Ella Whelan at Spiked Online points out the problems with Russell T Davies’ calls for ‘authenticity ‘ in casting and defends artistic freedom: Outrage is the most lucrative form of cultural capital today. People tweeting their disgust at the fact that they didn’t like a production, or didn’t feel represented by it, is no longer […]
Prejudice Under The Microscope: The Implicit Association Test (Part II)
The latest report from the team at Minding the Campus from part of the White Fragility Symposium, provides a forensic account of the flaws in concepts central to the ‘white fragility’ assertion: Supporters of the ‘unconscious racism’ thesis essentially argue that negative associations held by whites about non-whites, as revealed by the race IAT: (a) […]
Universities Should Exercise Healthy Scepticism Towards The Universities UK Report
Below two DDU supporters argue why many universities are wrong to uncritically embrace the Universities UK Report, ‘Tackling Racial Harassment in Higher Education’. A personal response from Howard Sherwood, graphic designer and DDU supporter Following the publication of the Universities UK (UUK) report, many predicted that it would be adopted by higher education establishments as […]
Writer Zadie Smith Reflects On Pandemic, Black Lives Matter Movement in ‘Intimations’
Robin Young, at wbur, interviews the ever thoughtful and thought-provoking author, Zadie Smith. Smith, London-born, now lives in New York. Remembering her brother’s birthday garden party in England, and the mix of people socialising with ease, she writes: …that garden represented structures that have been put in place that allow people to live near each […]
DDU Newsletter
From self-censorship in France to a beautiful humanistic film about the resilience of people in post-earthquake Haiti by Ildi Tillmann, Carrie from the team at Don’t Divide Us offers a selection of news and culture items in this week’s newsletter. Read it, and watch it, here: From self-censorship in France to a beautiful humanistic film […]
From Eastern Europe To Michael Brown: Blind Spots In Our Current Conversations About Race
Ildi Tillmann, at The Equiano Project, brings a fresh perspective on the question of historical erasure and asks what is lost when race becomes ‘a means to power’: In his recent documentary, What Killed Michael Brown, the author and narrator, Shelby Steele, makes various observations about American history, of which two particularly caught my attention. “We […]
Between Native And Foreign Lands: Learning To Live On The Boundary
Dr Alain J.E. Wolf, lecturer at the University of East Anglia, offers a personal reflection on the loss and belonging that can accompany the experience of emigration and suggests that there are responsibilities on both sides – immigrant and host nation: As a lecturer in languages and cross-cultural communication at a U.K University, and a […]
Why Debate And Discussion Has Shifted Towards Identity Politics
Emma Gilland at The Equiano Project considers the difference between a strong sense of self-identity and the political and ethical shallowness of identity-as-a-label. She suggests identity politics speaks to a vacuum created through a combination of two important trends: the demise of class-based voting, and the inability of the established political class to fill this […]
The University and the Social Justice Movement: A French Perspective
Michel Tavernier at Areo wonders why French universities, home of intellectuals closely associated with postmodernism, seem immune from the excesses of postmodernism’s political expression that beleaguers universities in the Anglophone world: Tuition fees, which are the product of freewheeling neoliberal economics, have spiralled out of control in the Anglophone world in general and in the […]
A Public Inquiry Without the Public? (Part II)
Montmorency Sharp provides a sharp-eyed commentary on the second and final session of the Oriel Commission’s Inquiry with regards to the fate of the Rhodes statue and plaque. Our fears that our cultural gatekeepers have a very ‘thin’ idea of the public are, sadly, confirmed: This was another session where questions were invited from the […]