Theatre forces staff to read up on racism
THEATRE staff will be made to read about “white privilege” in a mandatory book club set up to educate them on racism.
Staff at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester will have to attend the club, created in response to Black Lives Matter protests, as the converted cotton exchange reckons with its historical links to slavery.
The club will meet monthly to discuss tracts on racism including White Privilege by Robin De Angelo, which argues that “white people raised in Western society are conditioned into a white supremacist world view”.
The aim of the club is for staff to “educate themselves and one another on the barriers faced by marginalised communities to accessing theatre and the arts”, according to a statement from the theatre.
It has been set up alongside other initiatives, including anti-racism training, as part of a project by the charitable organisation to “kill the disease of racism”.
Other titles on the reading list include Reni Eddolodge’s Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race, Akala’s Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire and Nikesh Shukla’s The Good Immigrant.
Artistic directors Bryony Shanahan and Roy Alexander Weise, the first black person to hold the position at the Royal Exchange, said they wanted their new initiatives to be a “quiet and powerful part of the revolution that is happening in the world”.
The book club will also seek to educate staff on ageism and ableism in its choice of reading material.
The theatre has launched a raft of initiatives under the banner of “Disrvpt” to improve inclusivity and tackle perceptions of the complex once used prominently in the cotton trade.
Aside from the connection to slave labour in the production of the crop, theatre bosses have said the building could be seen as a “symbol of elitism, imperialism, disenfranchisement”.
An online statement on issues raised added: “It’s too posh for some, feels like a museum, makes you feel like you’ve got to submit to the way that the tall pillars remind you of the power that sits out of your reach; the arrogance of the gold adornment, almost mocking you as you enter.”