwards. The work of decolonization is as personal as it is political.

Today, more and more younger African writers are taking up Ngugi's call while taking advantage of the internet age. Jalada Africa, an online journal, best exemplifies the meeting between African literature, languages, the internet age, and the practical work of decolonizing. The Jalada Collective that produces the journal is composed of young writers such as Managing Editor Moses Kilolo, Treasurer Ndinda Kioko, the 2013 Caine Prize winner Okwiri Odour, Mehul Gohil, who was featured in the anthology Africa 39, and the poet Clifton Gachugua, whose first collection of poetry, The Madman at Kilifi, won the Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets and was published by the University of Nebraska Press in 2014.
"Pro-people and revolutionary literature could not contribute to decolonization if written in a formerly colonial language the people could not understand."
Whereas my generation inherited the language anxieties of the Makerere generation, the work of the Jalada Collective points to a generation that is more confident, unencumbered by colonial and neocolonial aesthetics. The Makerere generation was composed of writers in their twenties and thirties who understood themselves as having a mission to contribute to decolonization; this generation sees itself as having the mission to create democratic spaces for African literature, languages, and through internet use, a Pan-African readership. They want African languages to speak to each other, and to non-African languages, through translation.

The 2015 Jalada language issue, which also included podcast interviews with some of the contributing authors, aimed to create a meeting ground where languages would meet as material entities through the literature-side by side-and also engage each other through translation. In their call for papers the collective announced that:

The anthology will be a celebration of language, featuring fiction, poetry, visual art and various essays on the very subject of language. Writers are asked to submit original works written in their own languages and provide an accompanying English translation. We also ask writers to feel free to treat language as a theme, where language can be a character, a topic in a story or even incorporate languages other than English as the theme in the story. Writers may also write in English or various Englishes.[8]

While in the end most of the writing featured was originally in English, there were conversations across various language borders-Lusophone, Francophone, English and African languages.

In the spring of 2016, Jalada published and facilitated the translation of a short story originally written in Gikuyu by Ngugi into over 60 languages-47 of them being African. This came with practical challenges. Moses Kilolo noted they had very few professional translators and had to work with a team of "younger writers who are not very experienced in translation [but who] are taking up the challenge as well, and consulting widely in order to learn and do it well." And in terms of setting up publishing structures, they "[encouraged] other continent based magazines to join [them] in providing such platforms to these writers."

To call for translation as an active agent in the growth of literary traditions also sends out a challenge to writers, scholars, and publishers who see African languages as being in the service of the more-useful English. Or conversely, those who understand translation as most desirable when coming from European languages into anemic African languages desperately in need of European linguistic and aesthetic transfusion. The Jalada collective then is challenging the idea of servicing English, and proving the feasibility of a democratization of linguistic and literary spaces. Translation amongst African languages, as opposed to English into African languages, has yet to be practiced and theorized into critical and popular acceptance. For Jalada, to make Ngugi's Ituĩka Rĩa Mũrũngarũ: Kana Kĩrĩa Gĩtũmaga Andũ Mathiĩ Marũngiĩ ( The Upright Revolution: Or Why Humans Walk Upright) the most translated African language story is to claim a piece of literary history yet to be written.

Jalada's translation initiative is also part of a larger language awakening. Capturing the shift from an English-only consensus to a multiple-languages debate, the 2015 Kwani literary festival titled, "Beyond the Map of English: Writers in conversation on Language" centered and celebrated the language debate. At that festival, the inaugural Mabati-Cornell Kiswahili Prizes for African Literature were awarded. I co-founded the Kiswahili prize with Lizzy Attree, the director of the Caine prize, in 2014, with the express goal of "recognizing writing in African languages and encouraging translation from, between and into African languages." The $15,000 prize, divided amongst four winners, is awarded annually to the best unpublished manuscript or book published within two years of the award year across the categories of Fiction/Nonfiction/Graphic Novels. The winning prose entries are then published in Kiswahili by Mkuki na Nyota or East African Educational Publishers (EAEP), and the best poetry book will be translated and published in English by the African Poetry Book Fund.
"Translation amongst African languages, as opposed to English into African languages, has yet to be practiced and theorized into critical and popular acceptance."
Scholar and writer Boubacar Boris Diop has started Ceytu, an imprint in Senegal dedicated to the translation of seminal works by Frantz Fanon, Aime Cesaire, and others into Wolof. In 2013, Chike Jeffers edited an anthology of philosophical texts originally written in seven African languages and then translated into English. And Wangui Wa Goro, who translated Ngugi's Matigari from Gikuyu into English in 1982, has also done a lot of work to make African literary translation viable and visible.

But the African language awakening of the post-post-Makerere writers still has a long way to go before it can claim a space of co-existence with African writing in European languages. When setting up the Mabati-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for African Literature, Dr. Lizzy Attree and I were immediately confronted by the absence of structures that are simply taken for granted when it comes to English writing, not just in Africa but worldwide. Most if not all colleges in the US, for example, have a literary journal for undergraduate and graduate students. English and other literary departments have well respected literary journals (not to speak of academic university presses). States and cities have their own regional prizes and often have state-sponsored cultural organizations that support writers. Writers residencies compete for prestige.

In Kiswahili, which has an estimated 100 million speakers, there are only a handful of literary journals. And prizes for Kiswahili literature are not more than five. For Gikuyu, my mother tongue spoken by close to 7 million people, I can name only one journal: Mutiiri, launched by my father in 2000 as a print journal, and now found online.[9] There are no literary prizes associated with the language. Publishers of literary texts in African languages outside of South Africa are few and far between. I do not know of a single journal that produces literary criticism in an African language. Or any residencies that encourage writing in African languages. The point is, for a population that will soon reach 1 billion people, spread over 55 countries, even 100 journals and literary prizes would still be pitifully inadequate.

The work of linguistic decolonization cannot be done by writers alone. Governments must change their policy towards the teaching of African languages and create economic opportunities in those languages-whether it's agricultural extension officers trained in the languages of the communities they serve, or teachers trained in teaching African languages, or interpreters for national and international organizations, and so on. African languages have to move from being primarily social languages to vehicles of political, cultural, and economic growth.

We need literary criticism in African languages. And equally importantly, we have to decolonize African literary theory. Why should literary criticism continue to draw its primary conceptual oxygen from European literary theories? Why not use African literary theory to unlock the aesthetics of African literature? After all, our imaginations draw from our creolized cultures, and our cultures have and have had their own approaches to aesthetics. Literary analytical tools can be found in the cultures that produce African literature, but only if we first dig deep into African languages.

[1] Ngugi, J.T. "A Kenyan at the Conference." Transition, No. 5 (Jul. 30 - Aug. 29, 1962), p. 7

[2] Thiong'o, Ngugi Wa. Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. London: J. Currey, 1986.

[3] Wali, Obiajunwa. "A Reply to Critics from Obi Wali." Transition, No. 50 (Oct., 1975 - Mar., 1976), pp. 46-47.

[4] See Albert Gerard's African Language Literature who writes "What can be called the Golden age of Ge'ez literature began in 1270, when Yekuno Alma (1270 - 1285) mounted the throne and founded a new dynasty which over the next 250 years, managed to overcome the Muslim emirates and to strengthen Amhara supremacy...The reign of Amada Tyseyon (1314 - 1344) saw the emergence of original writing, both religious and secular (8).

[5] Dlamini, S. Nombuso, et al. "What does a decolonizing/decentralizing methodology in examining sexual lives entail?" African Journal of Reproductive Health 16.2 (2012): 55-70.

[6] Davies, Carole Boyce. "What Does Ngugi's Decolonisng the Mind Mean to You as a Writer and/or Scholar?" Facebook, Facebook, 6 Aug. 2017, 12:23, www.facebook.com/mukomawangugi.

[7] Ngugi, Mukoma Wa. "Recipe: How to Become an Immigrant and an Exile." Tin House, Tin House, 31 Jan. 2017, tinhouse.com/recipe-how-to-become-an-immigrant-and-an-exile/.

[8] Jalada. "Submissions." Jalada. N.p., 15 Apr. 2015. Web. 01 Feb. 2016.

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Mukoma Wa Ngugi: What Decolonizing the Mind Means Today

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"I wanted to meet Chinua Achebe, the young Nigerian novelist whose two novels, Things Fall Apart and No Longer at Ease, seem to herald the birth of a new society in which writers, freed from the burden of political protests and jibes at a disintegrating colonialism, can cast an unsentimental

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Reading Resource lists
Reading in preparation for Decolonising workshops at DMU A more extensive reading list on attainment gap, race in HE and Decolonising DMU Reading list for staff involved in DMU's Read to Debate series
Black Lives Matter - A collection of books, journal articles and magazine content that amplifies Black voices and the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter movement

Other Useful Organisations - Find links to other organsations you may find useful.

Frequently Asked Questions

Some answers to questions about the work of the project.

Examples of Good Practice

As part of our project work, the team have been working with colleagues across the institution to collate examples of good practice that align with the principles of Decolonising DMU. Through sharing these examples, we hope to support colleagues in understanding how decolonisation might translate into their every day practice.
Examples from colleagues
What does 'Decolonising' mean to staff?

One of the questions the Decolonising DMU team is frequently asked is 'what is meant by decolonising?' As well as providing resources in the toolkit for people to refer to, we also asked members of staff from across the institution what decolonising means to them and why they support Decolonising DMU.
Examples of staff narratives.
How to decolonise the Reading list.

https://dmureplay.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=ae8b2a7f-efb0-4ec9-bacc-ac94009f57d3

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Reading in preparation for Decolonising workshops at DMU A more extensive reading list on attainment gap, race in HE and Decolonising DMU Reading list for staff involved in DMU's Read to Debate series Black Lives Matter - A collection of books, journal articles and magazine content that amplifies Black voices and the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter movement Other Useful Organisations - Find links to other organsations you may find useful.

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Sir Ronald Ross had just returned from an expedition to Sierra Leone. The British doctor had been leading efforts to tackle the malaria that so often killed English colonists in the country, and in December 1899 he gave a lecture to the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce about his experience. In the words of a contemporary report, he argued that "in the coming century, the success of imperialism will depend largely upon success with the microscope".

Ross, who won the Nobel Prize for Medicine for his malaria research, would later deny he was talking specifically about his own work. But his point neatly summarised how the efforts of British scientists were intertwined with their country's attempt to conquer a quarter of the world.

Ross was very much a child of empire, born in India and later working there as a surgeon in the imperial army. So when he used a microscope to identify how a dreaded tropical disease was transmitted, he would have realised that his discovery promised to safeguard the health of British troops and officials in the tropics. In turn, this would enable Britain to expand and consolidate its colonial rule.

Ross's words also suggest how science was used to argue imperialism was morally justified because it reflected British goodwill towards colonised people. It implied that scientific insights could be redeployed to promote superior health, hygiene and sanitation among colonial subjects. Empire was seen as a benevolent, selfless project. As Ross's fellow Nobel laureate Rudyard Kipling described it, it was the "white man's burden" to introduce modernity and civilised governance in the colonies.

But science at this time was more than just a practical or ideological tool when it came to empire. Since its birth around the same time as Europeans began conquering other parts of the world, modern Western science was inextricably entangled with colonialism, especially British imperialism. And the legacy of that colonialism still pervades science today.
Listen to the audio version of this in depth article here:
As a result, recent years have seen an increasing number of calls to " decolonise science ", even going so far as to advocate scrapping the practice and findings of modern science altogether. Tackling the lingering influence of colonialism in science is much needed. But there are also dangers that the more extreme attempts to do so could play into the hands of religious fundamentalists and ultra-nationalists. We must find a way to remove the inequalities promoted by modern science while making sure its huge potential benefits work for everyone, instead of letting it become a tool for oppression.

The gracious gift of science

When a slave in an early 18th-century Jamaican plantation was found with a supposedly poisonous plant, his European overlords showed him no mercy. Suspected of conspiring to cause disorder on the plantation, he was treated with typical harshness and hanged to death. The historical records don't even mention his name. His execution might also have been forgotten forever if it weren't for the scientific enquiry that followed. Europeans on the plantation became curious about the plant and, building on the slave's "accidental finding", they eventually concluded it wasn't poisonous at all.

Instead it became known as a cure for worms, warts, ringworm, freckles and cold swellings, with the name Apocynum erectum. As the historian Pratik Chakrabarti argues in a recent book, this incident serves as a neat example of how, under European political and commercial domination, gathering knowledge about nature could take place simultaneously with exploitation.

For imperialists and their modern apologists, science and medicine were among the gracious gifts from the European empires to the colonial world. What's more, the 19th-century imperial ideologues saw the scientific successes of the West as a way to allege that non-Europeans were intellectually inferior and so deserved and needed to be colonised.

In the incredibly influential 1835 memo " Minute on Indian Education ", British politician Thomas Macaulay denounced Indian languages partially because they lacked scientific words. He suggested that languages such as Sanskrit and Arabic were "barren of useful knowledge", "fruitful of monstrous superstitions" and contained "false history, false astronomy, false medicine".

Such opinions weren't confined to colonial officials and imperial ideologues and were often shared by various representatives of the scientific profession. The prominent Victorian scientist Sir Francis Galton argued that the "the average intellectual standard of the negro race is some two grades below our own (the Anglo Saxon)". Even Charles Darwin implied that "savage races" such as "the negro or the Australian" were closer to gorillas than were white Caucasians.

Yet 19th-century British science was itself built upon a global repertoire of wisdom, information, and living and material specimens collected from various corners of the colonial world. Extracting raw materials from colonial mines and plantations went hand in hand with extracting scientific information and specimens from colonised people.

Imperial collections

Leading public scientific institutions in imperial Britain, such as the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and the British Museum, as well as ethnographic displays of "exotic" humans, relied on a global network of colonial collectors and go-betweens. By 1857, the East India Company's London zoological museum boasted insect specimens from across the colonial world, including from Ceylon, India, Java and Nepal.

The British and Natural History museums were founded using the personal collection of doctor and naturalist Sir Hans Sloane. To gather these thousands of specimens, Sloane had worked intimately with the East India, South Sea and Royal African companies, which did a great deal to help establish the British Empire.

The scientists who used this evidence were rarely sedentary geniuses working in laboratories insulated from imperial politics and economics. The likes of Charles Darwin on the Beagle and botanist Sir Joseph Banks on the Endeavour literally rode on the voyages of British exploration and conquest that enabled imperialism.

Other scientific careers were directly driven by imperial achievements and needs. Early anthropological work in British India, such as Sir Herbert Hope Risley's Tribes and Castes of Bengal, published in 1891, drew upon massive administrative classifications of the colonised population.

Map-making operations including the work of the Great Trigonometrical Survey in South Asia came from the need to cross colonial landscapes for trade and military campaigns. The geological surveys commissioned around the world by Sir Roderick Murchison were linked with intelligence gathering on minerals and local politics.

Efforts to curb epidemic diseases such as plague, smallpox and cholera led to attempts to discipline the routines, diets and movements of colonial subjects. This opened up a political process that the historian David Arnold has termed the " colonisation of the body ". By controlling people as well as countries, the authorities turned medicine into a weapon with which to secure imperial rule.

New technologies were also put to use expanding and consolidating the empire. Photographs were used for creating physical and racial stereotypes of different groups of colonised people. Steamboats were crucial in the colonial exploration of Africa in the mid-19th century. Aircraft enabled the British to surveil and then bomb rebellions in 20th-century Iraq. The innovation of wireless radio in the 1890s was shaped by Britain's need for discreet, long-distance communication during the South African war.

In these ways and more, Europe's leaps in science and technology during this period both drove and were driven by its political and economic domination of the rest of the world. Modern science was effectively built on a system that exploited millions of people. At the same time it helped justify and sustain that exploitation, in ways that hugely influenced how Europeans saw other races and countries. What's more, colonial legacies continue to shape trends in science today.

Modern colonial science

Since the formal end of colonialism, we have become better at recognising how scientific expertise has come from many different countries and ethnicities. Yet former imperial nations still appear almost self-evidently superior to most of the once-colonised countries when it comes to scientific study. The empires may have virtually disappeared, but the cultural biases and disadvantages they imposed have not.

You just have to look at the statistics on the way research is carried out globally to see how the scientific hierarchy created by colonialism continues. The annual rankings of universities are published mostly by the Western world and tend to favour its own institutions. Academic journals across the different branches of science are mostly dominated by the US and western Europe.

It is unlikely that anyone who wishes to be taken seriously today would explain this data in terms of innate intellectual superiority determined by race. The blatant scientific racism of the 19th century has now given way to the notion that excellence in science and technology are a euphemism for significant funding, infrastructure and economic development.

Because of this, most of Asia, Africa and the Caribbean is seen either as playing catch-up with the developed world or as dependent on its scientific expertise and financial aid. Some academics have identified these trends as evidence of the persisting "intellectual domination of the West" and labelled them a form of " neo-colonialism ".

Various well-meaning efforts to bridge this gap have struggled to go beyond the legacies of colonialism. For example, scientific collaboration between countries can be a fruitful way of sharing skills and knowledge, and learning from the intellectual insights of one another. But when an economically weaker part of the world collaborates almost exclusively with very strong scientific partners, it can take the form of dependence, if not subordination.

A 2009 study showed that about 80% of Central Africa's research papers were produced with collaborators based outside the region. With the exception of Rwanda, each of the African countries principally collaborated with its former coloniser. As a result, these dominant collaborators shaped scientific work in the region. They prioritised research on immediate local health-related issues, particularly infectious and tropical diseases, rather than encouraging local scientists to also pursue the fuller range of topics pursued in the West.

In the case of Cameroon, local scientists' most common role was in collecting data and fieldwork while foreign collaborators shouldered a significant amount of the analytical science. This echoed a 2003 study of international collaborations in at least 48 developing countries that suggested local scientists too often carried out "fieldwork in their own country for the foreign researchers".

In the same study, 60% to 70% of the scientists based in developed countries did not acknowledge their collaborators in poorer countries as co-authors in their papers. This is despite the fact they later claimed in the survey that the papers were the result of close collaborations.

Mistrust and resistance

International health charities, which are dominated by Western countries, have faced similar issues. After the formal end of colonial rule, global health workers long appeared to represent a superior scientific culture in an alien environment. Unsurprisingly, interactions between these skilled and dedicated foreign personnel and the local population have often been characterised by mistrust.

For example, during the smallpox eradication campaigns of the 1970s and the polio campaign of past two decades, the World Health Organization's representatives found it quite challenging to mobilise willing participants and volunteers in the interiors of South Asia. On occasions they even saw resistance on religious grounds from local people. But their stringent responses, which included the close surveillance of villages, cash incentives for identifying concealed cases and house-to-house searches, added to this climate of mutual suspicion. These experiences of mistrust are reminiscent of those created by strict colonial policies of plague control.

Western pharmaceutical firms also play a role by carrying out questionable clinical trials in the developing world where, as journalist Sonia Shah puts it, " ethical oversight is minimal and desperate patients abound ". This raises moral questions about whether multinational corporations misuse the economic weaknesses of once-colonised countries in the interests of scientific and medical research.

The colonial image of science as a domain of the white man even continues to shape contemporary scientific practice in developed countries. People from ethnic minorities are underrepresented in science and engineering jobs and more likely to face discrimination and other barriers to career progress.

To finally leave behind the baggage of colonialism, scientific collaborations need to become more symmetrical and founded on greater degrees of mutual respect. We need to decolonise science by recognising the true achievements and potential of scientists from outside the Western world. Yet while this structural change is necessary, the path to decolonisation has dangers of its own.

Science must fall?

In October 2016, a YouTube video of students discussing the decolonisation of science went surprisingly viral. The clip, which has been watched more than 1m times, shows a student from the University of Cape Town arguing that science as a whole should be scrapped and started again in a way that accommodates non-Western perspectives and experiences. The student's point that science cannot explain so-called black magic earned the argument much derision and mockery. But you only have to look at the racist and ignorant comments left beneath the video to see why the topic is so in need of discussion.

Inspired by the recent " Rhodes Must Fall" campaign against the university legacy of the imperialist Cecil Rhodes, the Cape Town students became associated with the phrase " science must fall". While it may be interestingly provocative, this slogan isn't helpful at a time when government policies in a range of countries including the US, UK and India are already threatening to impose major limits on science research funding.

More alarmingly, the phrase also runs the risk of being used by religious fundamentalists and cynical politicians in their arguments against established scientific theories such as climate change. This is a time when the integrity of experts is under fire and science is the target of political manouevring. So polemically rejecting the subject altogether only plays into the hands of those who have no interest in decolonisation.

Alongside its imperial history, science has also inspired many people in the former colonial world to demonstrate remarkable courage, critical thinking and dissent in the face of established beliefs and conservative traditions. These include the iconic Indian anti-caste activist Rohith Vemula and the murdered atheist authors Narendra Dabholkar and Avijit Roy. Demanding that "science must fall" fails to do justice to this legacy.

The call to decolonise science, as in the case of other disciplines such as literature, can encourage us to rethink the dominant image that scientific knowledge is the work of white men. But this much-needed critique of the scientific canon carries the other danger of inspiring alternative national narratives in post-colonial countries.

For example, some Indian nationalists, including the country's current prime minister, Narendra Modi, have emphasised the scientific glories of an ancient Hindu civilisation. They argue that plastic surgery, genetic science, aeroplanes and stem cell technology were in vogue in India thousands of years ago. These claims are not just a problem because they are factually inaccurate. Misusing science to stoke a sense of nationalist pride can easily feed into jingoism.

Meanwhile, various forms of modern science and their potential benefits have been rejected as unpatriotic. In 2016, a senior Indian government official even went so far as to claim that "doctors prescribing non-Ayurvedic medicines are anti-national".

The path to decolonisation

Attempts to decolonise science need to contest jingoistic claims of cultural superiority, whether they come from European imperial ideologues or the current representatives of post-colonial governments. This is where new trends in the history of science can be helpful.

For example, instead of the parochial understanding of science as the work of lone geniuses, we could insist on a more cosmopolitan model. This would recognise how different networks of people have often worked together in scientific projects and the cultural exchanges that helped them - even if those exchanges were unequal and exploitative.

But if scientists and historians are serious about "decolonising science" in this way, they need to do much more to present the culturally diverse and global origins of science to a wider, non-specialist audience. For example, we need to make sure this decolonised story of the development of science makes its way into schools.

Students should also be taught how empires affected the development of science and how scientific knowledge was reinforced, used and sometimes resisted by colonised people. We should encourage budding scientists to question whether science has done enough to dispel modern prejudices based on concepts of race, gender, class and nationality.

Decolonising science will also involve encouraging Western institutions that hold imperial scientific collections to reflect more on the violent political contexts of war and colonisation in which these items were acquired. An obvious step forward would be to discuss repatriating scientific specimens to former colonies, as botanists working on plants originally from Angola but held primarily in Europe have done. If repatriation isn't possible, then co-ownership or priority access for academics from post-colonial countries should at least be considered.

This is also an opportunity for the broader scientific community to critically reflect on its own profession. Doing so will inspire scientists to think more about the political contexts that have kept their work going and about how changing them could benefit the scientific profession around the world. It should spark conversations between the sciences and other disciplines about their shared colonial past and how to address the issues it creates.

Unravelling the legacies of colonial science will take time. But the field needs strengthening at a time when some of the most influential countries in the world have adopted a lukewarm attitude towards scientific values and findings. Decolonisation promises to make science more appealing by integrating its findings more firmly with questions of justice, ethics and democracy. Perhaps, in the coming century, success with the microscope will depend on success in tackling the lingering effects of imperialism.

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Decolonise science - time to end another imperial era

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Sir Ronald Ross had just returned from an expedition to Sierra Leone. The British doctor had been leading efforts to tackle the malaria that so often killed English colonists in the country, and in December 1899 he gave a lecture to the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce about his experience.