Curating content: tackling difficult topics in the age of activism, 18 Oct (online)

Wednesday 18 October 2023, 13:00 - 14:20 (online)

As teachers in Higher Education, we are often assumed to be experts in our field. But when the social and political contexts of that field profoundly shift it can leave us feeling uncertain and uncomfortable.  

Decolonization of disciplines has swept across institutions in what is an intensified cultural moment of political action and redress based upon decades of Indigenous peoples’ and civil-rights activism. Our own education and experiences may leave us feeling ill equipped to address the wide-ranging implications of these movements, even as we strive for more ethical and equitable pedagogies.  

In this session, Alice Stevenson talks through her experience of teaching Museum Studies, the curriculum for which has had to radically change over the last six years to reflect a rapidly changing sector.  

This online event will feature a short response from Helen Knowler, associate professor (education) at the UCL Arena Centre for Research based Education, before we open up the event to questions from the audience.

Event background

The event is organised by UCL’s Eugenics Legacy Education Project (ELEP), a programme of education activity to help address UCL's harmful historical links to eugenics. 
 
ELEP is theoretically anchored within the field of difficult knowledge studies. Britzman (1998) developed the concept of ‘difficult knowledge’ to investigate the ways that experiences of education and learning can be problematic, uncomfortable, and even harmful when encountering complex curriculum areas. ELEP supports educational projects that encourage engagement with core issues in social justice-oriented approaches to education, such as difficult knowledge.