In Society
The Society is delighted to be a partner of the Creative approaches to race and (in)security in the Caribbean and the UK (CARICUK) research project, which aims to transform discussions about race and anti-racism in UK higher education institutions. Led by Dr Pat Noxolo, the AHRC-funded equality, diversity and inclusion engagement project brings together artists and educators to provoke, participate and transform discussions, redefining race as an (in)security and encouraging education institutions to actively participate in anti-racist learning and transformation.
CARICUK has three elements. The first, the provocation, involved three collaborations with artists to encourage public conversations about how race can be understood as an (in)security. The second draws students and teachers into the discussion, and involves developing a range of online learning resources which encourage young people to produce their own artworks about Caribbean and racialised (in)securities. Finally, short films will record young Black people engaging with the Society’s building and archival materials, in order to think about what tangible institutional changes can be made in the short and long term.
Pat said: ‘I want to think creatively about insecurity in the world, about race as one of those insecurities, and I want to think about the Caribbean and the UK. The other thing I want to do with this project is to make the issue of race in education more easily, openly and explicitly talked about and discussed. I think there’s quite a lot of anxiety around race, we know that there are things to be addressed, but for the UK there’s such a long imperial history, people find it quite hard to talk about, particularly in contexts that have been very heavily affected by colonialism, such as geography.’
As part of the provocation element of the project, an original artwork by visual artist Sonia E. Barrett was installed at the Society’s building in South Kensington earlier this year. Titled Dreading the Map, the sculpture drew on surplus maps of the Caribbean and East Africa, some from the Society’s Collections, and used Black hair techniques to remake and reclaim what the maps represent. Sonia and a group of Black women co-creators shredded, plaited and weaved the maps together to create the installation.
Sonia said of the artwork: ‘I thought it would be really exciting to make this work in the Map Room at the Society, where so many map makers have departed from and critically returned to recount their versions of what they saw.’
Pat added: ‘Sonia’s work raised a number of really important geographical issues, around place and the making of place, around connection and how we interrelate with each other, and around mapping. How do we understand the map and what is its job in the current times? Sonia’s work cut right to the centre of what we want the project to do.’
Director of the Society, Professor Joe Smith, said: ‘We are really excited to be a partner to CARICUK, which has the potential to catalyse critical discussions and change at the Society. We are in the early stages of a significant project to redesign our building in a way that enables greater public engagement with the past, present and future of geography, and the Society, through enhanced interpretation of the building and its contents. CARICUK will help to directly shape this work, with long lasting legacies.’
To find out more about the project, the three arts collaborations and view recordings of their associated discussion events, visit the CARICUK website. www.caricuk.co.uk