Race
I am noticing how silent I am as Critical Race Theory is discussed. Not wanting to dominate, or take oxygen from others. Not feeling like my voice is valid in this discussion. But then I reflect – what immense privilege that is. My whiteness means I don’t need to explain. My whiteness makes my silence my choice (Eddo-Lodge, 2017).
As I think about my words for this blog. I stumble. How to stitch these words together. Prevent these blogs from feeling tokenistic. So I look to Audre Lourde, Victoria Adukwei and Rosa-Johan Uddoh. For whom poetry and prose are inclusive, political, powerful and dangerous. Maybe I can find my way within their poetry – I think to myself.
“Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought”
– Audre Lorde, Poetry is Not a Luxury
As I sit editing another Enhancement Plan with another recommendation about keeping students engaged in Language Support. I think about Adukwei’s poem Consolidate. I think about our students finding the hairs of the colonisers entwined within my words.
When I think about enforcing English onto our students when we all know what the English did. I think about Victoria Adukwei’s work on MOTHER TONGUES. I think about the intersection of neurodiversity here too (can dyslexia be language creation) along with race and class (how accents affect success).
When I think about the anti-bias training I did when I started at UAL. I think about the taste it left in my mouth. Unconscious bias, as it was framed. As if we didn’t mean all the things we did. Explaining away institutional racism. To cover up. To forgive. To continue the erasure of egregious and continual institutional racism (Tate, 2018).
Which version did you get? The coloniser or the colonised? (Sadiq, 2023).
In the pursuit of better ideas, I listen again to Audre:
“When we view living, in the european mode, only as a problem to be solved, we then rely solely upon our ideas to make us free, for these were what the white fathers told us were precious. But as we become more in touch with our own ancient, black, non-european view of living as a situation to be experienced and interacted with, we learn more and more to cherish our feelings, and to respect those hidden sources of our power from where true knowledge and therefore lasting action comes”.
– Audre Lorde, Poetry in Not a Luxury
To cherish. To respect the hidden. To dream.
Dreaming as a form of knowledge production (Adukwei Bulley, 2022).
We will wake up holding something new.
When I think about the attendance emails UAL send to our international students on student visas. The language of oppression and control. I question how far we have really come. The hairs of the colonisers on every word they are made to read.
I think about our policies, our regimes of truth. And our ‘policy silences’ (Garrett, 2024).
What is missing? Who?
The omitted people, and their omitted needs.
Whose truth are we part of?
Who gains? Or, lets reframe – How do white people gain? (Bradbury, 2020).
Who are we protecting?
Who is safe?
And why are all my teachers white, baby? (Uddoh, 2023)
Or shall we avoid the discussion and have another cup of tea. After all, there is no evidence of institutional racism here (Orr, 2022). Enough with this “plague of placards”.
Excellence over woke ideology please.
But wait.
A plague?
Whose excellence?
Nestled within these epistemologies of ignorance (Mills, 1997).
Let’s take a breath here.
….
And let’s SING.
“Mother of God, let me wear spaghetti straps to school freely and learn about Black history forever and ever. Amen” – Rosa-Johan Uddoh, Practice Makes Perfect
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Image Credits
- https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/audre-lorde : image by Robert Alexander/Getty Images
- Image from ‘Consolidate’, from Quiet by Victoria Adukwei Bulley
- Image from Liberation Agriculture on instagram
- Image of page from Practice Makes Perfect by Rosa-Johan Uddoh
Sources of knowledges and inspiration for this post
Eddo-Lodge, R. (2014). Why I’m no longer talking to white people about race. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Tate, S. A., & Page, D. (2018). Whiteliness and institutional racism: hiding behind (un)conscious bias. Ethics and Education, 13(1), 141–155. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2018.1428718
Uddoh, R. J. (2022) Practice Makes Perfect. Book Works and Focal Point Gallery.
Bulley, V.A. (2022). Quiet. Faber & Faber.
Mills, Charles W. 1997. The Racial Contract. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Bradbury, A., 2020. A critical race theory framework for education policy analysis: The case of bilingual learners and assessment policy in England. Race Ethnicity and Education, 23(2), pp.241-260.
Garrett, R. (2024). Racism shapes careers: career trajectories and imagined futures of racialised minority PhDs in UK higher education. Globalisation, Societies and Education, pp.1–15.
Sadiq, A. (2023) Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. Learning how to get it right. TEDx [Online}. Youtube. 2 March. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR4wz1b54hw
Made by Dyslexia. https://www.madebydyslexia.org/kids/
Watt, D. Article by University of York, Can your accent be a barrier to your employment prospects https://www.york.ac.uk/research/impact/employment-prospects/
I really enjoyed reading your blog post on faith.
I think the way you began the post recalling your experience working with students and visiting faith spaces in the Chiapas region of Mexico very engaging, especially your observation of a ‘healthy mischievous nature’ of these spaces which underpinned your thoughts and observations of both our reading list, workshop and your observation of UAL’s spaces and how inclusive they’re for multi-faith practice.
The edition of your own students view on the subject matter is great too. Really insightful !
Thanks Nick. I was happy to bring a bit of mischief into the blog as I have been thinking about cheek / humour / joy / mischief as methods within the context of a very challenging and heavy world. I was also happy to bring my students work / experiences into this as it felt like their voice was important here. This particular student is very talented communicator, and it was so clear to me after pulling this together where the value and the talent and knowledges lie in our course communities.
I was however uneasey about the risk of extraction, and asking this student to share their story for my gain. They were willing to contribute but I know that as a Course Leader students might feel obliged. But I have sent them the link to this and promised to return the favour.
anyway – thank you. x
Hi Ella,
I found this blogpost really interesting, especially your reflections on your own learning and engagement with critical race theory and how this interacts with institutional policies. At a university level, you seem to be asking what is tokenised rather than used to lead on systemic change.
You mention emails sent to international students, and this made me think about the exhibition There is No Alternative by Navine G. Khan-Dossos, and specifically this event https://theshowroom.org/events/approaches-to-prevent which discussed criticisms of the Prevent policy. This might also be of interest in thinking about the hostile environment created for racialised and migrant communities at UAL.
I wasn’t able to comment directly on your blog post about religion for some reason, but I wanted to say that I found your writinh there really interesting too, as well as the feedback you received from your student. I was wondering if you had room to add a little context about your collaboration in Mexico – which students were you working with, how did that come about?
Thanks again for sharing these reflections and insights.
Thanks Beth – Navine’s work looks amazing. This would be so reassuring for our students to know they are in an institutional culture where they were loved, and where these types of critical and creative spaces existed to protect them. I just did the Prevent training and it was shocking. I can think of a lot of other things we need to Prevent here.
Thank you for reading this blog and for your reassurances. As always I am in conflict with my wordcount. But I am starting to realise how to be less descriptive and more reflective… hopefully learning anyway.
And yes, I can add some context on Mexico. I was teaching there for 2.5 years 2016 – 2018 with Product Design and Architure students, and we were setting up a Social Innovation Lab in the Design School. Trying to connect communities and students together a bit better to share learning. It was exciting. Challenging. Wonderful. I miss it.