How should we deal with statues of racists and what should we do in our public space instead?

Last summer, we saw a statue of Bristol slave trader, Edward Colston, thrown in the harbour by Black Lives Matters protesters. Other statues of racist, colonial or controversial figures have also been taken down or been the sites of protests and University and other buildings have been renamed. A conversation has started to take place about how we reckon with the past, how we deal with the inheritance of public art and statues that we have, and how we make use of our public spaces and art for commemoration and historical understanding in light of what we need in the present.

Speakers:

David Lammy MP
David Lammy is the Labour Member of Parliament for Tottenham, England, where he was born and raised. After being elected for the seventh time in December 2019, he was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Justice. As part of this role, Lammy built on his landmark review of the criminal justice system, which explored the treatment of and outcomes for Black and minority ethnic people in British courts and prisons. The review included 35 wide-ranging policy recommendations for the government and criminal justice sectors. David previously served under the Blair and Brown Labour governments from 2002-2010 as Culture Minister and Higher Education Minister and was appointed to the Privy Council in 2008.

Lammy's parents arrived in the UK from Guyana as part of the over half a million people who moved from the Caribbean to Britain in the 1970s, known as the Windrush generation. He is renowned for his role in securing justice for those victims of the Windrush Scandal as well as victims of London's Grenfell Tower Fire, winning both GQ’s and the Political Studies Association’s Politician of the Year in 2018. He is also known for spearheading the fight against Brexit, pushing for more equal access to university and demanding the decolonization of education curriculums and international aid. Lammy explores these issues and more in Tribes, his book on both the benign and malign effects of our very human need to belong.

Subhadra Das (UCL Collections)
Subhadra Das is a writer, historian, broadcaster, comedian and museum curator at UCL Culture where she works with the UCL Pathology and Science Collections. She regularly talks to diverse audiences in classes, seminars, lectures, public talks and stand-up comedy about all aspects of her work from collections management to working with human remains. Her main area of research is the history of science and medicine in the 19th and 20th Centuries, specifically the history of eugenics and scientific racism. She uses museum objects to tell decolonial stories in engaging and affirming ways. 

Professor Tim Cole (University of Bristol and #WeAreBristol History Commission)
Tim Cole is Professor of Social History at the University of Bristol and also Director of the Brigstow Institute that fosters interdisciplinary and co-produced research. His research interests are focused on Holocaust history, geography and memory, environmental and social history and digital humanities. He is the chair of the Bristol History Commission. 

Chair: Dr Cathy Elliott

Further information

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