CSLBS News and Events

See below for details of upcoming and past events.

Upcoming: The Annual CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia Speaker Series 2025:
"Crop Over"
Distinguished guest speaker Sonia Boyce, artist and academic.
19 March 2025. Queen's House, Royal Museums Greenwich.
Bookings are open here.

The Annual CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia Speaker Series 2024:
“Caribbean Journeys and Colonial Legacies: A Reading of Ocean Stirrings”
Distinguished writer Merle Collins.
14 October 2024. IAS Common Ground (Room G11), UCL.

View this event on our YouTube channel:
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On the Humanity and Inhumanity of Data
Professor Alex Gil, Yale University.

16 October 2024. IAS Common Ground, UCL.

View this event on our YouTube channel:

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A CSLBS and UCL Sarah Parker Remond Centre collaborative event:
"Black Family History: Genealogy, Storytelling and Ethics in the Wake of Slavery"
A conversation between filmmaker Keme Nzerem and genealogist Bernice Bennett, moderated by historian Dr James Dawkins.
28 May 2024. Bentham House, UCL Laws.

View this event on our YouTube channel:

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The Annual CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia Speaker Series 2023:
“Of Uncertain Rank: The West India Regiments in British Imperial Culture”
Professor David Lambert, University of Warwick.
25 May 2023. Torrington Lecture Theatre, Torrington 1-19, UCL.

View this event on our YouTube channel:

YouTube Widget Placeholderhttps://youtu.be/5bQNHZOLiyc?si=j8XyoJ9nD2CPyt76

"Gendering Racial Capitalism: British Women Investors in Transatlantic Slavery."
Dr Lila O'Leary Chambers, University of Cambridge.
3 May 2023. IAS Common Ground, UCL.

"Brookes (Revisited)."
Professor Elgin Cleckley, University of Virginia.
18 April 2023. National Maritime Museum, GT Lecture Theatre.

"Talking Black History Walks: A Conversation with Tony Warner."
Tony Warner (Black History Walks) and Professor Matthew J. Smith (CSLBS).
9 March 2023. Black Cultural Archives, Learning Centre.

"Interleaving Records and Policies to Illuminate the Enslaved Community at Papine, Jamaica, 1817-1832."
Dr Suzanne Francis-Brown, University of the West Indies Museum.
30 November 2022. On Zoom.

View this event on our YouTube channel:

YouTube Widget Placeholderhttps://youtu.be/BWmohFXTdow?si=siQD9gRXrnfMoZA7

"Speaking the Unspeakable; Or Providing the Evidence Without Being Censored."
Dr Lissa Paul, Brock University.
10 October 2022. IAS Common Ground, UCL.

The Annual CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia Speaker Series 2022:
"The Measure of their Sadness: Slavery and Private Life in the Early Black Atlantic."
Professor Jennifer Morgan, New York University.
Darwin Lecture Theatre, UCL.

Inaugural Lecture:
"A Troubled Freedom: Power and Memories of Slavery."
Professor Matthew J. Smith, UCL CSLBS.
4 March 2022, UCL.

The Annual CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia Speaker Series at UCL

The Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery has held its annual Elsa V. Goveia speaker series since 2022.

Elsa V. Goveia (1925-1980) read History at UCL from 1945-1948. She was one of the first West Indian students to study in the department, and in 1947 she became the first West Indian to win the Pollard Prize for English History. After completing her PhD at the University of London in 1952, she became the first woman appointed as a professor at the newly created University College of the West Indies (UCWI). She was also the first Caribbean-born professor of West Indian Studies in the UCWI History Department, where she remained for three decades. At UCWI, she was responsible for a pioneering course on Caribbean History and her foundational research in the understanding of ‘slave societies.’

Our inaugural CSLBS Elsa V. Goveia speaker was Professor Jennifer L. Morgan of NYU, whose lecture 'The Measure of their Sadness: Slavery and Private Life in the Early Black Atlantic' is now available to view in full on the CSLBS YouTube channel. In 2023, our speaker was Professor David Lambert of the University of Warwick, whose lecture ‘Of Uncertain Rank: The West India Regiments in British Imperial Culture’ is also now live on our channel. In 2024, our speaker was distinguished writer Merle Collins, whose talk 'Caribbean Journeys and Colonial Legacies' is now live on our channel, too.

The 2025 event will be held on 19 March at the Queen's House, Royal Museums Greenwich. Our distinguished guest speaker is artist and academic Professor Dame Sonia Boyce. For further details and the booking link, please click here.