Blackness in Britain Conference
The Black Special Relationship’: African American scholarship and its impact on Black intellectual life in Britain’
30-31st October Birmingham City University
The Blackness in Britain conference series is concerned with the past and future histories and narratives of Black populations in the UK and the wider African diaspora. In our second interdisciplinary conference we invite scholars, intellectuals and activists to examine how Black British intellectual life has been influenced by African American scholarship. Despite the absence of Black Studies programmes in British Universities, Black communities in the UK have a long history of community activism that has been deeply engaged with the scholarship of Black America. From as early as the Pan-African Congress 1945 to current day community and online activism, Black individuals and communities in Britain have created dynamic intellectual spaces outside of the academy to engage in debates and to organise political activity around the ideas of Black Feminism, Black Nationalism, Black theology, Black Psychology, Afrocentricity, Pan- Africanism and Garveyism in order to resist and strategize against, imperialism, colonialism and racialised forms of oppression.
The conference invites a broad range of papers on Black experienecs in Britain, with no limit on topics of the presentations.
Topics can include but are not limited to:
| Conceptualising Black Studies in Britain
Black feminist activism and scholarship Pan-Africanism in Britain Gender politics The legacy of ‘New Ethnicities’ Racisms Neoliberalism, colonialism, imperialism |
Black Nationalism
Faith, theology, religion and blackness Black philosophies Black space, black geographies Blackness and education studies Blackness and health studies Blackness, socialism and social class Black activism online African centred thought Decolonial politics |
Programme At a Glance
| Thursday 29th October | |
| 19.00 – 22.00 | Black Doctoral Network Event
Film Showing: Agents of Change |
| Friday 30th October | |
| 9 – 10 | Registration |
| 10 – 11 | Welcome
Keynote Professor Gus John |
| 11.10 – 12.40 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 12.40 – 13.50 | Lunch |
| 13.30 – 15.00 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 15.10 – 16.40 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 16.40 – 17.10 | Tea and Coffee |
| 17.10 – 18.00 | Keynote
Dr Barnor Hesse |
| 19.00 | Conference Dinner |
| Saturday 31st October | |
| 10 – 10.30 | Registration |
| 10.30 – 11.20 | Welcome
Keynote Professor Denise Ferriera De Silva |
| 11.30 – 13.00 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 13.00 – 13.50 | Lunch |
| 13.50 – 15.20 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 15.30 – 17.00 | Parrallel Sessions |
| 17.00 – 17.30 | Tea and Coffee |
| 17.30 – 18.30 | Keynote
Professor Patricia Hill Collins Closing |