As part of the Student Union’s Black History Month events, Dr Foluke Adebisi gave a workshop entitled ‘Panafricanism, Afrofuturism and Decolonisation,’ which explored how to question and critically analyse the structures currently in place around us, and how such structures affect those who have been historically oppressed.
In an interview with Cameron Scheijde, co-Editor-in-Chief of Epigram, Foluke reflected on the influence of Black History Month: “There is a long tradition of leaving certain things out of the history books, and I think it’s important because it gives us the avenue to have these conversations that we don’t usually have.”
“A lot of what we do in University is about ideology and schools of thought. If you think about the racial and social formations of the world, and the theories that underpin them, the way in which the world is formed leaves certain theories out of it. […] If the University is a public good, where the point is to improve the world and make the world a better place, we cannot do that where certain histories, ways of knowing or epistemologies are left out.”
Foluke discussed the challenges of decolonising curriculums and the role students can play in working towards this. In the 2018/2019 academic year, Dr Yvette Russell and Foluke will be teaching a new unit called Law and Race:
“What those kind of units do is they shine a light on the structure and they help us to think about ways in which we can make the world not as unequal as it is. If the role of a University is to improve the world, then we need to question the structures that have made the world unequal.”
When asked about how white students can be good allies to the BME community, Foluke’s advice was to read widely and listen: “the problem is you shouldn’t ask people who are constantly having a certain lived experience of discrimination to be the teacher. There’s lots of good books out there."
"In the talk I defined allyship in the negative - I said 'if you advocate for something less than what you would expect for yourself then that is not allyship.' We have to keep reflecting on what we are doing, be critical of the structures that we have come to rely on. I think the first step is to read as much as possible, but also to learn and change.”
Read the full interview on the Epigram website.
To find out more about the new Law and Race unit read Foluke’s Law School blog post: ‘Why we are teaching Law and Race at the University of Bristol’