Friends call for more black history lessons
'We’ve been learning about British black history, white privilege and how to be anti racist.’
A Scottish Friend involved in one of the four South-East Scotland Area Meeting study groups set up to explore racism has said that there should be more taught about British black history on the UK school curriculum.
‘It’s complicated to actually implement a change,’ said Rici Marshall Cross from South Edinburgh Meeting, where the study groups were originally set up. ‘We heard about a project [the Black Curriculum] that is preparing lesson plans to make it easier for teachers to bring it into their lessons. This is the sort of positive action we’d love to support.’
Overall, she said, it was ‘shocking’ how little detail she knew about British roots in slavery and the British civil rights movements. ‘The idea [for the study groups] started as a book group around Reni Eddo-lodge’s book Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race (inspired by the book groups being run by Woodbrooke) and has widened to us sharing suggestions for a range of things to read/watch/listen to. In my study group at least, we’ve been learning about British black history, white privilege and how to be anti racist.’
Writing in the Edinburgh Friends’ newsletter, Rici Marshall Cross said she has learnt more from podcasts and programmes such as David Olusoga’s Black and British: A forgotten history and Britain’s forgotten slave owners.
Other resources recommended include: the BBC podcast What does a black history curriculum look like? and the Radio 3 essay: Thinking Black.
‘Talking with one another about white privilege helps to open our eyes to the many ways we navigate our lives without the burden of being judged by the colour of our skin,’ she writes.
‘Stories and accounts by people of colour lead us to ask ourselves what we can do. Perhaps it is in the small but challenging conversations with friends and family that we can help others to see systemic racism around us. We hope to arrange a learning session for all Friends in the Area Meeting about what to do if we witness a racist incident, from very obvious hate crimes to smaller everyday racism and microaggressions.’
The study groups are one of the ways Quakers are exploring their historical entanglement with slavery and commitment to diversity.
This month BYM sent out a press release stating ‘Quakers were totally immersed in the slave trade. Not just as abolitionists. They were ship owners, captains, merchants and investors, in ports such as London and Bristol. This hard truth faced Quakers’ representative body this week.’
The announcement followed Meeting for Sufferings on 5 December in which, instead of the usual Quaker silence, music was played including Bob Marley’s ‘Redemption Song’, and work from a young black rapper, Dave.
Edwina Peart, diversity and inclusion officer, said: ‘Quakers who played a leading role in abolition are now behind the curve. This is a moment of crisis in which the fault lines of inequality are laid bare.’
