# data[].attributes.headline
Idea! (Sorry didn't know where to put it)

# data[].attributes.subject
Idea! (Sorry didn't know where to put it)

# data[].attributes.body
Could we have a monthly decolonisiation newsletter that staff/students can sign up to as a way of keeping these conversations going long-term? I imagine only the most enguaged people would sign-up, but I actually think that could be valuable for creating a community of people who really want to drive change on this topic.

# data[].attributes.headline
So, why is decolonisation important to YOU?

# data[].attributes.subject
So, why is decolonisation important to YOU?

# data[].attributes.body
Use the space below to put your own answers if you want, anonymously or not.

# data[].attributes.headline
Dr Sarah Morton (Director of Postgraduate Programmes Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.subject
Dr Sarah Morton (Director of Postgraduate Programmes Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.body
For me, decolonisation is fundamentally about equality. If we believe in and want real equality, then we need to understand how imperialism and colonialism have shaped the modern world and recognise the continued impacts that constructed ideas of race have on communities and individuals. Within universities, we also need to question how knowledge is constructed within our disciplines and reflect on our own positionality as researchers because decolonisation means going beyond content and working to bring about wholesale change of discriminatory systems. For some, this process of questioning and dismantling to rebuild will be threatening. For others, the sheer scale of challenge will seem overwhelming, but the way forward is with small steps and identifying the practical things we can do as individuals and institutions. I therefore think we should understand decolonisation not as an act, but a process and as part of this, be open and listen, rather than just react to other voices and views. This sounds simple, but in practice takes continual work and self-reflection to achieve. So, for me as white woman, it is important that I do this work and, as I heard it described in a recent repatriation workshop, learn when to raise my voice in support but also when to centre other voices, pass the mic and take a step back.

# data[].attributes.headline
Jillian Sutherland (current PhD Researcher at Bath Spa and Artisa Curatorial Fellow at the the Holburne Museum) 

# data[].attributes.subject
Jillian Sutherland (current PhD Researcher at Bath Spa and Artisa Curatorial Fellow at the the Holburne Museum) 

# data[].attributes.body
Decolonising for me is a process of recovery: it means recovering multiple histories and recovering a sense of self and identity that has been lost. Decolonising also means engaging with and telling the whole truth. Without understanding the impact and consequences of colonialism, we cannot understand ourselves or each other, now. Furthermore, considering decolonisation is important because you can't change something unless you know about it.

# data[].attributes.headline
Florence Edwards (current undergraduate in English Literature at Bath Spa)

# data[].attributes.subject
Florence Edwards (current undergraduate in English Literature at Bath Spa)

# data[].attributes.body
Decolonisation is important to me because the more I learn, the more I realise how much I still do not know! I am writing my English Literature dissertation on classical tradition in the work of Toni Morrison and Rita Dove. Before I started researching, I naively thought there was no way of combining my interest in Ancient Greek mythology with decolonisation. Yet it was not long until I became conscious of a major black classical tradition in which authors of colour rewrite myths and challenge the racism at the heart of classical studies. How could I, someone who has professed a love of Ancient Greek mythology ever since I devoured the Heroes of Olympus children’s book series at the age of ten, have gone so long without ever encountering the work of these authors of colour? This process has shown me that racism permeates every area of the curriculum. As a result, if decolonisation is to begin reversing the impact of a history of racism, it must be equally far-reaching, rather than confined only to certain courses or modules. Universities have so much cultural authority and are ideally placed to begin the process of filling in our glaring knowledge gaps.

# data[].attributes.headline
Dr Cassandra Newland (Senior Lecturer in Heritage & Public History at Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.subject
Dr Cassandra Newland (Senior Lecturer in Heritage & Public History at Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.body
So many reasons! It's first, quite plainly, a human rights issue. We need to work to remove prejudices and biases from our world because it's the right thing to do as a human. Selfishly, it's the best way to make the society I want to live it. To create the universities I want to work in and encourage the students and colleagues I want to work with. From an academic standpoint it's an insane question. Decolonisation is important to us all, whether we're aware of it or not. What kind of rubbishy scholarship values only one small tranche of western, white research? How could that research environment ever lead to nuanced arguments, or new knowledge? Why as a researcher (and indeed a human) would you deliberately cut yourself off from that multitude of interesting international perspectives and voices? How could you ever hope to write anything of worth? Decolonisation is important to me because it is the future, the only way to better ourselves as humans and as scholars. The only way to build the just, open and resilient world I want to be part of.

# data[].attributes.headline
Dr Richard White (artist/ researcher, and Senior Lecturer at Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.subject
Dr Richard White (artist/ researcher, and Senior Lecturer at Bath Spa University)

# data[].attributes.body
By accident of birth I can go from home to work, visit places, walk freely without challenge or sly looks. On the whole the assumptions people make about me are reasonably positive and I see lots of people like me in positions of influence and authority. From Christs in church, to portraits of the wealthy, to the actors playing the good guys on stage and screen, I see people with the same skin tone as me, and mostly they are men like me too. I have grown up in, and to a great extent, I am still surrounded by aspirational models of white men, like me. I reject that white inheritance.

Looking back as a white man I notice the absences.The absences of Black people in the stories I grew up with, of the Romans in Britain, of Tudor England, of the Second World War...there was a regiment of Black US soldiers preparing for D-Day in the village I grew up in, and not a word was told of it. Coming to Bath I had to dig to find the stories of Black Romans and Black Georgians, I stumbled on the stories of Haile Selassie and Sancho and Bridgetower and of course the vast wealth that flowed into the city generated by theft, mass murder and the cruel exploitation of colonised people. There is a shameful silence and absence in the story of Bath part of an officially induced amnesia around whole chunks of the history of this country and this nation of England. It denies people racialised as Black far, far, more than me, but  the consequence is that I too am incomplete and disconnected from my becoming.

The more I notice the absences and silences in the stories and ways I have come to know the world, the more I reflect on what an anglocentric white supremacist education has deprived me of... and what through the atrocities of colonialism people like me have deprived other peoples of. It is not simply the looting of stuff from colonised nations it is the deliberate destruction and denigration of nonmodern, non European knowledges, the epistemic violence. People and their ways of being were stolen or trashed by colonisers, languages silenced, cultures suppressed in favour of a white elite European tradition. This silencing, these absences, the denial of theft and the refusal of responsibility embodied in the Master House all diminish my sense of who I can be and how we will be.

Decolonisation is a beginning of an essential unpacking and repair, opening up the possibility of healing the epistemic wounds of colonisation, discovering and perhaps making the tools to dismantle the Masters House.

# data[].attributes.body
This porton of the padlet is dedicated to the answers given to us by our speakers and collaboarators, all telling us why decolonisation is important them.
Feel free to add your own answers, anonymously or not.

# data[].attributes.body
5th May, 4pm
More information here

# data[].attributes.body
4th May, 4pm
More information here

# data[].attributes.body
This padlet is an overview of the campaign, as well as what decolonisation means to staff and students at Bath Spa. Hopefully it will encourage you to ask yourself the same question and share your answer. This way we can have an inspiring wall that will higlight that even though everyone has different definitions of decolonisation and different motivations to decolonise the world around us, we all see that it is vital to take action and enable this process to continue.

# data[].attributes.body
Check out our website for the article about the campaign with more information and details about it!
Decolonise The Curriculum Campaign

# data[].attributes.body
1. To educate students and staff at Bath Spa, and provide them with understanding of what decolonisation is and why it is important.

2. To introduce students and staff to decolnisation at Bath Spa and around Bath.

3. To build foundations for the process of decolonisation to continue, build projects, and start conversations about inequalites and how they stem from Britan's colonial past.

4. To teach and inspire people on how to make change within their own courses or everyday lives.

# data[].attributes.body
6th May, 5pm
More information here