BlackInk Issue Four

ISSUE 4 OCTOBER 2023

EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES AND PHOTO OPPORTUNITIES: THE POLITICS OF REPRESENTATION IN THE AGE OF DIVERSITY Gary Younge

THE INTERVIEW Gina Yashere

COLONISATION IN REVERSE: FROM MARGIN TO CENTRE Carolyn Cooper

A DEEP DIVE INTO BLACK BRITISH CULTURE FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MUSICIAN AND BLACK WOMAN VV Brown

LAUNCHPAD Tina Ramos Ekongo Lauryn Pinard

BlackInk Issue 4, October 2023 Published by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage Serendipity 21 Bowling Green Street Leicester LE1 6AS

CL00.14 Clephan Building De Montfort University The Gateway Leicester LE1 9BH

+44(0)116 482 1394 info@serendipity-uk.com www.blackink-uk.com www.serendipity-uk.com Copyright © Serendipity Artists Movement Ltd 2023 Company registration number in England and Wales 07248813 Charity registration number in England and Wales 1160035 Editor-in-Chief — Pawlet Brookes Contributors — June Aming, Pawlet Brookes, Maya Brookes, VV Brown, Alison Buchanan, Carolyn Cooper, Alexandria Davis, Annabelle Gilmore, Martin Glynn, Alix Harris, Caroline Johnson, Ivy N Jones, Kaitlene Koranteng, Mel Larsen, Audrey Leboutte, Georgina Payne, Lauryn Pinard, Tina Ramos Ekongo, Alison Ray, Shere Ross, Cayla Mae Simpson, Javier Torres, Michelle-Kim Vacciana, Annette Walker, Herdle White, Gina Yashere, Gary Younge Cover Wrap Image — Mel Larsen Back Cover Quote — Fanon, F. (1961) The Wretched of the Earth Researchers — Lauren Eaton, Amy Grain, Georgina Payne, Ashly Stanly, Heather Saunders Design — The Unloved Special Thanks — Paul Brookes, Brett Vincent ISSN: 2634-4270 All rights reserved. Whilst every effort has been made to provide accurate information, Serendipity cannot accept responsibility for any inaccuracies contained within this publication. The views expressed in BlackInk are not necessarily those of the contributors, editors or publishers. No part of this publication may be reproduced except for purposes of research without permission from the contributors and publishers.

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Contents 6

Editor’s Welcome — Pawlet Brookes

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Insight: Visual Art

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Launchpad

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Forgotten Histories

72

Arts and Culture

98

Voices of Resistance

132

Place and Space

152

BlackInk New Writing Competition

164

Spotlight – Windrush: A Scandal from the Start - Pawlet Brookes

170

2023 in Numbers

172

Coming Soon

178

2024 Calendar Highlights

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The Interview – Gina Yashere

Diaspora Aesthetics: Black British Storytelling through Photographic Slides — Kaitlene Koranteng The Moving Image, The Moving Body — Cayla Mae Simpson A Year (or Three) in the Diary of a Quiet Artist — Mel Larsen Welancora Gallery — Ivy N Jones Shades of Black Women — Tina Ramos Ekongo M ap repoze m (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

Buddy Bradley: Unsung Hero of the British Musical Stage — Annette Walker Representation, Relocation and Revelation — Caroline Johnson The Mystery of an Ordinary Man in Eighteenth Century Warwickshire — Annabelle Gilmore Unknown Soldier — Alison Ray A Life on Radio — Herdle White Black Dance Uncovered — Audrey Leboutte A Dancer in Every Home — Javier Torres Unpacking Opera — Alison Buchanan Beyond Face — Alix Harris The Silent Beat: A Haptics Conversation — Pawlet Brookes and Georgina Payne

Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge Colonisation in Reverse: From Margin to Centre — Carolyn Cooper Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? — Alexandria Davis A Deep Dive into Black British Culture from the Perspective of a Musician and Black Woman — VV Brown Reflections of a Cultural Gardener — Martin Glynn Representation and Contrast — Michelle-Kim Vacciana Dance, Embodied Knowledge and the Reclaiming of Spaces — Farida Nabibaks Colourism in Reggaeton — Maya Brookes The Summer After — Shere Ross TILT — June Aming

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EDITOR’ WELCOM Welcome to the fourth edition of BlackInk, published by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage. 2023 is a significant year for the UK. It marks the seventy-fifth anniversary of the arrival of the HMT Empire Windrush and consequently has shaped this edition through the theme Representation, Relocation and Revelation. Contributors provide an analysis of the political landscape alongside personal journeys. In a media landscape that alternates between sensationalising or ignoring the Black-lived experience in the UK, what does it mean to be Black British in 2023?

In this issue there is an insight into visual arts, coupled with a dialogue with Black women who are shaping the sector as archivists, film makers and artists. Visual arts have long served as a means to communicate and connect. In the UK there is a significant history of Black-led arts movements highlighting issues of race, gender and representation, which were founded in the 1980s, including the Black Art Group, East Midlands African Caribbean Arts and Autograph (Association of Black Photographers).

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We are delighted to share the work of Mel Larsen as the cover of Issue 4, as our first UK-based cover artist. Based in London, Larsen is a self-identified “quiet artist” whose artistic practice is a source of joy and refuge alongside her main occupation as a marketing consultant and business coach.

Larsen’s work reminds us of the multifaceted identities that we hold, personally and professionally.

All the Launchpad artists shine a spotlight on the visual arts. This year’s cohort manifests the experiences of Black women with commissions which reflect on the exploration of recognition and resourcefulness but also what it means to rest. Our focus on Black women will continue into our planned programme for 2024: 100 Black Women Who Have Made a Mark.

BlackInk New Writing competition returns with the two winners receiving significant praise from our panel of judges. The short stories are particularly evocative with their use of language, conjuring a written environment that in turn takes us from the life of a young girl in the heart of Trinidad to a young woman in South East London.

Editor’s Welcome — Pawlet Brookes

’S ME Articles across BlackInk Issue 4 unpack key issues and forgotten histories from across the African, African Caribbean and Latinx Diaspora, from a consideration of how colourism has shaped the music industry in Latin America, through to hostilities faced

by Black children in the education system, and whether reclaiming derogatory terms is harmful or helpful.

It was an honour to interview Gina Yashere for this edition as she looks back on her career as a comedian, her ambition to open the gates for other Black artists and the importance of finding joy in your work.

How To Scan A QR Code 1.

Open the camera app from your device (smart phone or tablet); this can be found on the home screen, control centre, or lock screen.

2.

Hold your device (smart phone or tablet) so that the QR code appears in the camera app’s viewfinder. Your device should recognise the QR code and show a notification.

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Tap the notification to open the link associated with the QR code.

Alternatively enter the website address directly into the search bar of your browser.

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Enjoy BlackInk’s digital content.

BlackInk is a forum for conversation, a space for critical analysis and an opportunity to document our lived experience. I hope that you enjoy reading this issue and will continue to join us throughout the forthcoming year, through our publications, in person and online platforms.

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INSIGHT VISUAL ART 8

Insight: Visual Art

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Over fifty per cent of the human brain is involved in visual processing, making visual arts one of the most powerful tools for communication. As a proponent of reception theory, Stuart Hall highlighted the interplay between artist and audience, and Black artists have played a significant role in leading the way for political change through their art. This section reflects on different roles within the visual arts as artist, archivist and activist, highlighting the significance of art as a vessel for collective consciousness.

Diaspora Aesthetics: Black British Storytelling through Photographic Slides — Kaitlene Koranteng The Moving Image, The Moving Body — Cayla Mae Simpson A Year (or Three) in the Diary of a Quiet Artist — Mel Larsen Welancora Gallery — Ivy N Jones

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THE GREAT REVEAL: THE VALUE OF BLACK CREATIVITY OBSOLESCENCE CAN BE DEFINED AS BEING OUT OF DATE OR NO LONGER IN USE. ARCHIVES ARE FULL OF OUT-OF-USE OBJECTS, MEMORIES OF MOMENTS THAT NO LONGER LIVE IN FRONT ROOMS, BUT IN OUR LOFTS AND CUPBOARDS COLLECTING DUST – AND SOMETIMES MAYBE THESE OBJECTS MAKE THEIR WAY INTO AN ARCHIVE TO LIVE A SECOND LIFE.

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The Institute of International Visual Arts (iniva) archive contains more than a few of these “obsolete” things. iniva was founded in 1994 as a response to political movements of the late 1970s and early 1980s working with and platforming Black and Asian artists, all the way up to the present day.

The archive is a snapshot of contemporary art history told through records related to programming of exhibitions and exchanges. For me, there are many artists whose work is indicative of this socio-political moment in our history and the need to respond through visual artforms what it means to be Black in Britain.

Slides are significantly symbolic of contemporary art practice as an artistic medium within its own right, but also as a communicator of practice, telling a story through a photographic moment. The term “slide” refers to a 35mm positive transparent image that is mounted on a card or plastic base. Slides feel abundant within iniva’s archive and are most prevalent within our exhibition records and artist files collection, which tells one a story of connection and absence. Some files feel larger than life, filled with exhibition ephemera, press releases, artist statements and slides. Others in contrast feel sparse, only containing a singular postcard or slide.

Insight: Visual Art Diaspora Aesthetics: Black British Storytelling through Photographic Slides — Kaitlene Koranteng

Frank Bowling. Photograph by Eamonn McCabe/Popperfoto via Getty Images.

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A slide within an artist file can act as evidence on several counts. They say an exhibition happened; this artwork existed – sometimes it may be the only evidence that an event took place or act as a clue to find out more about the legacy of a Black artists hidden within British art history. It is through these absences that myself as an archivist seem to become a detective, searching for meaning between items.

The process of archiving is one of questioning and in each stage of investigation, I ask how can we rectify the silences?

Do we speak to them in the descriptions? Or do we create new documentation to fill the gaps?

The painter Uzo Egonu is an example of one artist, whose work depicts the experience of being Black in Britian. The Nigerian-born artist’s work was exhibited in 1995 in an exhibition produced by iniva and Norwich Gallery titled Uzo Egonu: Past and Present Diaspora. Egonu‘s work explores modernism through European and Igbo traditions ultimately symbolic of an African Diasporic experience.

The hundreds of slides in Egonu’s artist file depict forms in transition between painting and sculpture, capturing grief, longing, and the everyday.

The artistic practice of Sonia Boyce is another thread that we can start to follow in the archive, moving from collage to installation to sound and capturing the British African Caribbean experience. In her artist file, we are given an insight into her shifting and developing artistic practice, but also the evolution of ongoing conversation between her works.

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Ultimately, the archive is a resource to enliven – to give a second life to ideas, creativity and the practices of artists captured in the archive, which can become a mechanism for something new. For example, in 2022, iniva’s Stuart Hall Library artist-in-resident Rohan Ayinde focused on the theme of Black abstraction. Heavily influenced by the work of artist Frank Bowling, Ayinde utilised the library and archive material as a catalyst for ongoing dialogue on the theme. In the archive, we can find two slides of Bowling’s work that was presented in the exhibition Fault Lines: Contemporary African Art and Shifting Landscapes, as part of the fiftieth Venice Biennale, for which iniva produced a catalogue in 2003. Bowling’s series Map Paintings rejected the idea of pure abstraction and instead structured his paintings around his own African Caribbean identity and ideas of post coloniality. Similarly, Ayinde explored his own experiences of Blackness, home and place through abstraction in his exhibition Dancing in The Ellipsis // A Cartographer’s Black Hole held at iniva’s Stuart Hall Library in 2022. Ayinde’s residency and exhibition mostly focused on materials from the library, but as the archive continues to become more accessible it is revealed that obsolete things can become sparks for new ideas and inspiration that allow for nurturing artists and artistic research.

Time and technological innovations render certain formats like slides difficult and seemingly impossible to access, but that does not make them less important in telling the story of Diasporic artists. By engaging its archive and celebrating the significance of artist slides, iniva continues to preserve the legacy of culturally diverse artistic practice, fostering creativity and understanding in the present and for forthcoming generations.

Insight: Visual Art Diaspora Aesthetics: Black British Storytelling through Photographic Slides — Kaitlene Koranteng

Time and technological innovations render certain formats like slides difficult and seemingly impossible to access, but that does not make them less important in telling the story of Diasporic artists.

Tower Bridge by Uzo Egonu. © Uzo Egonu estate. Photographer Matthew Hollow. Courtesy of Guildhall Art Gallery / Art UK

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THE MOVING IMAGE, THE MOVING BODY

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Cayla Mae Simpson on shoot with Djoe Tomakloe for Let’s Dance in the City. Photographer Georgina Payne.

Insight: Visual Art The Moving Image, The Moving Body — Cayla Mae Simpson

I PUT MY BAG DOWN IN THE SAND AND CAREFULLY PULL OUT A BORROWED DSLR CAMERA. THE SUN IS JUST BEGINNING TO PEEK OUT FROM UNDER THE ENDLESS BLANKET OF THE ATLANTIC OCEAN, CASTING PURPLE AND PINK LIGHT ACROSS KAYLA FARRISH’S FACE AND COSTUME. FARRISH IS A MOVEMENT ARTIST AND WE ARE MEETING FOR THE FIRST TIME TO CREATE A DANCE FILM TOGETHER. I BEGIN RECORDING, FARRISH DANCES, MOVEMENT EXPLODING FROM HER HEART. I’M STUNNED BY HER POWER, SURRENDER, AND PRESENCE. MOMENTS PASS AND I FEEL TENSE AS I FAIL TO KEEP HER IN THE FRAME. SHE’S RISING AND FALLING BACK INTO THE SAND WITH BRILLIANT PHYSICALITY. THE SONG PLAYING FROM A BLUETOOTH SPEAKER FINISHES AND SHE SETTLES. WITH A HINT OF GUILT, I ASK HER FOR ANOTHER TAKE. FARRISH DANCES AGAIN. AN EQUAL AND TREMENDOUS PERFORMANCE. I STEADY MYSELF AND PULL OUT SO I CAN LISTEN, HOPING TO BE PULLED INTO HER CURRENT.

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A hum of pink is left kissing the clouds and finally, the flow has invited me in. It is a treasure to experience and respond to the story branching out from her body across the ocean. Time slips away as she sculpts the salty air and I move between the memory of the movement before and anticipation for what’s to come. Kneeling by the shore Kayla bends backward, sending her collarbones to the sky and suddenly a flock of radiant white seagulls soar over her, joining us. They have also accepted her invitation. I am reminded that everything dances, even the light.

Something special lives in the space where dance exists.

If I am lucky and present enough to listen, I can film it.

Upon receiving the first edit of the film, Farrish reflected to me that she felt seen. I know from my own experience and from that of my peers, that this feeling can be rare for Black artists. Often, our work is recorded and presented as a fragmented glimpse of its original intention and essence.

Farrish is a generous artist, collaborating with her shifted my relationship with filming dance and made me curious about dance film as a transformative and potentially healing form of representation.

Live dance performance is ephemeral, it only happens once.

Although dance films cannot replicate that energy, they can potentially cast a wider net of viewership. Artists who don’t have the resources, support, or opportunities to present their work live can share dance films through screening platforms and the internet. This makes their work available to those who are unable to attend a live performance.

Another benefit of taking dance off the stage and onto location is the shift in process for creators. The environment is an element that can open new opportunities for collaboration with the space. For instance, a work filmed in a forest may be served by different movements than what would manifest for the stage. When audiences experience dancers performing in spaces that we inhabit daily, like a subway station or bedroom, there is potential for them to imagine their own bodies as moving expressive experiential vessels. Movement is a universal language and in cultures that often undervalue the kinaesthetic experience, seeing dance film in spaces other than the stage is invaluable.

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Movement is also central to both film and dance. Film is the moving image and dance is the moving body. Questions I often ask, how can the camera dance? and what does the dance see? The differences between the forms: new and ancient, concrete and ephemeral, memory and present provide a fertile and sometimes liminal space for new ways of creation and expression to emerge.

On many occasions, creating dance films has challenged my attachment to traditional or familiar processes. Some films have required that the narrative be filmed out of order, breaking the linear movement of time within the choreography. These instances have often shifted the timeline of the narrative and new meaning has emerged.

Other processes have offered environmental challenges.

Maybe the grass is not always ideal for floor work, but there is a conversation communicated in a body unconventionally moving on the bare earth. Adaptation is essential to creating dance films and lends to new ideas, new ways to help facilitate the telling of underrepresented narratives.

New ways spark many questions. How does a character’s position of power influence the choice of camera angle?

What happens when the camera only tracks and focuses on one part of a dancer’s body? What does the space in the frame around the dancers evoke? Does all of this influence the choreography and narrative? Regardless of the tools and approaches, if the essence of the dance is to be communicated, it is imperative to begin with intention.

The shared awareness that movement will be the conduit for communication calls for a different kind of listening from the filmmaker. Connecting with their own kinaesthetic experience can allow filmmakers to understand and respond to the dance. This could open space for a creative chain channelled through the choreographer to the dancer and then to the filmmaker into the camera. As both a dance artist and a filmmaker I am curious about how I can become a receptive and open channel. My experience with Kayla Farrish gave me a clue; it requires presence and the intention to receive. Maybe then there can be space for all that the dance has to give.

Cayla Mae Simpson’s next project Let’s Dance in the City will be available to view as part of Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage’s Digital BlackCentric Week in November 2023.

Insight: Visual Art The Moving Image, The Moving Body — Cayla Mae Simpson

The shared awareness that movement will be the conduit for communication calls for a different kind of listening from the filmmaker. Connecting with their own kinaesthetic experience can allow filmmakers to understand and respond to the dance.

Kayla Farrish in Falling Distance. Still by Cayla Mae Simpson.

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A YEAR (OR THREE) IN THE DIARY OF A QUIET ARTIST AUTUMN

SHE’S BACK – I’M MAKING LITTLE COLLAGES IN BED AT NIGHT. I’M SO INTO IT THAT I DON’T CARE IF I GET GLUE ON THE SHEETS OR ACCIDENTALLY CUT THE DUVET WITH THE SCISSORS. ALL THAT MATTERS IS I AM MAKING AGAIN. I’M BACK INSIDE MY ART-BRAIN AFTER MONTHS OF RESIDING IN THE COACHING AND CONSULTING MIND REQUIRED FOR MY “NORMAL” WORK. THESE MINIATURE COLLAGES WILL EVENTUALLY INFORM MY LARGER PAINTINGS.

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Quiet please – I’m a Quiet Artist, one of the millions who make art “on the side”. Also known as “amateurs”, although I dislike that term and its connotations; I’ve earned two fineart degrees and have made art for as long as I can remember.

Winter Clueless – Trying to get some artwork finished but it’s like pulling teeth. I just don’t have enough headspace after a week of doing my day-job. No energy, no ideas.

Gloom – This “open house” is lovely but the gloomy room I’ve been allocated is wrong for my upbeat work. In the hallway, I watch people walking in and out and overhear someone talk about my work in a dismissive tone, “It’s very 70’s isn’t it?” It hurts. For a moment I feel like a total amateur in the worst sense of the word.

Insight: Visual Art A Year (or Three) in the Diary of a Quiet Artist — Mel Larsen

The Islands (2023) by Mel Larsen.

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Wiggle (2023) by Mel Larsen.

Insight: Visual Art A Year (or Three) in the Diary of a Quiet Artist — Mel Larsen

COVID – I loathe the tedious process of setting up exhibitions: the transporting and hanging of the work, (although I love making, marketing and selling it). Prepping this exhibition has been even harder with post-COVID fatigue. During the busiest time at work I can remember, I need to somehow find time to complete artwork and get it framed. Jean Joseph, the wonderful artist/exhibition organiser, kindly finds a way to describe my work: “Mel Larsen finds inspiration in a multiplicity of forms, textures, materials and patterns that chiefly manifest as ethereal paintings. Her technique of combining ink, biro, paper collage and written text, with drawings and doodles are routes to intentional or accidental outcomes” Exhaustion – In a moment of inspiration, I announce on Instagram that I will do #The100DayProject. I start an exciting piece made out of cardboard and cowrie shells and stop after 10 days. 10% is all I can give right now.

Spring Go bright or go home – I’m dropping off bin bags at the charity shop full of clothes I no longer wish to wear – navy blues, browns and greys. I’m done with the dark. From now on I want bright, bold colours in my life. I want to wear them and I want to create with them. Are bright primary colours childish? I don’t care. I want colours and shapes I love. I want to get lost in my art-world, speak in my art-language.

As I walk down the road my mind flashbacks to my early childhood in Gibraltar immersed in the bluest skies and yellowest sun.

New future – Vision boards meet at the intersection of my coaching work and my artistic creations. I encourage my business clients to make these prophetic collages to focus their minds on trusting their heart and acting on their growth.

Immersion – Loving this amazing weekend in Brighton at “Wild Painting’. Facilitator Moyra Scott has guided us deep into experimentation. I arrived with zero inspiration.

Gradually I find joy in a lush forest of making, where a creative force is unleashed with so much to say, using layers and layers and layers of bright acrylic paint, acrylic pens, collage, biro pen, thread, glue and sparkles.

Simone Alexander, Zarina Bhimji and Himid herself. I’m so grateful they showed the younger me it was possible to claim the right to be Black, female and an artist.

Summer What a year – My creation pace has seemed glacial and yet here is a room at home stacked with vibrant paintings that I feel good about.

Open – Another Open House, this time one in a threestorey building worth millions with beautiful light. It’s totally off the beaten track so I have about four visitors all day, including a cousin I haven’t seen for 15 years. However, a visitor who heard about the exhibition via my post on Facebook, may possibly buy a piece and the exhibition organiser buys a piece on the spot – result!

A buyer – I upload more photos of my paintings on Facebook and a dear school friend contacts me to ask if she can buy a piece. You can have it for free I say, but she insists on paying.

It’s going to a good home.

Another buyer – She visits our home, chats to me about my work and buys a special piece that I spent ages on. I am so happy that she adores it too.

And another – This one sees my work on Instagram, contacts me and buys eight paintings, including a favourite created at the Wild Painting retreat. I am so excited!

Ready - I know a piece is ready when I feel I am in love with it. Before it gets to that stage, I always feel it needs endless fixing, changing, improving.

I am in love with being “a quiet artist” – no change required.

Benefits include: • I make art when and how I feel like it and enjoy it immensely • I feel no pressure to fit into a current trend • I don’t wonder whether my art will make history • I don’t worry whether my art will earn me a living • I care (less and less) whether anyone will like my art (and I love it when they do of course)

Icons – As a friend’s plus-one at a Women of the Year Awards, I notice one of the many iconic women at the table where I’m seated is… O.M.G., Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid! Takes my mind back to my dissertation on Black Women Artists, some 30 years ago for my Fine Art BA. It was hard work then, finding information on pioneers we take for granted now, such as Sonia Boyce, Sutapa Biswas, 21

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Album Page II (Debating with Powell and the Queen) Various Fabrics and Inkjet on Fabric on Stained Wooden Frame. (2023) Cyle Warner.

Insight: Visual Art Welancora Gallery — Ivy N Jones

WELANCORA GALLERY LOCATED IN A NINETEENTH CENTURY TOWNHOUSE IN THE BEDFORD STUYVESANT SECTION OF BROOKLYN, NEW YORK, WELANCORA GALLERY WAS FOUNDED BY IVY N JONES. THE GALLERY NAME IS AN AMALGAM OF THE NAMES OF IVY’S PARENTS AND OLDER BROTHER.

Bedford Stuyvesant has experienced a significant level of gentrification after an approximately 40-year state of disrepair that began with the exodus of Europeans during the 1950s, when the number of African American and Caribbean families moving into the neighborhood started to reached its peak.

The mission of the gallery is to represent artists from around the world by placing their work with collectors and institutions, holding major exhibitions and publishing scholarly catalogues and monographs. Our focus is on work by artists of colour. When the idea for the gallery was first formed, it was important to start our journey in a space that we own. It started out as a purely business decision and quickly evolved into this kind of disruption fuelled by the belief that we would succeed; and, a desire and resolve to try something in a location that really had not been done before. When the pandemic hit and in the wake of the killing of George Floyd, it became more apparent that maintaining a bricks-and-mortar space in Manhattan wasn’t the only driving force in the success of a New York art gallery. While the space that we operate out of is nontraditional by today’s standards, we have managed to carve out a niche away from the Chelsea and Tribeca art districts that works to our benefit financially and keeps us close to the community where many of the artists that we work with live and maintain their studios. We are able to reach a broader audience by participating in art fairs across the country. The fairs provide us with an opportunity to bring our programme to people who might feel more comfortable engaging with us in that setting before they decide to visit us in our space in Brooklyn. To date, we have served as an exhibitor at The Armory Show in New York, Frieze Los Angeles and the Nova Section at Art Basel Miami Beach

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Our most recent exhibition, Weh Dem? De Sparrow Catcher? is a solo presentation of new work by Cyle Warner. Warner’s first exhibition at the gallery brings together a reimagined archive of photographs and textiles to reveal a very personal exploration of his family’s life in the Caribbean.

Sourced from the Warner family archive, the photographs and textiles are layered, recomposed, enlarged and weaved together to create a nuanced understanding of his familial history. By recognising the ability of photography and cloth to capture a moment in time and serve as portals to the past, Warner relies on both to feed his curiosity and develop a current narrative, while also paying homage to his ancestors and their lives in the Caribbean and the United States. The photos, ranging from the mid 1940s to the early to mid 1970s, depict family members when they were permanently residing in the Caribbean. The hazy quality and sepia tones, as well as what’s visible, what’s further highlighted, and what’s left to be desired all lend themselves to the artist’s fractured understanding of a time in the Caribbean that he never experienced first-hand. The textiles consist of burlap from his father’s workplace, as well as fabrics and clothing gifted to Warner by influential women in his life. The works are representative of an archive embedded with experience, memory and touch.

Warner’s artistic practice is centred around his conceptual framework, rooted in West Indian culture, which he refers to as Dis (This); it is an infinite, rhizomatic approach to history that acts as a method for understanding the present through fragmented memories, stories, and myths.

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Cyle Warner was born in New York, NY, USA in 2001. He earned his BFA in Photography and Video from the School of Visual Arts in 2023. Warner completed a residency at the Yale Norfolk School of Art in 2022. He has participated in numerous exhibitions, including: Miami is Not the Caribbean, Yet It Feels Like It, Oolite Arts, Miami, FL (2022); MIGRATING SUN PART 1, Welancora Gallery, Brooklyn, NY (2022); Last Call, Bradley Ertaskiran, Montreal, CA (2022); Like Wildflowers, NYC CUlture Club, New York, New York (2022); If fluid was a song..., online curation by Adama Delphine Fawundu at Project Gallery V (2021); Becoming, School of Visual Arts Galleries, New York, NY (2021); The Meeting Point, Regular Normal x Art Noir, New York, NY (2021), We Still Around: Here, Black Gotham Experience, New York, NY; and The Privilege of Getting Together, Regular Normal, New York, NY. Warner has had two solo exhibitions: you take a longish road. Weh Dem? De Sparrow Catcher? which ran from 27 July to 18 September 2023.

Insight: Visual Art Welancora Gallery — Ivy N Jones

The hazy quality and sepia tones, as well as what’s visible, what’s further highlighted, and what’s left to be desired all lend themselves to the artist’s fractured understanding of a time in the Caribbean that he never experienced first-hand.

Left to Right: I don’t want to go (2023) Archival pigment print with collage on Hahnemühle Photo Rag. Cyle Warner.

A vessel a slow jam (2023) Various fabrics and inkjet on fabric on wooden frame. Cyle Warner.

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LAUNC 26

Launchpad

CHPAD Launchpad returns with two commissions that shine a spotlight on the lived experiences of Black women. Tina Ramos Ekongo challenges perceptions of Black women by reclaiming discarded materials to create portraits that showcase their richness and beauty. Lauryn Pinard, a multifaceted artist, collaborates with Latisha César and Holly Francis to make space for rest as a radical act.

Shades of Black Women – Tina Ramos Ekongo M ap repoze m (I am resting) – Lauryn Pinard

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SHADES OF BLACK WOMEN

TINA RAMOS EKONGO IS AN EQUATORIAL GUINEAN PAINTER AND ILLUSTRATOR WHO LIVES AND WORKS IN THE NORTH WEST OF ENGLAND. SHE GREW UP IN SPAIN BETWEEN MADRID AND ZARAGOZA, SHE STUDIED ART AND CRAFTS AT ESCUELA DE ARTES, FASHION DESIGN AT ESCUELA SUPERIOR DE DISENYO IN VALENCIA AND INTERNATIONAL MARKETING AT SHEFFIELD HALLAM UNIVERSITY.

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Focusing on portraiture, she is influenced by African traditional murals for health campaigns and the artwork found in African barbershops and hair salons. The materials serve as a juxtaposition to the undervaluing of Black women in EuroWestern societies and their real value as pillars of their communities and forces of change. Using cardboard as her principal medium, it gives a new value to a disposable material and highlights the exquisite beauty and resilience of the Black woman in different shades.

Launchpad Shades of Black Women — Tina Ramos Ekongo

Shantella Miller is a British Jamaican freelance visual artist and educator. (2023) Acrylic on cardboard. Tina Ramos Ekongo.

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Elle Mccarthy is a proud Pasifika woman, born in Fiji and raised in Australia. Mccarthy owns a management consultancy in Sydney, specialising in architecture, interior design and construction. (2023) Acrylic on cardboard. Tina Ramos Ekongo.

Launchpad Shades of Black Women — Tina Ramos Ekongo

Tiffanie O’Neill, was born in Newark, New Jersey, USA. Her family is from the American South and the Bahamas and now lives in Manchester, UK. O’Neill is a mother of two daughters, a writer and a life coach. (2023) Acrylic on cardboard. Tina Ramos Ekongo.

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Mayor Dutie was born in South Sudan and grew up in Australia. Dutie is an international fashion model. (2023) Acrylic on cardboard. Tina Ramos Ekongo.

Launchpad Shades of Black Women — Tina Ramos Ekongo

Nicole Ocran has Ghanaian and Filipino heritage. Ocran spent her formative years in the US and now lives in London, working as a fashion blogger, writer and podcaster. (2023) Acrylic on cardboard. Tina Ramos Ekongo.

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M AP REPOZE M (I AM RESTING) M AP REPOZE M (I AM RESTING) IS A SERIES OF PHOTOGRAPHS AND SHORT FILMS EXPLORING THE CONCEPT OF REST AS CREATIVE PRACTICE, ALONGSIDE THE BODY AS AN ARCHIVE FEATURING A CAST OF BLACK WOMEN. DRAWING FROM THE IMAGERY OF HAITIAN LWA EZILI AND THE WORK OF TRICIA HERSEY (THE NAP MINISTRY), THE PROJECT LOCATES BLACK WOMEN IN DECAYING SITES OF COLONIAL POWER, PLACING COMMODIFIED BODIES ALONGSIDE COMMODIFIED NATURAL MATERIALS.

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Caption

Launchpad M ap repoze m (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

At once a meditation, a ritual, an act of love and refusal, M ap repoze m attempts to offer a reclaiming of the space, asserting the omnipresence of Blackness within British sites of heritage. The photographs are accompanied by textual and aural descriptions [via QR code] composed by the movers which act as devices for self-expression, centring their perspective within the space. The dynamic between access and creative tool allows a point of entry within each of the movers’ realms as you move across their own world-building.

The work invites you to pause and contemplate while imagining alternative ways of being beyond colonial constructs. You are invited within their space.

In their own time. At their own pace. On their own terms.

A project by Lauryn Pinard In collaboration with and performed by Latisha César and Holly Francis Words by Latisha César and Holly Francis Photography and videography by Lauryn Pinard Shot at the Senior Common Room, Grove House, University of Roehampton Special thanks to the Dance Department at University of Roehampton, Lalitaraja and Candace Scarborough for their support Commissioned by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage.

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– LANSIRENN A young woman sits on her knees, hands resting on her legs, on a sea of blue and white fabric pooling out onto the floor around her and leaking from the crevasses of the bookcase and walls, Waterfalls Gazing contently out of a large window, basking in the natural light that spills abundantly into the room, highlighting her features.

A regal white, a blue head wrap adorns her head Fashioned into a long braid of alternating blue and white cascading her form, eventually resting by her legs.

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She wears a detailed cream lace dress with a strip of blue travelling over, Multiple small gold earrings shimmer against her deep brown skin, catching the light, her golden necklace and detailed ring follow suit dancing in the sunlight.

The rich turquoise necklace vibrant colour to her attire, matching the bold eye shadow focused on inner corners of her eyes.

Proudly claiming the neglected space Of a former gentlemen’s playroom With a deep colonial history

Launchpad Map repozèm (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

– HOLLY AND LATISHA BRAIDING NATTES ECHO Two women sit by the fireplace One is putting on the finishing touches to her companion’s hair There are echoes of the joy to come once this focused work is done When the love flows like water to fill the space There will be moments that glow and shimmer in the light Honouring reflections examining projections offering protection The Siren and the Mistress transform 37

– LATISHA - CONTEMPLATING WITHOUT PERSPECTIVE The lady lays by the fireplace using the mantel as a foot rest With a book in hand she pauses From the complex work Of bringing life to the dead space Although the forest that surrounds her no longer thirsts for water Her essence flows As her lungs expand and contract The world softens From rigid lines and harsh corners To curves and ripples and swirls She has soothed the fires with her waters for now And takes her rest

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Launchpad Map repozèm (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

– LATISHA - TOUT SOURIRE I sit with my face to the sun A bowl of cool water before Cross winds blow a gentle breeze And I have all the time and space that I need Souri Before Me

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– TRINITÉ The Mistress and The Twins make thrones of where they sit Regal postures with alters laid before them

What are your laws in the war of love What are your books when comes the flood Foaming up as it meanders around the women

Crown of pink and white Crown of coils

Are you prepared to face The you that was, is, and will be Will you host the trinity Can you stand the reckoning Can you endure our intensity

All must come All must bow All must answer

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Launchpad Map repozèm (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

– WAP KON JORGE She sits beneath the painting Questioning Reality out of focus Presence so vivid A living impression Wavering belief A seated rebellion 41

– REPO LOOK A young woman is seated, facing forward, crossed legged, arms resting on her thighs, in front of Erzuli, legs open, seated on her throne of books. A woman clothed in pink and white motifs flowers in bloom, gazes out to the side, reflecting.

Golden hoops beam as they catch the natural light.

Holding a small golden mirror that gleams in the sunlight, matching her jewellery embellishing her hair, ears, neck and fingers.

Pink and white twisted geometries adorn her head in an elaborate head wrap.

Fitted white trousers the distressed cut outs on her knees pop against the softness of her warm brown skin.

She confronts Unapologetically gazing forward, bright blue eyeshadow accenting the contours of her eyes.

A loosely fitted cream gently resting on her torso. She arbours the sea exposed at her neck line, warmth against her deep brown skin.

The gentle current and sea foam decorate the floor Bright blue beads Oceanic scenery

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Launchpad Map repozèm (I am resting) — Lauryn Pinard

– DLO A woman is reclining on a hardwood floor She is wearing a bright blue head wrap And is using her left arm as a headrest The crinkled cotton and lace of her long White skirt Flows like a waterfall From her legs down to the floor Reaching for the bowl and pitcher of water beside her

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FORGO HISTO 44

Forgotten Histories

OTTEN ORIES History has much to teach us about who we are and where we are today. However, more often than not, Black histories have been ignored or forgotten, whether this is the contribution that Black choreographers have made to theatre and film, highlighting Black presence in Britain before 1948, or analysing personal narratives and what they tell us about each other and ourselves.

Buddy Bradley: Unsung Hero of the British Musical Stage — Annette Walker Representation, Relocation and Revelation — Caroline Johnson The Mystery of an Ordinary Man in Eighteenth Century Warwickshire — Annabelle Gilmore Unknown Soldier — Alison Ray A Life on Radio — Herdle White

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BUDDY BRADLEY: UNSUNG HERO OF THE BRITISH MUSICAL STAGE IN 2020, BUDDY BRADLEY’S NAME APPEARED SEVERAL TIMES DURING MY RESEARCH ON TAP DANCE HISTORY IN THE UK AND I WAS INTRIGUED ABOUT HOW THIS AMERICAN BECAME THE FIRST BLACK CHOREOGRAPHER OF BRITISH MUSICAL FILM IN THE 1930S. HOW IS IT THAT HARDLY ANY DANCERS (INCLUDING MYSELF) HAD HEARD OF HIM? THE MORE I LEARNED ABOUT BUDDY, THE MORE WIDESPREAD I FOUND HIS INFLUENCE TO BE AND BY SUMMER 2021, I WAS WRITING A RESEARCH PROJECT PROPOSAL TO RECOVER THE MISSING STORY OF HIS CONTRIBUTION TO BRITISH DANCE PRACTICE.

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Forgotten Histories Buddy Bradley: Unsung Hero of the British Musical Stage — Annette Walker

Buddy Bradley and Jack Buchanan (circa 1930s).

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Brenda Dixon Gottschild, Constance Valis Hill1, Stephen Bourne2 and Sarah Whitfield3 are just some of the historians who highlight that there are hundreds of Black practitioners who have been marginalised and “invisibilised” from history. Reclaiming the work of Buddy Bradley (1905-1972) as dancer, choreographer and dance coach, demonstrates the significance of Black jazz dance and its practitioners in British musical theatre history.

African American choreographer and dance instructor, Buddy Bradley, was one of the leading influences in dance on the musical stage from the mid-1920s through to the early 1970s. He specialised in tap dance and other jazz dances with an Africanist aesthetic4 that were popular in the twentieth century (e.g. the charleston and lindy hop) but also worked widely with ballet and modern dance.

His contemporaries, Frederick Ashton, Agnes de Mille and George Balanchine, learned directly from his work, yet whilst they are remembered and celebrated as key choreographers of their generation, Brandley’s name has faded from memory. Bradley’s work includes over one hundred credits in British theatre, film, radio and television and still he remains invisible.

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Bradley’s success began with coaching white stars at the Billy Pierce Dance Studio that was located off Broadway during the mid-1920s when Black jazz dances, including tap dance, were becoming increasingly popular5. His reputation as a coach grew rapidly and he was regularly hired to restage dances for Broadway shows although racial segregation meant he was often unable to patronise those theatres. It was not until he was working in the UK that his production credits became more easily identifiable.

Bradley’s UK credits began with Charles B Cochran’s 1930 production, Ever Green, that starred Jessie Matthews.

Following its success, Bradley stayed in the UK to work on further musical productions and expanded into film, radio and television. His first film credit was for Evergreen (1934), the retitled adaptation of the stage production.

Although most of his dances would have been for the live stage, footage from surviving film and television productions demonstrate Bradley’s work and can be used to analyse it, especially his approach to “stage dancing”.

However, uncovering Bradley’s work involves navigating references of negative racial tropes and stereotypes. For example, he arranged dances for Revels in Rhythm (1933) and I was stunned to find a behind-the-scenes clip showing a white chorus dancer wearing a blackface head mask that was zipped up before running onto the stage for the finale.

Although minstrelsy was popular at the time, there is little evidence to the use of full head masks.

Forgotten Histories Buddy Bradley: Unsung Hero of the British Musical Stage — Annette Walker

Bradley’s work includes over one hundred credits in British theatre, film, radio and television and still he remains invisible.

Chorus girls practicing tap dancing with choreographer Buddy Bradley. 1 February 1937. Photographer Brook Bassett.

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Although most of his dances would have been for the live stage, footage from surviving film and television productions demonstrate Bradley’s work and can be used to analyse it, especially his approach to “stage dancing”.

In the early 1930s, Bradley opened a dance studio in the heart of London’s theatre district and ran classes until the late 1960s. He became “ known throughout Europe as the number one dance teacher of musical revue stars”6. Bradley’s students included the likes of John Mills, Audrey Hepburn, Bruce Forsyth and David Essex. Many performers, including dancers from the Royal Ballet, were sent to Bradley’s dance school to learn tap dance and modern jazz. Some students also went on to set up their own dance schools and so his dance lineage continues with those whose teachers were taught by him. The American choreographer, Henry LeTang, had his early tap training with Bradley in New York. Diane Hampstead was a tap student of the late Connie Turner in Tonbridge, who studied with Bradley in London and can spot a “second generation” Bradley student by their dancing. She once took a class with Henry and recognised something about his style before they eventually worked out the connection was Bradley.

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Occasionally, references to Bradley appear in articles or obituaries on dancers, actors, models or singers and several can also be found in biographies of his students and collaborators. The full scale of Bradley’s influence is unknown, but it extends internationally across several generations. In April 2023, Maureen Footer, author of the forthcoming biography on Bradley7, invited me to join her for an afternoon talking about him at a restaurant with retired performers, Ralph Tobert and Frank Coda. It had taken two years of intensive international research for Footer to discover Tobert and Coda who are just two of the hundreds, or more likely thousands, of performers who trained at the Buddy Bradley School of Stage Dancing in central London.

Tobert and Coda met in class as young men during the 1950s and have remained the best of friends ever since.

Tobert remembers Bradley as a quiet man with a calm temperament who wore blue suede tap shoes. Bradley hardly spoke during class and did not use counts or the names of steps. He began with a warmup followed by exercises and focused on using rhythmical phrases to teach steps. Both Tobert and Coda remember that Bradley had a series of at least six numbered tap routines.

Each routine was arranged to a different jazz tune and increased in difficulty with the highest level being reserved for selected students.

Forgotten Histories Buddy Bradley: Unsung Hero of the British Musical Stage — Annette Walker

I felt privileged to share an insight of an afternoon talking about Bradley with nonagenarians, Tobert and Coda, and their life in showbiz. The evening was topped off with Tobert and I dancing a “soft shoe” version (in our everyday shoes) of the Shim Sham routine in a restaurant. Tobert then taught me a short phrase he had recently remembered from Bradley’s class. As the evening was winding down, I spotted Tobert and Coda (without his walking stick) dancing side by side and realised they were going over one of Bradley’s routines. I swiftly attempted to capture the moment on my phone as it reminds me of how dance history is essentially ingrained in embodied practice. I wonder how studying Buddy Bradley from interviews, film clips, photographs and articles might also influence my own tap dancing and continue his legacy.

Buddy Bradley in Evergreen (1934). The Stephen Bourne Collection / Mary Evans

Footnotes 1.

Hill, C. V. (1992) ‘Buddy Bradley: The Invisible Man of Broadway brings Jazz Tap to London’ in Proceedings of the Society of Dance History Scholars, Fifteenth Annual Conference, edited

by Christena L Schlundt, 77–84. University of California

2.

Bourne, S. (2021) Deep Are the Roots: Trailblazers Who Changed Black British Theatre.

The History Press

3.

Mayes, S. and Whitfield, S. K. (2021) An Inconvenient Black History of British Musical Theatre: 1900 – 1950. Bloomsbury

4.

Gottschild, B. Dixon (1996) Digging the Africanist Presence in American Performance: Dance and Other Contexts. Greenwood Press

5.

Stearns, M. and Stearns, J. (1994) Jazz Dance: The Story of American Vernacular Dance.

De Capo Press (first published 1968)

6.

‘Buddy Bradley Tours Europe’ in Ebony, November 1954, Volume 10 Issue 1, 135–138. Johnson Publishing Company

7.

Footer, M (2026) Buddy Bradley, Feel the Floor: The Life and Legacy of Jazz Choreographer Buddy Bradley. Beacon Press

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REPRESENTATION, RELOCATION AND REVELATION WHEN I THINK OF THE ARRIVAL OF THE HMT EMPIRE WINDRUSH (ORIGINALLY MV MONTE ROSA) AT TILBURY DOCK 75 YEARS AGO ON 1948’S SUMMER’S SOLSTICE, I THINK OF MY FATHER’S JOURNEY TO THE UNITED STATES. ON A COLD NIGHT IN THE LATE 1970S, HE DESCENDED THROUGH THE AIR ON A PLANE SUSPENDED ABOVE NEW YORK CITY’S STUNNING SKYLINE. SHINING LIGHTS GLIMMERING AGAINST THE YAWNING BLACK MOUTH OF A NIGHT SKY. WHEN HE OPENED HIS EYES THE NEXT DAY, HE FOUND NOT THE CITY’S PROMISING BEAUTY, BUT A WORLD AWASH IN GREY, GRIME, AND COLDNESS. I FIND HIS REVELATION OF WHAT THIS RELOCATION BROUGHT HIM IS A BROADER METAPHOR FOR THE DISILLUSIONMENT CARIBBEAN PEOPLE HAVE FACED ALONG THEIR JOURNEYS OUTSIDE OF THEIR HOME COUNTRIES, ESPECIALLY TO COUNTRIES BY WHICH THEY WERE COLONISED. 52

Forgotten Histories Representation, Relocation and Revelation — Caroline Johnson

American Voyage. (circa 1960s). Photographer Mario Carnicelli. Courtesy of the David Hill Gallery.

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The more beautiful revelation I have come to is that I can never be separated from my Jamaican roots, nor the West African traditions that have survived for centuries across oceans and lifelines

With such a fraught history, I cannot help but marvel at the way my parents invented a beautiful life for my siblings and I. “Resilience” is what I have been told is the reasoning for this. I cannot help but wonder that we as Caribbean people are resilient, not necessarily because we want to be, rather because we are made to be out of survival.

As a fiction writer, I have felt both compelled to invent the representation I want to see through my storytelling and inspired by the ways in which people of Jamaican descent show up and show out in some of my favourite content, including Sheryl Lee Ralph, the original Dreamgirls, Emmy award winning Abbott Elementary actress, and mother; Grace Jones, an eccentric and stunning model, actress and musician; and Charmaine Wilkerson, New York Times bestseller of debut novel Black Cake which unravels a hidden history of a Jamaican family in the US. I find these modes of representation to be awe-inspiring and yet I yearn for a more grounded representation found in the everyday of my life.

In recurring motifs such as the sun-soaked mango-coloured sheets in which I sleep. The snapper from the Chinatown market on Sundays I try to escovitch and can never quite get the way like my father’s on Good Friday. The ocean to which I am called and invent stories from loose memories of shell hunting on white sand in Negril. In my first New York City apartment when insomnia holds my shining eyes wide open and I dash white rum in the corners just so I can rest.

In the people I pass by on the street going or returning from work whose phone conversations I eavesdrop on and find bits of family in strangers, from the content and expression of their stories. I find it in my face, the two-toned lips that were gifted by my father, the slope of my nose gifted by my mother, in the way my face is uneven as though a ceramicist had taken the time to make two halves of the same face separately and moulded them together, never checking for symmetry or texture. On this face, I wear the faces that came before me, and hold both histories revealed, untold and waiting to be discovered.

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I cannot help but wonder what it would have been like if my parents hadn’t relocated, if the lives we lived were free from this colonial past that inhaled the resources of our land or instilled a British education in people, and I mean beyond just school. The sobering revelation of being a daughter of a Diaspora is knowing I will never be untethered from a colonial past and that I am neither at home nor a stranger to my heritage. The sobering revelation is that my matrilineage goes beyond the blood of my mother and all the mothers’ bones and flesh before. It is also the British imposing “motherhood” through colonial legacy in my family and the United States, Britain’s daughter in violence, oppression, exploitation and amnesiac remixing of history.

The more beautiful revelation I have come to is that I can never be separated from my Jamaican roots, nor the West African traditions that have survived for centuries across oceans and lifelines. I maintain my heritage through what I have been taught by those I have loved, those who are still of this earth and those who are not. Whether it be knowing how to feel up a plantain and know it’s good for frying, how to clean my teeth with sugar cane, when to do a washout with cerasee tea, how to maintain community even when a country tries to break you up or how to flourish even when there’s no light, it is my heritage that keeps me propelling forward towards my future. My existence is where representation, relocation and revelation meet at once.

Forgotten Histories Representation, Relocation and Revelation — Caroline Johnson

How to Slice Plantains. Photographer Bob Rehak.

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THE MYSTERY OF AN ORDINARY MAN IN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY WARWICKSHIRE THERE IS NO SPECTACULAR STORY THAT FITS ALONGSIDE THE FEW BLACK PEOPLE FOUND IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY ARCHIVE AT THE WARWICKSHIRE COUNTY RECORD OFFICE. WHILST IT WOULD BE ENCOURAGING TO HEAR THE NARRATIVE OF A BLACK INDIVIDUAL MAKING BOLD MANOEUVRES THAT REQUIRED RECORDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ENGLISH COUNTRYSIDE, THIS IS NOT THE CASE. THERE IS NO MAN OF LETTERS LIKE IGNATIUS SANCHO, CORRESPONDING WITH THE SOCIAL ELITE, NOR AN INTERESTING NARRATIVE LIKE THAT OF OLAUDAH EQUIANO, WHOSE LIFE PRESENTS SUCH A RICH EXPERIENCE OF RELIGION, SAILING, AND POLITICS1. FOR A MOMENT, A NAME ASSOCIATED WITH AN ADMIRAL CONJURES HOPES OF A BLACK MAN SEAFARING FROM THE CARIBBEAN TO WARWICKSHIRE, MIXED IN WITH THE COLONIAL OPERATIONS OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE BEFORE SETTLING IN A VILLAGE OR TOWN IN THE COUNTRYSIDE. HOWEVER, AS WITH SO MANY STORIES, IT IS UNCORROBORATED. 56

Forgotten Histories The Mystery of an Ordinary Man in Eighteenth Century Warwickshire — Annabelle Gilmore

Tomb of Myrilla. Church of St Lawrence. Oxhill, Warwickshire. Photographer Annabelle Gilmore.

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Her gravestone tells of her enslavement to Thomas Beauchamp, who brought her from Nevis in the Caribbean.

Instead, the concrete evidence suggests a much more ordinary life for the people found in the parish records of Warwickshire. Will Archus lived in Oxhill in 1700, he was a Black man baptised as an adult in the church of Saint Lawrence. This is all the written information about him.

He is not married within that parish, nor is he buried in the parish. This is one thing that sets him apart from many of his neighbours, of whom you can trace family connections of marriages and baptisms of children. It leaves a longing for knowing who Will Archus was as a person. Baptised as an adult, it is likely that he was not born in England.

Warwickshire would not have been his first stop, perhaps it was Portsmouth or Bristol, or another port city connecting the British Isles to the rest of the world. How he arrived raises questions of forceful movement through conditions of enslavement. It is possible that this was the case but, similarly, he is not listed as such.

The better known Myrtilla was enslaved. Her grave is in the same church where Will Archus was baptised. Her gravestone tells of her enslavement to Thomas Beauchamp, who brought her from Nevis in the Caribbean. She was baptised the previous October, before her burial 6 January 1705. The parish record suggests that whilst she was enslaved to Thomas Beauchamp, she had been brought over as a servant for Mrs Beauchamp. After Myrtilla’s death, the name Myrtilla is found in a will proved in 1720 from the co-owner of Saddle Hill, one of Thomas Beauchamp’s three estates. It is clear that this is not the same Myrtilla but perhaps the two were connected in some way2 . Myrtilla’s time living in Warwickshire was not long, but as a young girl she travelled across the ocean and experienced a brief time as a servant. It is likely that she was cared for, the expense of a headstone suggests this but, nevertheless, her status as enslaved affects the reading of her story.

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Enhanced view of the Tomb of Myrtilla. Courtesy of Oxhill Village Council.

Forgotten Histories The Mystery of an Ordinary Man in Eighteenth Century Warwickshire — Annabelle Gilmore

On the other hand, the memory of Will Archus can live on without an explicit understanding that he was enslaved. Within such a close proximity to Myrtilla and the Beauchamps, and only a few years to separate them in the records, it is possible to think that, if he was enslaved, it would be noted as such. Instead, like every other person listed in the parish records, maybe he lived an ordinary life of a countryside villager. His unusual surname veils him in more mystery, leaving no hint as to his profession or physical description typically found with surnames like Baker or Little. It also does not link to any other surname in the parish. Perhaps he was a farmer, or cooper, maybe he did work for one of the landed estates as a stable hand.

Footnotes 1.

Ignatius Sancho, Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, An African, (London, 1782) Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, The African, (London, 1789)

2.

Vere Langford Oliver, Caribbean vol.6, (London: Mitchell, Hughes and Clarke, 1919), p.14

3.

Roxanne Wheeler, The Complexions of Race in Eighteenth-Century British Culture, (Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000)

The prejudiced attitudes towards Black skin were not yet so crystallised as they would become in the later eighteenth century3. It is likely that he would be seen as different in comparison to his neighbours in the predominantly white society, but there is a chance that it was not negatively used against him. His baptism suggests an engagement with the community around him, since religion held such a strong place within society at that time.

However, his disappearance from the records suggests an undertone of discontent amidst the parish of Oxhill. Whilst so many of his contemporaries remained within the parish, it is more than likely that he moved on somewhere else.

Perhaps the call of London, where so many other Black people were to be found.

Nevertheless, he was in Warwickshire. He serves to represent another facet of an everyday person. His anonymity as a Black man in early eighteenth-century Warwickshire should be celebrated as evidence that he was living his life as best he could, amongst the idiosyncrasies of Oxhill.

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UNKNOW SOLDIE IN 2019, DECIDING IT WAS NOW OR NEVER, I STEPPED FIRMLY OUT OF MY COMFORT ZONE AND FINALLY BEGAN WORK ON CREATING THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER. HOWEVER, THE JOURNEY TO THE WORK’S CREATION WAS AS ENLIGHTENING AND INSPIRATIONAL AS IT WAS LONG.

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Forgotten Histories Unknown Soldier — Alison Ray

WN ER

Soldiers of a West Indies Regiment. September 1916. Photographer Chronicle/Alamy.

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I used to go and visit the monuments, searching for my family name, with little success.

The Unknown Soldier has been germinating in my thoughts since my childhood. My sister and I were sent to Barbados to live with our grandmother in the 1970s when we were very young. Errol Barrow was in power as the first Prime Minister of Barbados, navigating Barbados to independence, bestowing free education as one of his many policies. My sister and I were captivated with deep respect, passion and adoration for what he had done for us as a people. During our time in Barbados we often heard on the radio of stories that Barrow was an ex-RAF officer and this was significant and was reported with respect and honour. It was upon our return to the UK that we encountered a totally different energy. There were not any Black service men and women shown on television during the remembrance services or indeed talked about with the same reverence. The contribution of people from across the African and African Caribbean Diaspora and India to both the First and Second World Wars was quickly being forgotten and replaced by a whitewashed vision of commonwealth.

Remembrance is so important in the UK. Each November, we watched and followed stories unfold about how much soldiers had given for their country. I used to go and visit the monuments, searching for our family name, with little success. They often spoke about the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey, meant to symbolise the hundreds of thousands’ lost “sons of Empire”.

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As my career as a dancer developed in the 1990s, my energy was divided between a commitment to my heritage, the lost and forgotten heroes, and my passion to dance. Later, I was living in France, working with various choreographers and dancers who shaped my choreographic voice and perspective: Kofi Koko, George Momboye, Kettly Noel. I witnessed Maurice Bejart’s interpretation of Beethoven’s ninth symphony, creating a work that integrated African dance with classical ballet and I worked with Craig Revel Horwood for The Legend of Lion King for Euro Disney. In the UK, I danced with Peter Badejo and Kokuma. From there my career took other paths and then in 2014, I was accepted onto the Masters programme at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance. I needed time to reflect on my practice as a choreographer. Through the programme I regained my confidence in my capability as a dynamic, talented choreographer, whilst furthering my skill set utilising technology as a creative tool that can complement and aid my dance practice. Equally, I would judge myself, as a Black female in her fifties in a space with choreographers half my age. I questioned myself with insecurities on whether my work is valid, but I learnt a great deal on the programme, so it was worth it, and enabled me to affirm the importance of my work and passion.

My initial research commenced in the summer of 2019, through my first encounter with the chairman of the West Indian Association of Service Personnel (WASP), Vince McBean. I was introduced to the organisation, which holds archival records and images of servicemen from the RAF. I heard about the stories of Allan Willmot (Jamaica, Navy and RAF), Ulric Cross (Trinidad, RAF), Walter Tull (UK, Army), William Robinson Clarke (Jamaica, RAF), Errol Barrow (Barbados, RAF), Flight Officer Weekes (Barbados, RAF) and many more. Seeing these photographs corroborated that Black people were an integral part of the war efforts of conflicts throughout the twentieth century. They are a missing link when we celebrate contributions made by those during this challenging chapter of British history.

Forgotten Histories Unknown Soldier — Alison Ray

A West Indian member of the Auxiliary Territorial Service, one of the first cohort of 30 women to travel to the UK to support the war effort. 1943.

Photographer The National Army Museum / Mary Evans Picture Library.

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I have now arrived at a point where I am able to bring together my passion of dance with that of my heritage and reclaim hidden history, showcasing the contribution of Caribbean, African and Black British servicemen and women’s legacy in supporting the UK in difficult times.

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Adelaide Hall performing at a concert at Riverside Studios, Hammersmith. 1981.

Photographer The Stephen Bourne Collection / Mary Evans Picture Library.

Forgotten Histories Unknown Soldier — Alison Ray

I set about how best to recount this untold history. The Unknown Soldier is an interdisciplinary work that uses dance, text, live music, and visuals to weave a narrative of the contributions of the Black service men who fought for Britain during the First and Second World Wars. It uses a poetic narrative, constructed around themes that speak to the heart of loss, belonging, racism, respect and acceptance, tackling issues such as conscription, training, identity and place. As we look back at 75 years of Windrush we need to reflect on our relationship with Britain before 1948, Caribbean people who have cared, supported and contributed, not only shaping cultural relationships in the UK but have strived for empowerment and emancipation at home in the Caribbean.

The holistic combination of music and dance is integral to African Diasporic artistic practice. I collaborated with my daughter Elle-Imani Baglira, a violinist and composer and Theophilous Alade, dancer and later assistant choreographer. We created a sense of ambiguity within the work. For the soldiers who would go off to war unsure if they would return, the violin is used as a dissonance sound. The berimbau creates an opposing sound of the beat defining the heart of the rhythm of the work. We used songs that create themes; There Goes That Song Again is a reference to Adelaide Hall’s work in the UK during the Second World War. This song is used to bring the audience into the era of the 1940s during the war. It demonstrated the life of servicemen and women when they were off duty and how the arts were used to bring hope and joy during an era of war and destruction.

I have now arrived at a point where I am able to bring together my passion of dance with that of my heritage and reclaim hidden history, showcasing the contribution of Caribbean, African and Black British servicemen and women’s legacy in supporting the UK in difficult times.

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A LIFE ON RADIO I ARRIVED IN 1959. I WAS 18 AND I USED TO GO TO THE FIELD WITH MY FATHER EVERY DAY WITH DONKEYS AND YAMS. I USED TO CRY SOMETIMES WHEN I HAD TO LEAVE. MY MUM RAISED A LOT OF COWS AND GOATS, SHE DECIDED TO SELL SOME TO SEND ME TO ENGLAND TO DO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING.

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In August 1959, I came over by BOAC. I flew over, I did not come on one of them ships that take two weeks to get here. I arrive at London Heathrow, I had never seen so many white people. But I could not find the people that were supposed to meet me, some friends of some friends of my parents in Jamaica. I start to panic. Probably start to holla. So, I went to a taxi driver and asked to get to Luton. He said, “you’ve got to go to St. Pancras, then take a train to Luton”. Well I thought, I’ll get lost. I asked the taxi driver if he could take me to Luton. He looked at me as if to say “show me the money”, I said no, I can pay. At that time, £25 or £30 pounds was a lot of money, I came over with that money. But he took me to Luton. The taxi driver was a really good man. He said “I won’t leave until somebody come. Because there was no one to meet you at the airport. So maybe no one is like in the house.” I rang the bell and a chap came out and said “wait, what are you doing here?” I said, “today’s the day I arrive”.

It turns out that they had hired a car for the following day to come and pick me up. I waved to the to the taxi man and got into the house. The first thing in those days, when a Jamaican arrived, was “where the rum then?” But yes, I did.

I brought some rum. But for the first two weeks, honestly, if I could walk back to Jamaica, I would have. About a year later, I came to live in Leicester.

Forgotten Histories A Life on Radio — Herdle White

Herdle White with Jimmy Helms and local fans in Leicester (1976). Courtesy of Herdle White.

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I flew over, I did not come on one of them ships that take two weeks to get here. I arrive at London Heathrow, I had never seen so many white people.

In 1967, the BBC wanted to start local radio. They were travelling around the country asking local councillors if they were willing to take part. The only place that said yes, was Leicester. In November 1967, BBC Radio Leicester started.

During the time, my wife was a primary school teacher. She listened to the radio, heard some children’s programme, rang in and said, “I don’t think much of what you’re doing”. They invited her in to help them and as a faithful husband, I went along. I met the manager and the producers. About four or five weeks later, I was asked to do a Caribbean round up music news programme. I started a five-minute programme with a friend of mine, Neville Cook. We did five minutes.

That went on for a couple of months and then I started doing my own thing on a Wednesday. I had 15 minutes. I was working at Bentley engineering. My lunch break was from 12 o’clock until one o’clock. At 12 o’clock, I would rush out, jump in my car, get to Radio Leicester for about twenty past, get ready to do my show from half past, until quarter to one, then run back into my car, rush back to Bentley and clock in at one.

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Then the big opportunity came. Bob Marley came to Leicester. It was the old De Montfort University, Leicester Polytechnic. They had invited Bob Marley and the Wailers to perform. Neville Cook, another friend and I went to see Bob Marley. There were only about one hundred people there, at that time, Bob Marley was not that big. Bob Marley never spoke in any dialect, other than Jamaican dialect. I interviewed Bob Marley in Jamaican dialect. I understood the guy. We both understood each other, we are both Jamaican. I edited the interview and took it to the producer. He listened and he came back to me and said that we could not use it, because English people would not understand. It is a 15-minute programme about Caribbean music! Caribbean people will understand! They said no, they were very adamant. I picked up the tape and put it in the bin. I was that upset. I wonder how much that tape would be worth now. But it is one of those things. Over time, I progressed to an hour and two hours on a Saturday and eventually a three-hour Friday night reggae and soca music programme. I became involved in producing other programmes for BBC Radio Leicester and my role grew.

Forgotten Histories A Life on Radio — Herdle White

Herdle White at the old BBC Radio Leicester studios in Charles Street (Circa 1980s). Photograph by David Higgs. Courtesy of Herdle White.

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One of my favourite interviews was with Hot Chocolate, Errol Brown. He was doing his last tour around England and we arranged an interview with Errol because he was coming to Leicester. We were only allowed 15 minutes. Errol, was born in Jamaica and came over when he was about eight or nine. We had a shared background, growing up as boys in Jamaica. My allotted time came to an end and Errol said to his secretary, “please tell the other people they will have to wait longer, because I find somebody who I can relate to”. We spoke for another 20 minutes and after that he said “Herdle, I’m going to put you on the guest list. When I come to Leicester, when I finished I want you and your wife to come backstage and meet me.” We were like lost brothers. I really enjoyed that interview. It was very moving to meet people like that. I have been fortunate to meet so many amazing singers and musicians; Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, Billy Ocean, Jimmy Helms, Mica Paris, Candi Staton, Maxi Priest, Boris Gardener, Stevie Wonder and the Three Degrees.

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This year, I finally retired from BBC Radio Leicester at eighty-two years old and 55 years on air. I’m not going to be there for eternity. Sometimes when some of us go get these opportunities, we lock the door for other people. I have never been like that; I am always encouraging people to come on board and I try to help them wherever possible.

You lay a foundation and then you get people to build on the foundation. I strongly believe that.

Herdle White at the old BBC Radio Leicester studios in Charles Street (Circa 1980s). Photograph by David Higgs. Courtesy of Herdle White.

Forgotten Histories A Life on Radio — Herdle White

I have been fortunate to meet so many amazing singers and musicians; Billy Ocean, Jimmy Helms, Mica Paris, Candi Staton, Maxi Priest, Boris Gardener, Stevie Wonder and the Three Degrees.

Herdle White with Errol Brown of Hot Chocolate on his last tour of the UK. De Montfort Hall, Leicester (2001). Courtesy of Herdle White.

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ARTS AND CULTUR 72

Arts and Culture

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In this edition of BlackInk we reflect on international arts leadership across dance, theatre and opera. Contributors to this section explore what it means to create spaces for Black artists, to uphold the legacy of trailblazers and the struggle to build support and resilience. An undercurrent of these ambitious leaders is the reminder that just because something has not been done before, it does not mean it cannot be done.

Black Dance Uncovered — Audrey Leboutte A Dancer in Every Home — Javier Torres Unpacking Opera — Alison Buchanan Beyond Face — Alix Harris The Silent Beat: A Haptics Conversation — Pawlet Brookes and Georgina Payne

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BLACK DANCE UNCOVERED ZINNEMA IS AN ARTISTIC HOUSE FOCUSSING ON AUTODIDACT, SEMI-PROFESSIONALS OR LEISURE TIME ARTISTS. ZINNEMA PROMOTES AND DEVELOPS PROJECTS BY INDIVIDUALS AND COLLECTIVES, BASED IN BRUSSELS OR ITS PERIPHERY, WHO EXPRESS THEIR CIVIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THEIR IMAGINATION THROUGH ANY ARTISTIC DISCIPLINE.

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Arts and Culture Black Dance Uncovered — Audrey Leboutte

When I first came into contact with Zinnema, where I am currently artistic coordinator, I was particularly active with the former director (Jan Wallyn) on the following issues that were occupying the organisation:

In this way, Zinnema is not just a Brussels, Flemish and Belgian organisation unique in its mission, but also in its methodical vision to realise that mission: participatory and never finished.

1. What are the reasons for being active in the arts in a nonprofessional way today? What type of artistic disciplines are considered valid? Which bodies (literally) are considered artistic?

In my work as artistic leader, I always tried to focus on “practicing care” (quoting Lise Sofie Houe, Aarhus University). Prioritising connection and empathy in a white environment, as simple as it is, can be quite disobedient:

2. How do we meaningfully share power and resources from the organisation to the user? How do we strengthen the participatory impact of every artist and visitor we are collaborating with?

• Taking time, knowing the capitalist system we are working in, to create a welcoming and warm atmosphere while working with people from the margins of the art centre • Focussing on creating a framework that makes room for vulnerability • Allowing exchange of energy rather than capturing energy.

Black Dance Uncovered (2023). Photograph by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage.

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In our attempt to practice our values and placing structural oppression in our everyday reflection, we’ve been questioning the white frame surrounding projects focussing on Black art and culture during COVID. It came with its flow of white tears and white guilt.

In our attempt to practice our values and placing structural oppression in our everyday reflection, we’ve been questioning the white frame surrounding projects focussing on Black art and culture during COVID. It came with its flow of white tears and white guilt.

We secured funding to organise an exchange for Black creative artists of 18 – 30 years old, with up to 15 dancers and choreographers from Belgium and 15 from the UK, with the exchange as a mission to professionalise them through dance and informal learning. Dance is a medium to work on empowerment, mobility, innovation and collaboration with people from different backgrounds. But dance is also an artform where appropriation and arrogation are the norm.

With the lights on structural racism that came during the pandemic, we were looking for partners and artistic leaders that will engage to co-create a vision for this programme that will: 1. centre fewer white institutions and white art forms as the standard 2. establish a base to allow young people to imagine a more desirable future (necessary after an anxious pandemic episode and COVID’s disproportionate effect on marginalised communities).

We connected with Thomas Prestø (Trinidad/Norway) creator of the Talawa Technique™1 and artistic leader of Tabanka Dance Ensemble, who suggested Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage led by Pawlet Brookes (Jamaica/St Kitts/UK) as a UK partner who host the only international Black dance festival in the UK. From there, we collaborated with two grassroots platforms: MDF The Label founded by Massinda Zinga (Angola/Martinique/Belgium) and Timiss led by Moustapha Sarr (Senegal/Belgium), to act as recruiters and facilitators. This was the start of Black Dance Uncovered, a constellation of excellence gathered in order to create Black experimentation, Black knowledge and Black transmission to uplift a new generation of creators.

We created a “third space” spanning beyond geography and language, where the majority of the economic, artistic and social capital went to Black-led organisations.

During a week in Belgium, participants developed an understanding of the attributes that define a professional Africana2 dancer, the work methodology behind the Talawa Technique™, a small part of the Tabanka repertoire and were honoured by the presence of Sidiki Camara, one of the leading contemporary percussionists from Mali, to accompany the dance classes. The bootcamp was very intense emotionally, culturally and artistically, as the participants created strong bonds while going through an intensive and comprehensive programme together.

This first exchange week consolidated the group and contributed to making unforgettable memories. Starting from that week they began building a sense of community and a common vocabulary.

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Arts and Culture Black Dance Uncovered — Audrey Leboutte

In the UK, the programme took place during the annual dance festival organised by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage, Let’s Dance International Frontiers (LDIF). Black Dance Uncovered was inspired by the theme for the festival: Uncovering the Dance Within: Origins and Authenticity. Providing participants with access to the whole festival was an unequalled opportunity. The festival was compiled with such a dramaturgy that it is a tool to facilitate processes of change. Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage has done brilliant work when it comes to articulate meaningfully the different interventions together. The diversity of speakers, bringing a variety of academic, activist and artistic perspectives, showed the interrelationships between different realities. It felt to me as a collective response to the need of deconstruction and the imperative of new narratives, with contemporary stories brought on stage or in situ by multiple talented voices during the evening shows. On top of that, the planning of the festival created the conditions for permeating and transformative encounters.

Participants had the opportunity to take part in a number of guest masterclasses led by Cameron McKinney, Antoine Hunter, Shamel Pitts and Freddy Houndekindo, and seminars (dance dialogues) from Alexandria Davis, Anita Gonzalez and Tia-Monique Uzor, but they also had unique contact with those experts. It is one thing to attend an event but having a one-on-one conversation with someone you look up to can nurture your practice to the next level. The participants went a step further in networking strategies, choreographic training and received resources to broaden their perspectives and artistic gaze. They experienced what it is to work across cultures and artforms as spectator of the opening show and by the close presence of artists such as Cubs the Poet (invited as poet in residence for the festival).

As a result, the participants have grown their international network and kept those networks active by continuously exchanging with the people they’ve met and connected.

Since the festival, they have been using social media as a smart way to show their engagement. They are supporting each other’s projects, coming to each other events and are each other’s promotional amplifiers. They gained enormous confidence in their capacity to lead projects and are in constant conversation with multiple partners’ organisations shaping the impact of the festival and the programme far beyond the original reach.

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Dance is a medium to work on empowerment, mobility, innovation and collaboration with people from different backgrounds.

The results has been collaborative and collective healing.

Black Dance Uncovered went far beyond our expectations.

We experienced Black joy, Black safety, Black excellence. The participants all had an African or African Caribbean heritage.

All the facilitators and leaders blended into participants as the collaborative aspect of making it a success came from all parts. All the persons involved were actively co-creating the programme by being very generous, spontaneous and supportive towards the others. The group was glowing from this “healing in process” energy. Abundance was the motor, unapologetic was the steering wheel. The genius of this hybrid programme of theory, dance, technique and opportunity was to make room to allow people to redefine themselves, provide food for thought on issues that resonate specifically to our own experience and to give tools and resources that allow further research.

As we are all engaged in one or multiple art forms, we are all sensitive or receptive to the wounds of the Diaspora. As BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour) we are dealing with major ethical catastrophes on this planet which means an ethical restoration is necessary. A realignment is needed to allow growth. The dance workshops, led by Thomas Prestø, provided an infusion of coherence which led to inner stability and helped us develop a more fluid way to respond to the world.

We experienced how the collective and individual are not separate; they work as an interdependent system. This exchange shifted the way participants see the world and their role in it, resulting in deeper conscious choices that can have lasting impacts. We were unconsciously spectator of each other’s process of transformation: readjustment of body, mind and soul, acceptation of self as complex entities and poetry in motion, envisaging new perspectives, shifting the gaze about leadership and redefining (the idea of) “success”.

This programme is another example indicating the importance of community space, having access to a communal space where we emotionally process the challenging aspects of the world, which allowed us to develop a more complete and healthy relationship with the complex realities of our time by building personal and collective resilience. This is a starting point to improve our abilities to participate in society in a constructive way and heal underlying trauma that perpetuates old patterns of domination, exploitation, and disconnection.

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Arts and Culture Black Dance Uncovered — Audrey Leboutte

Black Dance Uncovered went far beyond our expectations. We experienced Black joy, Black safety, Black excellence.

In conclusion, I would like to credit the participants that have not been mentioned to emphasise the collective aspect of this experience: Tunkanmi Akinfe, Israel Basanga Ngashi, Yohana Bayekula, Kassy Bondoko, Pawlet Brookes, Kendra Chiagoro-Noel, Amelia Chinnock-Schumann, Kenza Demba, Lorrine Douglas, Siham Ennajjary, Nora Fagbemi, Laura Ferretti, Holly Francis, Roxanne Fraser, Brice Gabiro, Fama Ka, Betina Kashiama, Shirley Langhelle, Michiko Limanya, Wolman Luciano Michelle, Francesca Matthys, Sara Moutaouaj El, Francis-Williams Mutshipay-Nkashama, Jonathan Nzouekeu, Georgina Payne, Lauryn Pinard, Thomas Prestø, Joel Ramirez, Mouss Sarr, Marshal Siziba, Anaïs Stinglhamber Nkoy, Igor Tavares, Jemima Tawose, Georgia Thompson, Sydneé Thompson, Lucciano Wolman, Massinda Zinga,

Footnotes 1.

Talawa Technique™ is a fully codified and examinable technique for Africanistic kinaesthetic movement. Talawa Technique structures elements of African and Caribbean practices uniquely designed to facilitate polycentrism, multiple movement qualities, grounding and polyrhythm. The Talawa Technique seamlessly merges ancestral movements, culturally contextualised vocabulary and contemporary movement sensibilities. It bridges the gap between “urban freestyling”, traditional and contemporary dance.

2.

The term Africana specially refers to any dance that originates from the dance practices of African peoples, which include all people from African descent who carry African philosophy of thought and culture in their daily practices.

Definition from Talawa Technique intensive lecture note by Thomas Prestø.

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Carlos Acosta. Photographer Johan Persson.

Arts and Culture A Dancer in Every Home — Javier Torres

A DANCER IN EVERY HOME CUBA HAS A UNIQUE HISTORY THAT SETS IT APART FROM OTHER CARIBBEAN ISLANDS THAT HAS SHAPED CONTEMPORARY RECOGNITION WITH RESPECT TO ONE ART FORM IN PARTICULAR - BALLET. UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF PIONEERS SUCH AS ALICIA ALONSO IN THE MID-NINETEENTH CENTURY, BALLET IN CUBA QUICKLY THRIVED ARTISTICALLY AND GREW EXPONENTIALLY WITH STATE FUNDING. TODAY CUBA IS RENOWNED AS A HOT HOUSE FOR DANCE TALENT AND TRAINING AND BALLET. HOWEVER, ONE STORY IN PARTICULAR HIGHLIGHTS THE POWER OF TALENT AND DETERMINATION. IT IS THE STORY OF CARLOS ACOSTA, AN AFRO-CUBAN DANCER WHO TRANSCENDED HIS HUMBLE BEGINNINGS IN HAVANA TO BECOME A WORLD-RENOWNED FIGURE IN THE BALLET INDUSTRY.

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Carlos Acosta. 2019. Photographer Stephane De Sakutin/AFP/Getty Images

Arts and Culture A Dancer in Every Home — Javier Torres

Carlos Acosta shattered barriers and defied expectations by becoming the first Black principal dancer of the prestigious Royal Ballet, an achievement that holds significant historical and cultural significance.

Carlos Acosta shattered barriers and defied expectations by becoming the first Black principal dancer of the prestigious Royal Ballet, an achievement that holds significant historical and cultural significance. Although Cuba was not a member of the British Commonwealth, Acosta’s journey is a testament to the universal appeal of dance and the ability to break through racial barriers.

Today, Carlos Acosta is revered as an emblematic figure in Cuba and the United Kingdom. His contributions to the cultural development of both nations, particularly in the realm of dance and ballet, have been profound. Recognising the need to nurture young talent and provide opportunities for those lacking access to formal artistic education, Acosta established the Acosta Dance Foundation (ADF) in 2011 as a non-profit organisation. The foundation’s primary focus is to support aspiring dancers who face various challenges in pursuing their artistic dreams. Through scholarships, workshops, master classes, and community projects, the foundation equips talented individuals with the necessary tools and resources to develop their artistic skills. The ADF now operates on three key pillars: a dance academy in Cuba, a dance centre in London and the Acosta en Casa digital initiative to launch in 2025.

The Havana Dance Academy, located alongside the Acosta Danza Company in the Cuban capital, serves as a training ground for young dancers. Equipped with state-of-the-art facilities, including dance studios and classrooms, the academy provides a nurturing environment for students to cultivate their talents. Graduates who demonstrate exceptional skills can join the Acosta Danza Company or explore other professional avenues within the global dance community.

In addition to its physical presence in Havana, the Acosta Dance Foundation recognised the power of digital platforms in reaching a wider audience. Acosta en Casa will be developed as a digital platform to democratise dance education and bring the joy of dance to people’s homes worldwide. This innovative initiative will allow individuals to engage with the Foundation’s work, participate in virtual classes, and connect with fellow dance enthusiasts from different corners of the globe. However, the Foundation’s ambitions extend beyond Cuba and the virtual realm. In 2023, the Foundation will establish the Acosta Dance Centre, situated at the Royal Arsenal in South-East London.

It serves as a hub for dancers, creatives, and industry professionals, fostering community engagement and offering public dance courses, workshops, festivals, scholarships, and other artistic opportunities.

The ADF distinguishes itself through its commitment to artistic excellence and its core values. Authenticity and a genuine appreciation for Cuban culture form the foundation’s ethos. They believe in the power of dance as a tool for social change, aiming to transform attitudes and create creative opportunities for individuals from all walks of life. The Foundation embraces openness, inclusivity, and respect, striving to ensure a work accessible to everyone without prejudice or barriers.

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Carlos Acosta’s journey from a marginalised neighbourhood in Havana to international acclaim is a testament to artistic relocation and the resilience and talent of individuals who dare to dream. His success has shattered longstanding stereotypes in ballet and opened doors for future generations of diverse dancers. Beyond the realm of dance, the ADF’s work represents a broader narrative of Black representation, relocation, and expansion. It is a powerful testament to the transformative power of the arts in breaking down barriers and celebrating the beauty and talent of individuals from all backgrounds.

As the Foundation grows and evolves, its impact will extend far beyond the dance community. Through its dedication to education, community engagement, and artistic excellence, the Carlos Acosta foundation will leave a legacy, inspiring individuals to pursue their passions and embrace the transformative power of the arts. In a world often marked by inequality and divisions, the Foundation stands as a beacon of hope, unity, and inclusivity. Through the universal language of dance, they build bridges, break barriers, and create a more harmonious and vibrant world.

The ADF journey embodies the spirit of resilience, creativity, and cultural exchange. It highlights the remarkable ability of dance to transcend boundaries and ignite change and a commitment to nurturing talent, fostering inclusivity, and creating opportunities for underrepresented communities. It exemplifies the power of the arts to shape a brighter future. By celebrating diversity and embracing the transformative power of dance, the Acosta Dance Foundation creates a world where every home can be touched by the joy and beauty of dance.

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Arts and Culture A Dancer in Every Home — Javier Torres

Carlos Acosta in rehearsals. Photographer Raúl Reinoso.

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UNPACKING OPERA WHAT DO YOU DO?

I AM A SINGER ARE YOU A GOSPEL OR SOUL SINGER?

NO, I SING OPERA!!!

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Arts and Culture Unpacking Opera — Alison Buchanan

I have this conversation a lot, and it always amuses me. I wonder if they assume gospel because I am a Black woman of a certain size, or if it’s the way I talk. I don’t know any Black person who hasn’t assumed I am a gospel singer.

I think I am asked this question because, until recently, there has been little to no representation on the UK opera stage. Until the age of 16 I assumed I was the only Black opera singer in the UK, until I was hired to sing chorus at Glyndebourne Opera in their iconic and highly acclaimed production of Porgy and Bess. I saw for the first-time representation and affirmation and there was no going back.

Many singers in that production were American, they had a confidence and energy that was infectious to us, their British counterparts. Opera Ebony was a company founded in 1973 in New York by Wayne Sanders and Ben Mathew to redress the lack of representation in American opera. Opera Ebony opened doors for singers and what the Americans brought to us was their feeling of belonging.

I am child of a Baijan father and a Jamaican mother.

Although there was a little classical music in my father’s record collection, there were no outings to see a visiting orchestra or classical concert. My parents supported my interest in the classical instruments at school, it was clear I had talent and they happily went along with recommendations for me to join the youth orchestra, the youth choir and to attend junior music schools and perform in concerts. However, I was an anomaly amongst my generation of “immigrant kids”.

Alison Buchanan in Queen Charlotte (2023) Netflix. Photo courtesy of Pegasus Opera Company.

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This is a busy time for us… It has been a revelation to see how the other opera companies have changed since the murder of George Floyd. Suddenly we are having conversations that Lloyd Newton could not have, but more importantly there is conversation followed by action.

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Pegasus Opera in Windrush Square (2023). Photographer Anna Watson/Alamy.

Arts and Culture Unpacking Opera — Alison Buchanan

After my studies at the Guildhall School, where I was given a list of roles I could expect to be excluded from as a Black singer, I relocated to America. I studied at the prestigious Curtis Institute of Music, and what a revelation that was. I was not an anomaly; I was accepted and I was expected to succeed. This was a new experience for me, this feeling of it being enough that if I put in the work, I would progress… end of story! I recently chatted with my mother about her school life in England. She spoke about coming to England at the age of 7 and being bullied by teachers and being made to feel less than, and incapable. After school she took herself to college (whilst being a young mother with me) and proved to herself that she was more than capable by getting the qualifications she needed. It pains me to think about the treatment she and many of her generation had to suffer. I think those feelings of being inadequate have haunted her all her life. I know she is proud of my achievements and I wonder whether she thinks about what she could have achieved had she been given the chance.

Today I run an Opera Company called Pegasus Opera which was started 31 years ago by my friend Lloyd Newton, a Jamaican tenor. I met Lloyd at Glyndebourne in 1986 in the Porgy and Bess production. When the production ended, he found himself with no opportunities so he decided to start his own company; the motto “Harmony in Diversity” was at the heart of everything he did.

After his untimely death from cancer in 2016, I was given the task of continuing his legacy. Today we are very much about representation, but not just on the stage, diversity is reflected in the pit, behind the scenes and amongst the creative team. We were announced by Arts Council England in November 2022 as one of its new National Portfolio Organisations, which was thrilling and enables us to extend our working in schools, mentoring and encouraging young singers, performing legacy and hope concerts, staging productions and championing works by Black and Asian composers. Pegasus recently commissioned a Windrush Opera, which we will start showcasing in 2024.

Opera will not change overnight. It is still very much the bastion of the white, upper-middle classes. There are so many barriers, including the pricing. Lack of representation, let’s face it, why should I support an art form where no one looks like me? For some, opera being sung in a foreign language is a barrier and the repertoire is not inclusive.

English National Opera recently staged Blue, the story of a Black policeman, dealing with his family, his fears for his son who ultimately is killed by a white policeman. We need to start telling our own stories on the operatic stage.

At Pegasus Opera concerts I tell the audience they are in my living room where we sing and tell stories. I want the audience to feel comfortable, to laugh and chat back. At a recent Windrush concert at Bernie Grant Arts Centre, I asked the audience where I could get good roti in Tottenham and they danced to ‘Sugar Bum Bum’… our audience are more likely to come back because they feel included.

Recently while planning repertoire for Windrush seventyfifth anniversary events, I was confronted with challenges about the music I wanted to perform. The criticism was about using white colonialist composers, about offensive calypso lyrics and about foreign languages. It really challenged my thinking. What am I representing? How should I represent? What stories am I telling? I see this as a good thing. I expect opera companies and audiences to evolve, so I too should evolve. What Pegasus Opera presents can influence the next generation of opera makers and those that attend. That is a huge responsibility and it is my opportunity to show my mother and our forebearers “YES YOU CAN!!!”

This is a busy time for us… It has been a revelation to see how the other opera companies have changed since the murder of George Floyd. Suddenly we are having conversations that Lloyd Newton could not have, but more importantly there is conversation followed by action.

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Arts and Culture Beyond Face — Alix Harris

BEYOND FACE IN 2010, I WROTE A ONE PAGE PROPOSAL ABOUT CREATING A THEATRE COMPANY FOR BLACK PEOPLE IN PLYMOUTH. IT WAS THE FIRST TIME I HAD COME ACROSS THE INCREDIBLE TALAWA THEATRE COMPANY AND THOUGHT “WOW WOULDN’T IT BE AMAZING TO HAVE SOMETHING LIKE THIS IN PLYMOUTH”. I SHARED IT WITH A COUPLE OF ARTS LEADERS IN THE CITY TO SEE WHAT THEIR THOUGHTS WERE ON IT. I WAS TOLD “THAT’LL NEVER HAPPEN HERE”.

Alix Harris. Photographer Dom Moore.

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In 2019, I went to Bristol to watch Chinonyerem Odimba’s Princess and the Hustler directed by Dawn Walton. I came back feeling inspired and energised by the production; I shared with another arts leader about the incredible moment the community cast joined the show and how significant that moment was to the story and the impact of the play. The response. “You’d never be able to do that here”.

Nine years later I was still being told the same narrative, despite me having established Beyond Face four years prior.

Was that comment a dig at my leadership ability? Or was it yet another example of an unwillingness to see what was possible? To recognise the people that existed in the city who they weren’t willing to see?

In 2015, I set up Beyond Face. Beyond Face began with two strands, first as a youth company in response to having many conversations with young people from the global Diaspora sharing with me that “theatre was not for people like us”, with the second strand to make work exploring stories that weren’t being told in Devon.

In 2020, the world changed significantly and the doors that had been knocked upon many times, had finally decided to open. We launched our artist development programme We are Here, the name a response to the ongoing erasure narrative, where we created an offer for artists to engage, collaborate and thrive. There has since been a significant growth of our programme of work and team; we rebranded to relocate from being based in one city to becoming more regionally focused. The relocation came from a need to sustain ourselves and the work that we do in a region where we are constantly met with a denial of the global Diaspora’s existence within the arts and culture scene. We underwent a process of a theory of change with our now interim chair Titilola Dawudu, this was an integral part of our journey and our need to relocate our identity as a company. This change was a pivotal moment as a company and has both been a liberating and challenging experience, balancing trying to maintain our artistic integrity and ensure that we are making work ourselves as well as supporting other artists. The tension often lies when we end up doing a lot of sector support, navigating what we thought were creative collaborations, falling into consultancy.

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In April this year I was in Jamaica, with my aunties and uncle. All crammed together in my cousin’s car as she drove us around the island. I sat and listened to them share stories and debate with one another about their childhood and their history. The significance of the different places on the island that held different memories for them, both of joy and of sadness. I was so grateful for those days together, to just be able to take a moment to ground myself, to receive a bulk of recipes from my auntie with the encouragement of returning back to the UK to attempt to make the food I was eating whilst I was there. They asked me if I would write a play about the family, if I wanted to go and see a theatre show.

In all honesty, for the first time in a long time, I didn’t want to think about theatre, about making and creating. I just wanted to pause and have a chance to connect with family I rarely get to see.

However, completely switching off was harder than I thought. I was thinking about theatre, because of the stories, because of the shared history and the different perspectives that we all have. I was thinking about how this experience and this time together will influence the development of our current show, Bigger Than Lyrics. Although we have shared histories, intersections make the shared experience so nuanced. It made me appreciate even more the people that have come before me and how Beyond Face can amplify and continue to share and profile incredible artists, activists, storytellers, musicians.... Spending time listening to my family was to me the equivalent of listening to the people we work with. Absorbing and reflecting on what my responsibility is. Recognising the difference between when listening is enough or to recognise when it is my responsibility to take action.

In 2023, Beyond Face joined the Arts Council National Portfolio. We have a programme of artist development, productions, young people and regional voices, all with the mission and vision to make the South West a region where people from the global Diaspora see the arts and culture sector as an industry they can thrive in. 13 years on from being told “this will never work here”.

Arts and Culture Beyond Face — Alix Harris

The tension often lies when we end up doing a lot of sector support, navigating what we thought were creative collaborations, falling into consultancy.

Beyond Face Scratch Night. Photographer Dom Moore.

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THE SILENT BEAT: A HAPTICS CONVERSATION LAST YEAR, SERENDIPITY INSTITUTE FOR BLACK ARTS AND HERITAGE BEGAN WORK ON THE BLACK DIGITAL DANCE REVOLUTION. THE AIMS OF THE INITIATIVE WERE AMBITIOUS BUT NOT UNREALISTIC - EXPLORE HOW TECHNOLOGIES CAN BE USED TO PUSH THE BOUNDARIES OF HOW DANCE IS CREATED AND SHARED. AS A RESULT, BLACK DIGITAL DANCE REVOLUTION HAS HAD REAL PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS, NOT JUST CHALLENGING THE PARAMETERS OF TECHNOLOGY, WHILST ALSO REDRESSING THE RACISM AND ABLEISM THAT IS SYSTEMATICALLY ENFORCED WITHIN TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS.

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Arts and Culture The Silent Beat: A Haptics Conversation — Pawlet Brookes and Georgina Payne

Antoine Hunter. Photographer Georgina Payne.

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Finding ways to “ feel” music is nothing new and Deaf people have always found ways, whether it is adjusting the bass so vibrations can be felt through the floor or standing near to the speakers.

The Silent Beat: A Haptics Conversation started with the exploration of haptic technology, the use of tactile feedback to stimulate a sense of touch. Many people will be familiar of its use in mobile phones and in recent years haptics have become an integral part of the immersive digital gaming experience. We considered how this kinaesthetic communication might be used creatively in the interpretation of music and the potential this might have for Deaf dancers and choreographers. We proposed the idea to Antoine Hunter, an esteemed choreographer and artistic director of Urban Jazz Dance Company and the Bay Area International Deaf Dance Festival, and the project evolved from there.

Collaborating initially with researchers at De Montfort University, a unique haptics profile was created for Antoine using a haptics vest and wrist bands. With over 40 sensors, the vest enabled the isolation of specific layers and sounds within music – the bass could be allocated to a specific part of the chest and back and conversations took place with the developers of Bhaptics in South Korea to tailor the technology so that individual instruments could be amplified. Then came the first challenge of navigating the way that the haptics suit restricted movement, how it felt to move in a certain way with a specific pulse, how the access to the spinal column was constricted, and the muscle memory of the vibrations.

Finding ways to “feel” music is nothing new and Deaf people have always found ways, whether it is adjusting the bass so vibrations can be felt through the floor or standing near to the speakers. Antoine had also been recently involved with the development of Droplabs’ Haptic shoes that convert audio into vibrations and his expertise was vital in shaping the trajectory of the project. Before we could begin, we had to establish a glossary for the project, working across three languages: American Sign Language, British Sign Language and English. Terminology had to be defined and articulated to ensure everyone was on the same page. This meant consultation with members of the Deaf community to confirm existing signs and also the creation of a few new ones.

From there, we considered the ways in which a live audience would be able to engage with the experience.

Experiments with mocap technology and the virtual environment provided a visual opportunity to map Antoine’s choreography and establish a space for creativity. A virtual avatar inhabited different spaces providing a digital echo of Antoine’s experience. Navigating the temperamental technology was a test, but elation came in one workshop session where we were able to achieve a world-first, bringing together in real-time in-person live performance with virtual environment, mocap and haptics.

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Arts and Culture The Silent Beat: A Haptics Conversation — Pawlet Brookes and Georgina Payne

The lights dimmed and Antoine and Soweto entered the stage with staccato steps. Joyful and energetic, the audience embraced the innovative atmosphere.

Soweto Kinch joined the creative team to compose a musical score that would embrace and encapsulate the performance experience for artist and audience alike. Soweto and Antoine played with the opportunity to perform with and without the haptic technology, developing a collaborative connection of music and movement. Elements of the score were tailored to only be felt by Antoine though the haptic suit, intentionally excluding the hearing audience members, a truly silent beat. Other elements played with chaos, over-stimulating the senses to test physical and audiological parameters.

As we approached the ambition of sharing the work as a performance for Let’s Dance International Frontiers 2023, Tonderai Ratsai was brought on board as digital researcher and technician, completing the creative team with a new energy around interactive arts. The live sharing was approached with some trepidation as we wondered how the audience, hearing and D/deaf, would respond.

The lights dimmed and Antoine and Soweto entered the stage with staccato steps. Joyful and energetic, the audience embraced the innovative atmosphere. As one person remarked: “Only a live event with deaf artists can provide such an experience about music through haptics or vibrations - so I really valued and deeply enjoyed the evening.”

As technology continues to evolve, it is essential that we continue to explore the ways that they can be used for creativity and access. We are currently exploring how haptics might add further dimensions to the experiences of artists and audiences, D/deaf and hearing. Black Digital Dance Revolution will culminate with the Digital BlackCentric Week 6-12 November 2023.

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VOICES OF RESISTAN 98

Voices of Resistance

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2023 marks three significant anniversaries: the seventyfifth anniversary of the arrival of the HMT Empire Windrush, the sixtieth anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr’s “I have a dream…” speech and the tenth anniversary of Black Lives Matter. Each event serves as a reminder to the need for resistance against systemic racism and this section highlights voices of resistance, including Gary Younge’s analysis of the truth behind representation, to Carolyn Cooper’s considered reflection of the writers who have encapsulated British Caribbean experience, and Alexandria Davis’s bold reclamation of language.

Resistance can be heard from protests to the poets.

Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge Colonisation in Reverse: From Margin to Centre — Michelle-Kim Vacciana Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? — Alexandria Davis A Deep Dive into Black British Culture from the Perspective of a Musician and Black Woman — VV Brown 99

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Jacob Philadelphia and Barack Obama in the Oval Office (2009). White House Photos/Alamy

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES AND PHOTO OPPORTUNITIES: THE POLITICS OF REPRESENTATION IN THE AGE OF DIVERSITY WHEN BARACK OBAMA WAS CONTEMPLATING A RUN FOR THE WHITE HOUSE HIS WIFE, MICHELLE, ASKED HIM WHAT HE THOUGHT HE COULD ACCOMPLISH IF HE WON. “THE DAY I TAKE THE OATH OF OFFICE,” HE REPLIED, “THE WORLD WILL LOOK AT US DIFFERENTLY. AND MILLIONS OF KIDS ACROSS THIS COUNTRY WILL LOOK AT THEMSELVES DIFFERENTLY. THAT ALONE IS SOMETHING.”

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I think we can and should all agree that Obama’s presidency was of huge and unrivalled symbolic importance.

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Gary Younge and Stormzy (2020). Courtesy of Gary Younge.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

Four months after he was sworn in, at least one kid saw himself differently. It was May 2009 and 5-year-old Jacob Philadelphia had gone with his dad, a Black ex-marine, to the Oval Office for a family photograph with the president. With him were his mum, Roseanne, and his older brother, Isaac, 8. The boys were allowed to ask Obama one question each.

The parents had no idea what they were going to say. Isaac asked why the president had got rid of the F-22 jet fighter.

The president said because it cost too much. Jacob asked: “I want to know if my hair is just like yours.”

He was so quiet, Obama asked him to repeat the question.

Jacob obliged. Obama said: “Why don’t you touch it and see for yourself?” He bent down and lowered his head so that it was within Jacob’s reach. Jacob paused. The president prompted. “Touch it, dude!” he said. Jacob reached out and rubbed the presidential pate. “So, what do you think?” Mr Obama asked. “Yes, it does feel the same,” Jacob said. The White House photographer snapped the moment. In 2012, Michelle Obama told a fundraiser: “Every couple of weeks the White House photographers change out the photos in the West Wing, except for that one. So, if you ever wonder whether change is possible, I want you think of that little Black boy in the Oval Office of the White House touching the head of the first Black president.”

When Obama won the presidency people did look at America and think of it differently. Its status in the world rose with almost every country having a better view of the US under Obama than they had under his predecessor, George W Bush. That wasn’t primarily because he was Black but because he was engaged where Bush was antagonistic, nuanced where Bush was brash, and eloquent where Bush had been monosyllabic.

But Black Americans also looked at themselves differently and that was, primarily, because the president was Black.

During his tenure polls consistently showed that African Americans were more likely than any other group to be bullish about their own future and to think the country’s best days were yet to come. I lived in the US throughout his presidency, first in New York and then in Chicago; his picture was in most Black barbershops, hair salons and Black-owned diners. This sense of pride and ownership should not be underestimated or diminished. That scene in the Oval office with Jacob Philadelphia is powerful for a reason. In a country that was a slave state for more than 200 years, an apartheid state for 100 years and has only been a non-racial democracy for less than 60 years, his presidency was a milestone.

I think we can and should all agree that Obama’s presidency was of huge and unrivalled symbolic importance. Symbols should not, contrary to the words of the late comedian George Carlin, “ just be left to the symbol minded.” They matter. They are not insubstantial. But they should not be mistaken for substance either. Because for all of the pride, joy and sense of inclusion that Obama’s presidency brought to Black America there were other facts to contend with.

Under his reign the wealth gap between Black and white Americans grew, as did the unemployment gap and Black poverty. Meanwhile, Black income has stagnated.

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Increasingly, after that, my senses were heightened to the political and media response whenever Black people rose to prominence, be it through skill, popular acclaim, elections or otherwise.

It was while he was in power that the Black Lives Matter hashtag was first coined, following the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the murder of Trayvon Martin and then took off as a movement, with the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The question as to whether America can elect a Black president has been answered; the issue of the sanctity of Black life, however, had yet to be settled. Obama’s hope that “America will see us differently,” it seems was left only half fulfilled. It is unlikely that Zimmerman looked at Trayvon and thought, “there goes the future president of America.” Americans saw racism differently; they do not, however, necessarily view Black people differently.

In his autobiography Obama acknowledged this himself.

During a trip to Brazil, he visited a favela in Rio and waved at the Black and brown kids who clamoured to see him. “I’ll bet that wave changed the lives of some of those kids forever,” said his senior adviser and long-time friend Valerie Jarrett, who was in the room with Michelle all those years ago. “I wondered if that were true,” wrote Obama. “However much it might cause them to stand straighter and dream bigger, it couldn’t compensate for the grinding poverty they encountered every day… By my own estimation, my impact on the lives of poor children and their families so far had been negligible – even in my own country.”

None of this, I am keen to emphasise should be understood as a verdict on Obama’s entire presidency. Obama serves only as an illustration of the more general theme of this talk: how should we understand the politics of representation in a moment when the principles of diversity are embraced but not always fully understood. Does it matter if our leaders are of different races, ethnicities, religions genders and orientations? If so, why? To some in this audience the answer to that question might seem obvious? Yet, as I hope to make clear, it is precisely in our reluctance to interrogate the question that we can reach some truly appalling, if not comical, answers. Are there really Black and brown asylum seekers waiting to see if they will be deported to Rwanda, thinking: “Well, at least this policy has been advanced by an Asian woman…that is something.”? What should we make of the fact that the most diverse senior cabinet ever was a calamitous mess under the shortest premiership ever and dramatically crashed the economy? How do we understand the fact that the party with the most diverse representation in parliament that has done more in power to advance the rights of women and minorities than any other UK-wide party is the only party only to have ever been led by white men? Ultimately the issue boils down to two questions.

What, if anything, do we want from diversity? What do we want from representation?

To engage these questions properly – and I will be applying them primarily to race but they transfer easily to other identities - we will have to keep several ideas in our head at the same time: that diversity is not simply skin deep; that we should not confuse the institutional with the impressionistic; that the way things appear may not align with how they operate; that the aspiration to demonstrate diversity may be easier to attain than the ability to realise it in any meaningful sense; that it is possible for things to look different and act the same or, at times, even worse; indeed, at times they may be able to act worse precisely because they look different. That, in short, we should never confuse photo opportunities with equal opportunities.

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Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

As the African American radical and academic, Angela Davis, explained when I interviewed her several years ago: “… when the inclusion of Black people into the machine of oppression is designed to make that machine work more efficiently, then it does not represent progress at all. We have more Black people in more visible and powerful positions. But then we have far more Black people who have been pushed down to the bottom of the ladder. When people call for diversity and link it to justice and equality, that’s fine. But there’s a model of diversity as the difference that makes no difference, the change that brings about no change.”

I started with Barack Obama because his example, in some ways, most dramatically illustrates so many of these points but also because he acts as a counterweight to the conversation we are trying to have now in this country. And I think if we had been more disciplined in the conversations we had about Obama, we would be in a better shape for the discussions we are having here and now.

Because when it comes to the politics of representation in this country it has been not just a very busy period – we have had a female prime minister with a Black chancellor, quickly followed by a prime minister of Asian descent and a foreign secretary of African descent. Just to illustrate the trajectory of the change we’ve seen, it took 225 years before we got anything other than a white man for Home Secretary. Since then, only two of the last eight have been white men and if we discount the six days of chaos when Grant Shapps stepped in, we have not had a white home secretary for more than five years. How do we understand this at a time when racial assaults have been increasing, faith in the police among women and minorities has been plummeting and we have the most reactionary immigration policies for generations?

The challenges inherent in these questions first occurred to me two decades ago when I saw a picture story in the Daily Mail showing a collection of Black police officers from the Metropolitan police. At the time, minorities comprised 25 per cent of the capital and just 4.5% of the Met. A month earlier, the Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir John Stevens, conceded he might look abroad for Black and Asian recruits because he could not recruit them here. Here was the Daily Mail writing: “It is a picture that reflects changing times and attitudes within the police service... this exclusive picture of Yard employees shows forces are beginning to reflect the racial mix of the community they serve.”

So, the picture did not reflect any kind of reality. Nor did the caption writers intend it to. It was presented not as an indication of change but in lieu of it. Increasingly, after that, my senses were heightened to the political and media response whenever Black people rose to prominence, be it through skill, popular acclaim, elections or otherwise. Each time, their success – in fact just the sight of them ostensibly succeeding - was hailed as a step forward, a breakthrough, a signal that things were getting better. Now sometimes they were getting better and sometimes they weren’t, but generally the picture showed nothing of the sort.

Take Meghan Markle. We were told this union of a mixedrace American woman with a man who was, at the time, sixth in line for the throne showed how much had changed in Britain. But once again it did nothing of the sort. First of all, by 2018 mixed-race marriages were a banal fact of British life. The last census found that one in ten British people were in an inter-ethnic relationship including 62 per cent of Black people. As such, it didn’t show how much Britain had changed; it showed how long it had taken for the royal family to catch up with those changes.

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Diversity, having different people with different experiences in the room, matters. If you ever get to the point of saying it doesn’t matter – and some people do – you’re sunk.

Second, the consequent fallout, including Markle’s claims of racism within the royal family, suggest less had changed than had been assumed. The fact that someone or something is new to an institution indicates that it has changed its personnel not its practice. Indeed, their presence may simply show how backward its practices are. Allow me to illustrate the point from my own working life. In 1999, the year the Macpherson report into the murder of Stephen Lawrence came out, I got my column in The Guardian. I was glad to do it. Up until that point The Guardian had never had a Black columnist. Clearly, with all the talk of institutional racism my appointment was seen as a corrective gesture. A regular column is prized real estate in a newspaper. Only a few can get it, your picture goes next to it. The roster of columnists is, to some extent, a collective projection of the paper’s world view. So, if you wanted to showcase a more racially diverse and inclusive editorial team that would be the place to do it.

The trouble is there is far more to editorial work in a newspaper than just columnists. There are editors, who decide which articles to run on any given day; there are subeditors who write headlines; there are photographers and picture editors. You can’t see them when you buy the paper.

But between them they wield considerable power. Indeed, while a columnist might be the most prominent among them, some of those people behind the scenes have far more influence in terms of the paper’s priorities and directions than a columnist does.

In fact, my first column for The Guardian was spiked.

I’d written about the NATO bombing of Bosnia and the comment editor at the time thought I should stick to subjects closer to home. “We have people who can write about Bosnia,” he said. “Can you add an ethnic sensibility to this.”

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The whole point of having a Black columnist, he thought, was to write about Black issues. I had other ideas. On another occasion an article I’d written about why it wasn’t okay to say Black people are genetically better at sport was given the headline: “Black people have brains too,” as though that were ever up for debate. Elsewhere, a senior editor dropped the ‘N’ bomb in a news conference. When I wrote about the logic of reparations one of my colleagues said I was in for “a hiding” if I carried on writing things like that. So, my presence gave the illusion of change but how much had actually changed?

This was The Guardian. However bad it was there it was certainly worse elsewhere. But my basic point here is not about me or The Guardian but where diversity sits in the process. Because diversity is one of those words that is embraced unthinkingly, without any real interrogation of what it is actually for, that having a “ front of house staff” who look different is not a reliable indicator of how an institution is faring when it comes to inclusion. Diversity isn’t for display; it’s either part of a process to create greater equity and inclusion that, ultimately, should lead to some form of equality, or it’s just window dressing.

One of the funnier illustrations of how this plays out is at the BBC. When it comes to television news they have long seen the need to put Black people front and centre on their flagship news programmes. But when it came to their most important radio programmes there are very few Black people. One can only surmise that on some level they think that the presence of Black people only really matters when you can see them. Their contributions beyond that, one assumes, are deemed to be of little importance.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

The impact when it came to various news outlets can be a mixture of comical and execrable. At one point Dawn Butler (Labour MP for Brent) was mistaken for Marsha De Cordova (Labour MP for Battersea) on the BBC and then, while reporting on how the BBC had made that mistake The Evening Standard confused Marsha de Cordova with Belle Ribeiro-Addy (Labour MP for Streatham). There are only 13 women of African descent in the House of Commons. Yet somehow, they had managed to mix up just under a quarter of them in a single week. Mistakes happen in newsrooms all the time. But one can only assume that these mistakes would have been less likely to have occurred if there had been more non-white people in the room. The trouble is that those particular rooms are not public facing and so are less likely to have non-white people in them.

“The way we see things is affected by what we know and what we believe,” wrote John Berger in Ways of Seeing. “The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled.” What is truly unsettling when it comes to this age of diversity is the degree to which so many will try to claim so much for the politics of representation while offering so little in return. In the words of the slave abolitionist Frederick Douglass, “they want crops without ploughing up the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.”

Diversity, having different people with different experiences in the room, matters. If you ever get to the point of saying it doesn’t matter – and some people do – you’re sunk. If you say it doesn’t matter that Ben Carson, the African American brain surgeon and republican who was Donald Trump’s head of the Department of Housing and Urban affairs (HUD) is Black then you have ceded a very important principle. If you claim that it doesn’t matter that Liz Truss is a woman or Suella Braverman, Rishi Sunak or James Cleverly are Black or Asian then you have boxed yourself into a corner in which a range of arguments you will want to make at other times are no longer available to you. You cannot simply support the notion of diversity so long as the product of that diversity supports you. You either support it or you don’t. Those who are selective will quickly find their credibility on the issue severely undermined.

Diversity in representation matters. Take Sajid Javid. In a cabinet where there were more former Oxford Union presidents than there were minorities, it mattered that the state school-educated son of Pakistani migrants had a top job that covered policing, immigration and security. He brought a set of experiences, from discrimination to family poverty, that were lacking in the highest levels of government.

But, once again. we have to be very careful how we challenge the notion that claims for more diverse representation can be overstated. Because there is a risk here, a risk not that we may be misunderstood but that we might be too literally understood: that sloppy thinking, imprecise framing, opportunist interventions and media-craving could provide ammunition to those who would do us harm. There is a real and important distinction to be made between extolling diversity as a goal in itself and embracing it as just one means towards greater equality and inclusion.

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The fact that he is a millionaire and a Tory clearly did not insulate him from racism. On the Guido Fawkes website, a Conservative site where bigots go to reinforce their rage, his appointment was greeted with the following comments: “It rather appears the white man’s burden has moved in with us for good”; “He’s looking forward to being joined by millions of others from Turkey”; and “Never trust an Arab.” (Let’s forget for a moment that Pakistan is not in the Arab world and further from Turkey than Britain.) When Donald Trump came to Britain and a state banquet was held Javid was not invited. That may have had something to do with the fact that in 2017, after Trump promoted Twitter posts by the far-right group Britain First, Javid tweeted: “So Potus has endorsed the views of a vile, hate-filled racist organisation that hates me and people like me. He is wrong and I refuse to let it go and say nothing.” Now a white Tory Home Secretary might have protested but, in the unlikely event that they did, they would not have been able to protest like that.

Diversity among our representatives matters. It counts for something. If we say it doesn’t then we lose an important component of the argument that says we need different people in the room. But that is the beginning of the argument, not the end. Because the question then arises, well what are they doing in the room? Are they keeping the door open so that others may follow or are they slamming it shut? Is the presence in the room benefiting others or just themselves? Are they ascending alone or are they lifting as they climb? It matters and it counts. The issue is how much does it matter and what does it count for?

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Let’s go back to Javid for just a moment. He became Home Secretary after Amber Rudd was forced to resign because of the Windrush Scandal. When Javid was appointed, he evoked his personal story to express sympathy and contrition. “Like the Caribbean Windrush generation, my parents came to this country from the Commonwealth in the 1960s,” he said. “So, when I heard that people who are outstanding pillars of their community were being impacted simply for not having the right documents to prove their legal status in the UK, I thought it could be my mum, my brother, my uncle – even me.” But a few years earlier he’d happily made clear that, were it up to the policies of this government of which he was a part, there would be no Javid. His dad, Abdul, came to Britain from Pakistan with a pound in his pocket and became a bus driver in Rochdale. Javid made it clear that nowadays his dad would never have been allowed in and that he was fine with that. So, here is a politician who extols his own story as an example of what is possible, even as he actively seeks to ensure that this self-same story would no longer be possible. So, while it counts for something, it clearly doesn’t count for much.

This, I believe, is why the people from underrepresented groups have always found it so much easier to make it to the top on the right than on the left. Broadly speaking it is fair to say the right favours the individual over the collective; those who emerge on the right are keen to insist on their personal rights and responsibilities. On the left people are far more likely to have come through collective institutions – like trade unions, social movements or community activism; those who emerge on that wing are keen to insist on their group affiliations. So, when someone from an underrepresented group rises on the right, they travel light. The ascent is theirs and theirs alone. This is not a criticism – though I do not share that philosophy - but an observation. They are often at pains to deny the importance of their gender or ethnicity.

They are keen to put the dominant culture at its ease. Don’t worry. I’m not bringing anyone with me. I come alone.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Ms Doria Ragland and Prince Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor (2019) Chris Allerton/Sussex Royal.

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If the benefits of diversity in representation only acquires meaning under certain circumstances, then the question remains, what are those circumstances?

But to rise as someone from an underrepresented group on the left, you are more likely to rise as a tribune of your identity. They generally aspire to articulate the interests of the group of which they are a part. They are at pains to explain why their identity is relevant and the groundbreaking nature of their presence in a particular place should be understood contextually. They come with a set of demands beyond themselves. And so, they rise more slowly, but more deliberately and more consequentially, because they are ostensibly bringing others with them.

When Javid explains that he would not let his father in now – that the story on which he has traded is no longer possible – he is being candid about the very limited ramifications of his elevation. But for all that his rise did force a reckoning with those who wish to make pronouncements on diversity.

Two crude camps emerged. One said his appointment showed that that the race of people in positions of power doesn’t matter; while others insisted his appointment was by definition a step forward for all non-white people. Not only are neither of those statements true, both are potentially dangerous since they either dismiss race and ethnicity as being meaningless, or fetishise them as being fundamental.

The importance of representation in public affairs cannot be underestimated; it can however be overstated. Three of the countries in the top ten for representation of women in their national parliaments are also the countries in the top ten for rates of rape.

If the benefits of diversity in representation only acquires meaning under certain circumstances, then the question remains, what are those circumstances? Now there are many factors but, for now, I want to focus on just a couple. The first is that it must take place within the context of a purposeful and determined fight against discrimination. Take people of colour. Hiring a range of non-white people at any level in order to correct an imbalance in the workforce, inevitably begs the question, how did that imbalance come about?

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No institution is isolated from the world in which we live.

Nobody’s opinions can be abstracted from the society in which they were raised. So, if there is racism in your world – and there is – then there will be racism in your institution.

People sometimes talk boldly about eliminating racism from the workplace. I think that’s a grand aspiration. But I don’t think it’s an achievable one – or at least not so long as racism exists elsewhere. Racism is like a hardy virus: it will produce variants that will adapt to whatever body politic exists. The aim, I believe, must be to thwart it, challenge it, mitigate it, call it out, bring it up and whenever possible shut it down.

So anti-racism of course means sanctions for discriminatory behaviour, training, respected and effective grievance procedures and conscious hiring policies that seek to redress the imbalance. But it also means effective monitoring of promotions, retention, communication practices, exit interviews and team dynamics. It means challenging the racism in the organisation because if you don’t the non-white people you recruit will not likely last for very long. It means not integrating people into the culture of the organisation but changing the culture of the organisation to adapt to the new people in question. If their difference makes no difference then why bother?

The other thing I want to focus on is intersectionality. Some people get intimidated by that word but the best way to understand it is this. We are, at any given moment, many things and also just one thing, ourselves. I am straight, male, Black, British, a father and an able-bodied academic from a working-class background and living a middle-class life.

I am also just Gary. All identities work independently but none work all alone. My gender is a factor in my thinking and being, but it can’t be understood without taking into consideration my class, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity and a host of other rogue characters.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

Understanding this is also key into gaining some insight into who has been able to rise and why. Stuart Hall once wrote that only when he came to Britain did he become West Indian. Before his arrival he was Jamaican and he understood that to be very different to Barbadian or Trinidadian. In time the distinctions would be even further flattened and they would just become Black, whether they were from Jamaica, Barbados, Nigeria or Ghana. But the difference mattered.

Obama once again provides an example. His father was Black and Kenyan; his mother was white and American. As such is he is Black and he is Kenyan American but he isn’t African American, a term which was literally invented to describe descendants of slaves. The only history of slavery Obama has in his family came through his mother. Why does this matter? Well, look back to Obama’s 2004 Democratic convention speech which effectively put him on the map.

He refers to his parent’s impossible love and, leveraging his immigrant roots, he says: “My father came to America. A magical place…” Well, his father came to America in 1959.

It no doubt was magical if you were coming from colonised Kenya to university. But for African Americans this was only 5 years after Rosa Parks was kicked off the bus and four years before the March on Washington. African Americans couldn’t vote. No African American candidate could look back on their ancestry and describe it like that. There were disadvantages for Obama too. Much as white Americans loathed Jesse Jackson, they would never have accused him of not being born in America or demanded to see his birth certificate. None of this makes Obama any less Black. It just shows why “Black”, like most racial terms, is often an inadequate shorthand. Turning back to Britain with that critical eye, if we step back a little, we can see something of a pattern in which Sajid Javid’s Pakistani heritage is actually an outlier. The term Asian literally covers half the planet. In this matter it would help to be more precise.

Rishi Sunak’s father was born in Kenya and his mother in what is now Tanzania. They were part of a caste of people of Indian descent within the British Empire which enjoyed some privileges and a far higher status than the local Black African populations. Part of a merchant class they came to Britain with some money and an education – both financial and cultural capital. His father was a GP, his mother was a pharmacist who started her own business. They could send their son to a prep school in Romsey and then onto Winchester. Suella Braverman’s mother is from Mauritius and father is from Kenya (with ancestors in Goa). Her uncle was the Mauritian high commissioner to the UK. Priti Patel’s parents are of Indian descent but came from Uganda.

Black is almost as unhelpful a category as Asian in this regard.

There are no people of Caribbean heritage in the cabinet.

Even African gives only an approximation. Indeed, all those Black people who have been in the cabinet over the last year or so are from West Africa. Kemi Badenoch’s parents are Nigerian. She went to school mostly in America and Nigeria.

Her father is a doctor and her mother is a lecturer. Kwasi Kwarteng’s parents are Ghanaian; his mother is a barrister; his father was an economist with the Commonwealth secretariat. He went to Eton. Of all of them, James Cleverly is the only one with a background of only moderate privilege.

His father was a white, British, surveyor; his mother a Sierra Leonean midwife, and even he went to private school.

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“We can’t be racist: look how diverse we are.”

One would not want to be too reductive about how these ethnicities informed their political trajectories. There is nothing inevitable in them becoming Tories. But there is an undeniable consistency between their class position, their ethnicities (as opposed to their race) and their political affiliation that goes beyond mere coincidence.

It is in this intersection of identities, which may be more or less powerful and exist within each of us, that we are presented with a further challenge in our understanding the politics of representation. To replace an Eton-educated white man with an Eton-educated Black man may be understood as limited progress in any context but particularly in an institution where class discrimination is the central issue. Any permutation for any single appointment or election will be imperfect which is why we cannot understand advances primarily through appointments or elections but must see them in relation to the broader advance of oppressed people in their bid for greater equality and representation.

Which brings me to my final point. So what? So, what if you prioritise photo opportunities. It might not help the pursuit of equal opportunities but how does it hinder it?

First, and most obviously, it contributes to a climate in which the opponents of equal opportunities can thrive and their duplicity fester. We see this over and over. When Trump appointed Ben Carson to Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, there were some – many even – who made the claim that this proves he is not racist. It did nothing of the sort. When the Conservatives had several non-white candidates competing for the leadership some claimed it proved they were not racist. It does nothing of the sort.

When Obama won the presidency people claimed that if he could do it then that proved that racism was not an obstacle to progress in America. It did nothing of the sort.

As Arundhati Roy explained in her essay Do Turkeys Like Thanksgiving, in which she referred to the presidential pardoning of a single turkey during Thanksgiving: 112

“A few carefully bred turkeys … the occasional Colin Powell or Condoleezza Rice … are given absolution and a pass to Frying Pan Park. The remaining millions lose their jobs, are evicted from their homes, have their water and electricity connections cut, and die of Aids. Basically, they’re for the pot … who can say that turkeys are against Thanksgiving? They participate in it!”

The presence of non-white people can also be used as cover for whatever discriminatory agenda is being employed.

Where integrity, or at the very least, intellectual honesty should be, we find people hiding behind implausible deniability. “We can’t be racist: look how diverse we are.” Of course, this is all the more effective when non-white people are advancing policies that will most hurt non-white people.

But we should be careful here not to become essentialist in our understanding of what is taking place. It is patronising, infantilising and racially problematic to claim that Suella Braverman and Priti Patel are being used when they advocate draconian and racist immigration and asylum laws. To say that is to remove their agency and render them as cyphers for some greater, more powerful message. They are grown women. They know what they are doing. They should not be relieved of their responsibility for what they are doing.

What they are doing is wrong. But it is also wrong to claim that they don’t know what they are doing or that they are somehow stooges.

At the end of his epic poem, Notebook of a Return to the Native Land, Aime Cesaire writes: “no race possesses the monopoly of beauty, intelligence, strength [...] and there is space for everyone at the rendezvous of victory.”

No race possesses a monopoly on ugliness, ignorance and weakness either. Unfortunately, there is a space for us all at the gates of perdition should we wish to take that path.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

BBC News Preseter Clive Myrie (2023). Photographer Kathy DeWitt/Alamy.

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Fighting inequality is not a public relations exercise; you can’t take on the endemic challenges bequeathed by centuries of oppression with a marketing campaign. Exclusion is not simply an issue of how things appear. It is a system.

Now it’s not that these moments don’t tell you anything.

They might. Sometimes the thing they tell you is relatively subtle; sometimes it’s stark. But what it can’t tell you, in and of itself, is if racism either isn’t present or is on the retreat.

Part of the problem here is a crude understanding of how racism operates, that if you vote for a Black person or choose to have them in the room or even in your bed then that absolves you of all thoughts and actions regarding race.

That was never the case. Racial integration – indeed any kind of social integration - sits quite easily alongside inequality and discrimination. (Men and women have been integrated for years and look at the inequalities there). The legal right of people to mix does not inevitably change the power relationship between them. In the US the former slave-holding confederacy was, in many ways, the most racially integrated part of the US. There were high rates of miscegenation (mostly forced and occasionally consensual); slaves and servants raised white children and often lived in close quarters with their owners. Strom Thurmond, who ran for the presidency in 1948 as a segregationist, fathered a Black daughter by a maid in 1924. The issue was never whether people mixed but on what basis and to what end.

So, admitting non-white people into an organisation, even getting them to run it, does not, by itself, suggest an institution is advancing racially. Indeed, quite often photo opportunities are used precisely to avoid having to grapple with equal opportunities. Which brings us to the next problem: the vulnerability of the people in the photo. Because when individuals are advanced as poster boys or girls of a particular agenda rather than as part of a thoroughgoing shift of power they become extraordinarily vulnerable.

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People question their capacity to do the job. If things don’t change elsewhere in the institution, then others look at them and wonder what use their presence is to them. Now I want to make it plain here that the burden for this problem should not be put on the Black or brown person who gets the job. We live in a capitalist society, we need to work. I do not doubt for a second that the people in these jobs are generally qualified to do them. Even if they’re not, that would not differentiate them from many of their white colleagues who ostensibly will pass or fail on their record, not their race.

But it is those people in the photo who will be held in doubt both by a portion of their white colleagues who believe they were not hired on their merits and by a portion of their non-white colleagues who treat them with suspicion for having risen to a position of prominence in an organisation they deem to be racist. The final negative consequence of approaching representation as a standalone, promotional exercise in the age of diversity is cynicism. Those who support inclusion and equity become cynical because they want change and, instead, they get non-white faces in prominent places. Non-white people see an outcome but no process. They are presented with a trajectory they have little chance of emulating because discrimination within the institution remains as embedded as ever. Just as the White House only needs to pardon one Turkey, there are only so many people the institution needs in any one photo. If they’re not sincere about changing the way the organisation operates, then they really only need them for the photo.

Voices of Resistance Equal Opportunities and Photo Opportunities: The Politics of Representation in the Age of Diversity — Gary Younge

But it also feeds the cynicism of opponents of equity and inclusion. It’s not a matter of principle, they conclude, it’s all for show. Why bother with the show? After all there is no problem. If there was a real problem, they’d tackle it.

But clearly, they’re not worried about the way things are, just the way things look. Fighting inequality is not a public relations exercise; you can’t take on the endemic challenges bequeathed by centuries of oppression with a marketing campaign. Exclusion is not simply an issue of how things appear. It is a system. We don’t want diversity for its own sake but as a means of removing discrimination from that system. In representation we seek people who will change the system in our interests, not just in our likeness. The colour of the people at the top are not irrelevant. But the symbolic value of seeing a handful breaking through a glass ceiling is only so much use if hundreds more are stuck in the basement and the lifts have been disabled.

References Calmes, J. (2012) When a Boy Found a Familiar Feel in a Pat of the Head of State. The New York Times.

Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/24/ us/politics/indelible-image-of-a-boys-pat-onobamas-head-hangs-in-white-house.html Accessed: 31 July 2023 Kochhar, R., Fry, R., (2014) Wealth inequality has widened along racial, ethnic lines since end of Great Recession. Pew Research Center. Available at: https:// www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2014/12/12/ racial-wealth-gaps-great-recession/ Accessed: 31 July 2023 McKellogg, J., (2012) The Obama Haircut The Washington Post. Available at: https://www. washingtonpost.com/video/politics/decision2012/ the-obama-haircut/2012/10/25/efc1d556-1ea211e2-9746-908f727990d8_video.html Accessed: 31 July 2023 Sallis, T. (2018). More Union Presidents than BME people in cabinet. Cherwell. Available at: https:// cherwell.org/2018/01/19/more-union-presidentsthan-bme-people-in-cabinet/ Accessed: 31 July 2023 The Guardian (2023) Barack Obama. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/barack-obama Accessed: 31 July 2023 White, G. B., (2015). The Racial Gaps in America’s Recovery. The Atlantic. Available at: https://www. theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/08/jobsnumbers-racial-gap-recovery/400685/ Accessed: 31 July 2023 This is a transcript of the Windrush Day Lecture delivered on 22 June 2023 for Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage.

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COLONISATION IN REVERSE: FROM MARGIN TO CENTRE LOUISE BENNETT’S SATIRICAL POEM, COLONIZATION IN REVERSE WRITTEN IN RESPONSE TO THE WAVES OF CARIBBEAN MIGRATION TO THE UNITED KINGDOM IN THE 1950S, GLEEFULLY CELEBRATES THE TRANSFORMING POWER OF JAMAICAN CULTURE AS IT PLANTS ITSELF ON BRITISH SOIL. MOVING FROM THE “MARGINS” OF EMPIRE TO THE IMPERIAL “CENTRE,” CARIBBEAN PEOPLE DESTABILISE THE COLONIAL IMBALANCE OF POWER:

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Wat a joyful news, Miss Mattie, I feel like me heart gwine burs’ Jamaica people colonizin Englan in reverse. ...

What a islan! What a people!

Man an woman, old an young Jusa pack dem bag an baggage An tun history upside dung!

Voices of Resistance Colonisation in Reverse: From Margin to Centre — Carolyn Cooper

Caribbean Arrivals (1962) Photograph by Trinity Mirror/Mirrorpix/Alamy

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Turning the native into an alien in his/her own country was one of the deliberate consequences of British imperialism across the globe. Reverse colonisation through language most appropriately makes bigots like Starkey aliens in England.

In a related poem, Independance – yes, “dance” – Bennett mocks the song and dance of flag Independence orchestrated by the political elite. Conversely, she validates the high self-esteem of many so-called “ordinary” Jamaicans who do, indeed, take on the world with extraordinary confidence.

They upend history. Bennett suggests that physical size is no absolute determinant of real power, or of a people’s sense of their proper place in the world. In the words of Miss Mattie: She hope dem caution worl-map Fi stop draw Jamaica small, For de lickle speck cyaan show We independantness at all!

Moresomever we must tell map dat We don’t like we position Please kindly teck we out a sea An draw we in de ocean. (118) Miss Mattie’s personification of worl-map is an excellent example of the way in which predominantly oral Jamaicans conceptualise abstraction. Worl-map is just like any other out-of-order individual you can reprimand, if you don’t like the way s/he chooses to position you in the larger scheme of things. Miss Mattie intuitively recognises that maps are not absolutely fixed representations of some divinely orchestrated ecosystem. Maps delineate the geo-politics of the times. To study the history of the maps of the world is to understand the shifts of power among those who still claim the (natural) right to define the expansive boundaries of their own world, to the exclusion of others.

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The reverse colonisation of England is manifested in the widespread impact of the Jamaican language. In 2011, the notorious historian David Starkey made a now-infamous allegation on BBC Two’s Newsnight programme. In his commentary on rioting across England provoked by the murder of a Black man, Mark Duggan, by police in London, Starkey declared: “What has happened is that the whites have become black.

A particular sort of violent, destructive, nihilistic gangster culture has become the fashion. Black and white, boy and girl, operate in this language together. This language, which is wholly false, which is this Jamaican patois that’s been intruded in England. And this is why so many of us have this sense of literally a foreign country.”

Turning the native into an alien in his/her own country was one of the deliberate consequences of British imperialism across the globe. Reverse colonisation through language most appropriately makes bigots like Starkey aliens in England. More than a decade after Starkey’s vitriolic outburst, the supposedly “wholly false” language of youth culture is now acknowledged as an authentic expression of the culture of unwelcome intruders who have claimed the right to settle in the “motherland”. The Jamaican language has become mainstream.

Voices of Resistance Colonisation in Reverse: From Margin to Centre — Carolyn Cooper

To mark the seventy-fifth anniversary of the arrival of Caribbean migrants in the UK on the Empire Windrush, London Transport’s Poems on the Underground series highlights six poets. The first four verses of Louise Bennett’s Colonization in Reverse were selected. Two other Jamaican poets are featured: James Berry and Kei Miller. Benjamin Zephaniah, born in Britain to a Jamaican mother and a Barbadian father, John Agard and Grace Nichols, both born in Guyana, are also celebrated.

Kei Miller’s poem, The Only Thing Far Away, gives a pungent account of colonisation in reverse, expressed in the language of food: In this country, Jamaica is not quite as far as you might think. Walking through Peckham in London, West Moss Road in Manchester, you pass green and yellow shops where tie-headwomen bargain over the price of dasheen.

Miller extends the process of reverse colonisation beyond the Caribbean: And beside Jamaica is Spain selling large yellow peppers, lemon to squeeze onto chicken. Beside Spain is Pakistan, then Egypt, Singapore, the world . . . here, strangers build home Together, flood the ports with curry and papayas in Peckham and on Moss Road, the place smells of more than just patty and tandoori. It smells like Mumbai, like Castries, like Princess Street, Jamaica.

Sometimes in this country, the only thing far away is this country.

Similarly, Grace Nichols reclaims the “vernacular flavoured names” in the alien markets of the UK in her poem Bourda: Not Aubergine but Balanjay Not Spinach but Calaloo Not Green-beans but Bora Not Chilli but Bird-pepper And not just any mango but the one crowned, Buxton Spice, Still hiding its ambrosia in the roof of my mouth, still flowering like the bird-picked mornings on the branches of my memory.

Benjamin Zephaniah’s The London Breed confirms another form of colonisation in reverse, the music of the Caribbean: I love dis great polluted place Where pop stars come to live their dreams Here ravers come for drum and bass And politicians plan their schemes, The music of the world is here Dis city can play any song

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Reggae, lovers’ rock, dancehall, calypso, soca, grime, jungle are the carnivalesque sounds of the city. James Berry’s SeaSong One is an ironic reminder of the optimism that took Caribbean migrants to the UK: Come on Seawash of travel Expose new layers of skin Come on calm voice of sea Come and settle on land Sea’s tumble wash Change our rags for riches John Agard’s Windrush Child evokes both the past and the future: Windrush child your Windrush mum and dad think of storytime yard and mango mornings and new beginnings doors closing and opening These Windrush poems on the underground tell a complex story of reverse colonisation. There is loss but also recovery.

In the words of Benjamin Zephaniah: A world of food displayed on streets Where all the world can come and dine On meals that end with bitter sweets And cultures melt and intertwine

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References Agard, J. (2009). ‘Windrush Child’ (for Vince Reid, the youngest passenger on the Windrush, then aged 13), from Alternative Anthem, Bloodaxe Books.

Berry J. (2011). ‘Sea-Song One’ from Windrush Songs, in The Story I Am In: Selected Poems, Bloodaxe Books.

Bennett, L. (1982). Jamaica Labrish, Kingston: Sangster’s Book Stores, pp 179.

Bennett, L. (1966). Selected Poems “Independance” Kingston: Sangster’s Book Stores, pp 129 Miller, K. (2007). ‘The only thing far away’ from There Is an Anger that Moves, Carcanet.

Nichols, G. (2020) ‘Bourda’ from Passport to Here and There. Bloodaxe Books.

Zephaniah, B. (2001) ‘The London Breed’ from Too Black, Too Strong. Bloodaxe Books.

Voices of Resistance Colonisation in Reverse: From Margin to Centre — Carolyn Cooper

A father and son arrive at Waterloo Station. 15 October 1951. Photographer Mirrorpix/Alamy

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IS SHE BANJEE, OR IS SHE C**T? NO MORE THE MEEK AND MILD SUBSERVIENT WE!

WE’RE FIGHTING FOR OUR RIGHTS, MILITANTLY! Sister Suffragette (1960)

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The lyrics above from the 1960s musical Mary Poppins are a declaration of gender equality, a war cry to the emerging feminist calling her to “cast off her shackles” and take her place as socially and politically equal to men. Sister Suffragette is a character of commentary, a Disney depiction of a woman’s protest against the “Cult of True Womanhood” (History.com Editors, 2009). She is a character representation of a feminist rally against the internalisation of patriarchal propaganda that deems the woman’s empowerment and agency as a gateway to promiscuity and objectification. Sister Suffragette advocates that we should all be feminists and work collectively to radically humanise the modern-day housewife and emerging adult woman by empowering her rights over her body with liberty and justice for some. We need to discuss the superimposed criteria for being a feminist and the injustices against every woman’s right to say yes to her pleasure and authentic self-expression without assault or judgment. Feminism, while well-intentioned, often comes across as a construct of classism. It is an approach to a particular socioeconomic status that dehumanises one person to rehumanise another, a mindset plagued by misogyny and Eurocentric sensibilities.

Is Feminism a political ideology in need of re-evaluation?

Perhaps it is time for a heart-to-heart about the origins of our perceptions of hypersexuality, etiquette, and popular revue to ensure equity of femininity across all persons who identify as women, whether by birth or choice.

Voices of Resistance Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? — Alexandria Davis

Nicki Minaj at the Billboard Hot 100 Music Festival (2015). Photographer Daniel DeSlover/ZUMA Wire/Alamy.

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Fun fact: C**t is the second most derogatory word in the English language, just on the tail end of N****r.

Is there a correct way to empower femininity? I will break down the word “empower” to help us better explore this question. To empower is to grant someone permission to take authority over one’s own life, strengthening one’s confidence to do something. Empowerment is a human interaction in which both parties must first respect each other as individuals, not property. So, how do we empower the Black body? How do we find justice for a body that continues to be demonised and objectified by post-colonial attitudes that have memorialised an entire Diaspora as primitive and needing refinement? In the now globalised feminist effort, where is justice for the Black woman, her body, and her holistic existence, pleasure and all? At what point will she gain permission to appreciate her fullness without being demonised for the magnitude of her assimilated physical characteristics? Do you think feminism was created with the Black woman in mind, or is she an immortal representation of what not to be?

Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? Fun fact, C**t is the second most derogatory word in the English language, just on the tail end of N****r. Many feminists of the twentieth century have taken back this word as a statement of feminine power, a campaign that seeks to “transform the pejorative” and reclaim the woman’s right to protest and pleasure (Muscio, 2002). The big C-word is also popular in Queer/Ballroom culture, a persona reclaimed as feminine superiority. Banjee, on the other hand, is a term associated with the unrefined woman; some individuals even would go so far as to say, “the embodiment of a ghetto/’hood Black woman.” An example of this stereotyping can be witnessed through the character Tommy in American author, playwright and actress Alice Childress’s Wine in the Wilderness. Tommy, whose name we later learn is short for Tomorrow, is a female factory worker.

To some, like the play’s main character, Bill Jamison, and his two “educated, middle class” companions, Cynthia and Sonnyman, Tommy is the manifestation of “Banjee” when they meet her wearing a cheap weave and tacky skirt. Bill Jamison is a visual artist on a mission to complete the final painting in a “triptych” he titles “Wine in the Wilderness” - a series of paintings realising his concept of the Black woman’s evolution.

Jamison sees Tommy as the ideal model for the triptych’s missing segment, the “Banjee” Black woman, to counter his already defined vision of “a regal Mother Africa in her noblest form.” For Jamison, the third image in the triptych is, 124

“The lost woman... what the society has made out of our women. She’s as far from my African queen as a woman can get and still be female; she’s as close to the bottom as you can get without crackin’ up ... she’s ignorant, unfeminine, coarse, rude ... vulgar ... a poor, dumb chick that’s had her behind kicked until it’s numb ... and the sad part is ... she ain’t together, you know, ... there’s no hope for her.” (Childress, 1969) While this is not a conversation about the Black man’s perspective of Black womanhood, it is an investigation of why Marilyn Monroe and not Josephine Baker. How can some women reclaim their power to transcend the pejorative while memorialising Black feminine iconography as “a symbol of alienation and degradation of colonisation, lost children, exile, the expropriation of female labor… the sexual and the economic exploitation of Black women by men, White or Black” (Elkins, 2007).

Voices of Resistance Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? — Alexandria Davis

Saartje Baartman. Image Chronicle/Alamy.

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The quote above is from cultural historian Rachel Holmes about the nineteenth century performer, Sara Baartman, affectionately known as the Hottenttot Venus, a woman and descendant of the non-Bantu-speaking people of South Africa known as the Khoikhoi. Baartman was introduced to London in the late eighteenth century via a series of slave trades by men who sought to profit from the exploits of her physique through photography and exhibition showcases.

This tragic tale, summarised by Holmes, aids in the disempowerment of Baartman as a person, memorialising her dehumanisation as a slave first, and victim second. An archive of circumstance which further appropriates the Black woman and her legacy. Many would argue this is because Baartman was enslaved, but does being a victim of circumstance impact your access to resilience and ingenuity? Is Baartman not allowed to be celebrated for her empowered exhibition of assumed sensual identity in the face of social adversity? Two hundred and eight years later, Black artists and icons like Nicki Minaj, Lil Kim and Foxy Brown are referred to as “the modern-day Sara Saartjie Baartman” (Dionne, 2012), demonised for their choices to capitalise off the hyper sexualisation of their image and artistry. To some, like culture writer, Evette Dionne, their behaviour “further devalues the Black woman’s presence in media and entertainment.” This point of view is instilled in many of us through debutante balls and tea parties. It is an attitude that attempts to shame these women for their ability to engineer personal empowerment in the face of adversity. I am advocating for the re-evaluation of how we speak about all women and their right to approach feminine liberation as they choose. Acknowledging our history does not require us to be consumed by the myth of what caused our dehumanisation.

I vote we do away with the weaponisation of history and attributes of Black iconography as a portrait of exploitation.

While we cannot erase the past that many members of the African Diaspora were enslaved, we need to clarify that our ancestors were not slaves. Enslavement is a condition; a slave is a pronoun that robs a person of humanity. Ask yourself what is to gain from debasing these Black women or any woman’s approach to femininity and celebration of her body to an unintelligent act of bestiality. We can all be more mindful with our use of language and critique to help unstitch ourselves from the attitudes of misogyny that manifest in a derogatory commentary that perpetuate the devaluation of an entire Diaspora and gender identity.

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References Childress, A. (1969). Wine in the Wilderness: A Comedy-drama. Dramatists Play Service, Inc. Nika, C. (2018). Rolling Stone. Available at: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culturenews/qa-azealia-banks-on-why-the-c-word-isfeminine-181176/ Accessed: 31 July 2023 Dionne, E. Nicki Minaj - the Modern Sarah Baartman. For Harriet Celebrating the Fullness of Black Womanhood. Available at: http://www. forharriet.com/2012/04/nicki-minaj-modern-sarahbaartman.html.

Accessed: 31 July 2023 Elkins, C. (2007). African Queen: The Real Life of the Hottentot Venus by Rachel Holmes - Books - Review.

The New York Times. Available at: https://www. nytimes.com/2007/01/14/books/review/Elkins.t.html Accessed: 31 July 2023 Gamble, M. (2007) The Legacy of Sara Baartman, vol.

15., 2022 Sherman, R. M., and Sherman, R. B., (1964) Glynis Johns Sister Suffragette Available at: https://g.co/ kgs/XmXDxt History.com Editors. (2009, October 29). Women’s Suffrage - The U.S. Movement, Leaders & 19th Amendment. HISTORY. Available at: https://www. history.com/topics/womens-history/the-fight-forwomens-suffrage Accessed: 13 June 2023 Matthews, A. D. Hyper-Sexualization of Black Women in the Media. University of Washington Tacoma, 2018. Available at: https:// digitalcommons.tacoma.uw.edu/cgi/viewcontent. cgi?article=1026&context=gender_studies.

Accessed: 31 July 2023.

Muscio, I. (2002). Cunt: A Declaration of Independence. Seal Press.

Paul, D. “Chapter 6: Voguing - Category Is: The Language of Cunt.” VANGARDIST MAGAZINE, 23 June 2021. Available at: https://vangardist.com/newsarticle/chapter-6-the-language-of-cunt/.

Accessed: 31 July 2023.

Voices of Resistance Is she Banjee, or is she C**t? — Alexandria Davis

Beyonce Knowles at the American Music Awards (2007). Photographer Lionel Hahn/ABACAPRESS/Alamy.

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A DEEP DIVE INTO BLACK BRITISH CULTURE FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MUSICIAN AND BLACK WOMAN BEING BLACK BRITISH ENCOMPASSES A MULTIFACETED RANGE OF EXPERIENCES, STRUGGLES, ACHIEVEMENTS, AND CULTURAL EXPRESSIONS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO THE FABRIC OF THE NATION. HOWEVER, WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF BEING BLACK BRITISH, AND WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO EXPLORE ITS HISTORICAL ROOTS? WHAT ARE THE CONTEMPORARY CHALLENGES, AND HOW CAN WE CELEBRATE ITS UNIQUE IDENTITY?

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Pride, gratification, solidity, security, support, and integrity are words that come to mind when thinking of British patriotism. However, for many Black people, their British identity is shaped by a complex interplay of factors, including their cultural background, experiences of racism and discrimination, and their sense of belonging to both the Black and British communities.

The history of Black people in the United Kingdom can be traced back to the Roman occupation of Britain, when Black soldiers and merchants from North Africa were among those who settled in the country. Despite this, the modern history of Black people in Britain is often associated with the period of slavery and the slave trade.

The influx of Black immigrants to the UK is very much a part of my history as my grandmother and grandfather on both sides of my family came here during the 1960s. When they arrived, they were greeted with much disdain and life was hard for them.

Voices of Resistance A Deep Dive into Black British Culture from the Perspective of a Musician and Black Woman — VV Brown

Black British Albumn Cover. VV Brown.

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Growing up, I often heard stories from my uncles who had experienced the cruel reality of racism in Britain. They talked about how Black men had to hide their bags and keep their hands firmly in their pockets whenever they were near police officers, out of fear that they would be unjustly accused and arrested. Even now their tales still haunt me - when my father and brother talk about law enforcement, I can sense a deep underlying tension, a heavy air of fear and mistrust.

It is almost like it’s become instinctive, something that has been passed down through the generations; we live with an everlasting feeling of foreboding and insecurity whenever police are around us.

As time passed, many people in the community had feelings of segregation and abandonment only increased. They were seen as nothing more than outsiders, viewed with mistrust and resentment by those who had lived there for so long that they felt entitled to their location in a higher status bracket.

The history of this entitlement comes from the British Empire, which is steeped in a deep and oppressive past, from the days of colonial rule to modern day. This imperialistic attitude has left its marks on many areas of society, but none more so than the Black community. It has contributed to the persistence of racism and inequality. Because of this there is a deep dichotomy when it comes to Black British identity where there is often an internal conflict and tension that arises from existing in two worlds: the dominant culture, and the culture of one’s own racial or ethnic group. Whilst the experience of Black people in the United Kingdom is not identical to that of African Americans, the concept of double consciousness can still be relevant.

The concept of being ‘in-between’ or ‘straddling’ two distinct cultures has long been acknowledged by sociologists.

According to Bourdieu’s theory of habitus, individuals can develop an appreciation for aspects of their culture that they would otherwise not have access to if they weren’t expatriates. Similarly, Melucci’s theory of social autotomy posits that people who inhabit two different cultures often carry out activities which are symbolic negotiations between them. As I grew older, I became increasingly aware of how often I had to “mask” parts of my identity to fit into different environments. From a white-dominated ballet class to an oppressive Oxford interview, I could feel myself squirming and shrinking under the pressure to be less than who I was.

This kind of self-censorship only serves to deplete one’s sense of self; as a young Black woman, it was often exhausting for me simply trying to exist in such contexts.

Black Britishness is a complex and multi-faceted journey, and opinions on racism and the modern conversation vary widely.

Black British people may feel caught between two worlds, struggling to fully identify with either British or African and African Caribbean culture.

Conversely, it is important to reinforce that we are a community of much strength and resilience, out of which comes bridges of creativity and excellence. Despite being fragmented in many ways, it is our pain that encourages us to rise and be better versions of ourselves. We use the hardships faced to motivate growth, productivity and culture, inviting a new era of ingenuity and innovation. We have embraced the historical struggles, cultural fusion, and ongoing resilience and the Black British identity represents a powerful force that continues to shape the nation’s cultural fabric. A generation has grown on the shoulders of the strength of those before us and with this has caused a powerful conscious shift in generational wealth and the breakage of generational trauma and fatalistic expectation.

By recognising and celebrating Black Britishness, we can collectively foster a more inclusive, equitable society, where everyone’s contributions are valued, and diversity is embraced as a strength. As it states in my song Black British: “navigating through the beautiful and terrifying life, Black British”.

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Voices of Resistance A Deep Dive into Black British Culture from the Perspective of a Musician and Black Woman — VV Brown

Black British people may feel caught between two worlds, struggling to fully identify with either British or African and African Caribbean culture.

VV Brown.

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Place and Space

What does it mean to care for the spaces we have created? This section examines changemakers across environmental activism, music, education and technology as they consider appropriation, representation and legacy.

Change comes not just from building and growing, it is about carefully tending what we have created to ensure that it continues to thrive.

Reflections of a Cultural Gardener — Martin Glynn Representation and Contrast — Michelle-Kim Vacciana Dance, Embodied Knowledge and the Reclaiming of Spaces — Farida Nabibaks Colourism in Reggaeton — Maya Brookes

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REFLECTIONS OF A CULTURAL GARDENER SETTING THE CONTEXT

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE COMMISSIONS STOP COMING IN, AND YOU HAVE DONE ENOUGH WITH YOUR CAREER? TURNING 65 IN JULY 2022, I REACHED A POINT WHERE I NEEDED TO RE-EVALUATE BOTH MY LIFE AND CAREER. I NOW REFER TO MYSELF AS A CULTURAL GARDENER, AS I AM OF AN AGE WHERE I AM GROWING, ENDING AND TAKING CARE OF MY LEGACY, WHILST ROOTING IT FIRMLY WITHIN THE LANDSCAPE OF THE BLACK CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL PRESENCE. I COME TO THIS POSITION HAVING HAD A CAREER IN THE ARTS SPANNING OVER FOUR DECADES WHERE I HAVE HAD MUCH OF MY WORK BOTH PUBLISHED AND PRODUCED. ALONGSIDE THIS, I HAVE PURSUED AN ACADEMIC CAREER WHERE I GAINED A DOCTORATE AND AN APPETITE FOR WRITING HISTORIES OF THE BLACK PRESENCE. 134

Place and Space Reflections of a Cultural Gardener — Martin Glynn

Francis Williams, the Scholar of Jamaica. (circa 1745) Oil Painting. Unknown Painter. Courtesy of Victoria and Albert Museum.

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– THE BLACK PRESENCE IN HISTORY History for me is about repair, healing, and the building of personal agency on account of inaccurate depictions of my past that today needs the revision and reimagining.

The history I refer to here is unreconciled in its telling by those who have hidden multiple truths in exchange for the propagation of white privilege and superiority. When I looked for deeper insights expressed through the lens of crime and punishment, I found myself wanting. My book, Invisible Voices: The Black Presence in Crime and Punishment in the UK, 1750-1900, did not start with quotes, academic theorising, or point-scoring historical references. Neither was it designed to court public opinion in the hope of gaining approval from white historians. The entry into the narrative drive was rooted in a simple science fiction premise, namely “what would happen if British history reflected, represented, and included me? whose social, cultural, and political identity is not white.”

– THE SEARCH Frequenting mainstream bookshops such as Waterstones, I searched aimlessly for books rooted in both the Georgian and Victorian periods that reflected a truer picture where “crime and punishment” is concerned. Legions of books exploring both those periods presented robustly researched and well-argued scholarly works. The insights, perspectives, and positions are accurate. However, scouring this material in search of the elusive narratives of Black peoples’ contribution, I came away dismayed, frustrated, and brought back to 1968, when I entered my first year of senior school and encountered history for the first time. I loved learning about the past, embraced the intrigue, mystery, and stories of days gone by. However, reflecting, I never saw any historical figure of note that looked like me. Fast forward to the 1990s when I started to work in prisons where many offenders I met looked like me, where those being stopped and searched looked like me, where those occupying column inches for violent crime looked like me. Fast forward to 2010, when I began my PhD, a journey where I uncovered a hidden shroud thrown over the historical reasons why so many of those who looked like me propped up the criminal justice system.

Fast forward to 2020, I decided I need to understand mass incarceration, racial disproportionality, the absence of the teachings of slavery, colonialism, indigenous oppression, the rise of right-wing populism, alongside the proliferation of the racialisation of criminal justice systems. So, I decided if I could not find the literature, I needed to unearth this hidden narrative, put it into the world, and invite a wider readership to contest claims made without ever making the exclusion of people who look like me accountable for this omission.

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– TENDING THE GARDEN Like my predecessors I have spent years examining how changes of notable historical events such as rapid population growth, industrialisation, slavery, the colonisation of Africa, and subjugation of Indigenous peoples have impacted on our understandings of crime and punishment during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It is further upsetting to learn how previous historians have air brushed me out of wider contemporary debates and claims made regarding the Black historical presence. A key impetus for me therefore in authoring this book was not to lean too heavily on regurgitating the apparatus and mechanisms of crime and punishment but, instead, to detect and focus on lifting the veil of silence that surrounds “the Black presence” that is both obscured and hidden from the public gaze.

Having grown tired of the absence of critical discourses on the Black historical within the UK, and understanding binary concepts, such as assimilation verses integration, blackness verses whiteness, colour blindness verses racial privilege, independence verses interest convergence, that have previously been passed off as simplistic arguments, which at times is nothing more than fighting over a patch of racialised waste ground that seldom alleviates the damage that a disconnect from history has had on the wider perceptions of Black people and their lives. Revision of crime and punishment history in my view has a key role to play in shaping the way we should understand, and engage with, noteworthy events in our lives, both past and present in relation to the construction of our understandings of the wider crime and punishment history project. History in this context is equally important in the way we understand how the trajectory and orientation of race in relation to crime and punishment has also changed over time. It is now time to transcend the imposed limitations by those who see history as mere events, not the stories behind them. My work now chooses to speak to this situation and make the Black presence visible by creating a space for muted voices to speak. My future work also lays a foundation for the next generation of students, scholars, educators, and practitioners to pick up the mantle, pushing the agenda for historical recognition forward.

Pause, reflect, and dwell with me, as we garden together.

Place and Space Reflections of a Cultural Gardener — Martin Glynn

“what would happen if British history reflected, represented, and included me? whose social, cultural, and political identity is not white.”

A Sketch At The Holborn Townhall, London: ‘Is The Beaconsfield Government To Have A Fresh Lease Of Power?’ ‘No!’, (1880).

Photographer Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group/Getty Images.

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REPRESENTATION AND CONTRAST THE EMPIRE WINDRUSH MADE ITS VARIOUS EMBARKMENTS WITH INTREPID EXPLORERS, FROM ACROSS THE CARIBBEAN ISLES, ON BOARD. THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT HAD REACHED INTO THE ‘COLONIES’ TO SPECIFICALLY REQUEST OUR PARTICIPATION IN SUPPORTING THE UK’S RECOVERY FROM THE DEVASTATION OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR. THERE WAS A NEED FOR OUR PROFESSIONAL PROWESS, AND WE WERE COURTED

BY MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT WHO CARRIED OUT RECRUITMENT TOURS OF THE ISLANDS AND, IN LATER YEARS, BY QUEEN ELIZABETH II’S TOUR OF JAMAICA, ALL WHICH MUST HAVE BEEN VERY COMPELLING AND CALLED TO OUR ASPIRATIONAL RECKONING. HOWEVER, FOR THOSE OF US THAT HAD THE FAITH, THAT PUT OUR MONEY AND OUR LIVES INTO THE DREAM, ALMOST AS SOON AS DOCKING, WE FELT THE SENSATION OF BEING MAROONED, NO WARM WELCOME, NO APPLAUSE, NO THANKS. 138

Place and Space Representation and Contrast — Michelle-Kim Vacciana

Within one generation of our time in the UK, ceilings were lowered especially for us, so there was no space to stand to our full height, let alone grow taller. This restriction was then combined with residential apartheid and a very cool wind, which threatened to blow us back across the seas unless we be compliant with our own oppression. Within two generations we were ghettoised and criminalised. Three generations deep and our place in society is still worthy of the term “struggle”.

Children at a primary school in Nottingham (1985). Photographer John Birdsall/Alamy.

It seems more broadly, that the world is in the flux of crisis; nationally we know this to be true. With a barrage of news stories pertaining to the brutalness imposed on the Black experience, such as stop and search, disproportionate penalisation that often starts within school and echoes out onto the streets, almost seamlessly then clocking into the prison system. Relevant intervention and care come down to the grinding work of grass roots companies, community groups, churches, and individuals, desperately trying to halt the well-trodden cascade of inner-city life, which often starts with education. School is where children usually feel the first sting of how racism functions.

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Schools are institutions, implementing a framework for key formative years, carving out paths that [especially] position Black children, as less than. There is a discomfort around acknowledgement of being “othered”, and an unconscious satisfaction with putting or seeing the “othered” child in their perceived rightful place via harsher punishment, exclusion, banning of culturally specific hair styles, claims of intimidation and a nuance of other versions of bias, based around a person’s ethnicity.

Visceral wrongdoing by these educational bodies entrenched abusive behaviours that happen in such spaces, is currently coming to light more and more. Institutional bodies whilst wrapped in expectations and standards set in place by policy, is still at the mercy of individuals, to fulfil what has been set out in writing with integrity.

When you walk within the walls of an institution, your focus is pulled in. Having worked as an artist in education for 20 years, I have been present to witness the routine and instinctive framing of Black children as automatically villainous (never the victim), and is amongst the standardised attitudes that harangue the mushrooming “Academy” school system. Academies do not afford teachers the room for individualisation, reflection, growth and to consider how we collectively go about caring for each-other in a way that does not discriminate. Nobody wants to declare that they are a racist and most people who are, do not recognise it, and would rather argue the guilt of the children they are responsible for the care of, than scrutinise their own thinking. Data driven targets and the push for improved statistics, help create an artifice that is contrary to why most people enter the teaching profession.

Amongst this are Black children who are less likely to be considered when it comes to expressing appreciation, the administration of appropriate care, empathy, understanding, and protection.

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One of the key factors that I have significantly witnessed both within the walls of schools and out in society, is a bizarre fear and disgruntlement around Black people expressing joy. I was on lunchtime duty once at a secondary school, when I was drawn to a group of seven to eight students who were excited about something; they made the effort to tell me that a music video they had made and placed on YouTube was doing well. I was delighted as I had encouraged them to pool their talents and do something creative together. As they played me the music, they started dancing, singing along and experiencing joy. I noticed the headteacher get on his walkie talkie and come striding over, shouting “what’s going on! Stop this! Stop this immediately!”.

Unfortunately for him, I was part of the throng and whilst I didn’t know the words to the track, I contributed a host of dance moves! The headteacher became very stuck when he saw me amongst the group, and I could see that he was desperately thinking about what to do next. I made a point of inviting him to join us, to which he looked as though I’d insulted him. He ended up walking away on that occasion, but had I not been there, I know those students would have experienced a very different outcome.

I have worked alongside some incredible education staff who are fending off discrimination, but like the people they represent, they can often come under fire also. Teaching is one of the leading professions that people leave within three years of qualifying or taking up a position in a school.

Place and Space Representation and Contrast — Michelle-Kim Vacciana

Having worked as an artist in education for 20 years, I have been present to witness the routine and instinctive framing of Black children as villainous and is amongst the standardised attitudes that harangue the mushrooming “Academy” school system.

– RELOCATION AND SURVIVAL

– SO BE A LEADER, NOT A DICTATOR

The 1940’s – 1970’s world which saw the peak of transition from the Caribbean, did not speak about the impact of poor mental health in people’s lives, on a person’s physical wellbeing, capacity for resilience, and its ability to erode away hope. Generational trauma is real, not a theory, but a living aspect of individual and communal lives.

Be authentic and bold enough to decide upon your own journey and not what is pressed upon you by societal stereotyping and racist expectations. Remember what it was like for you and help someone else along the way.

Education and many other social sectors are in the grips of institutionalism, so hold tight to your personal values; you may occasionally have to sit around a board table and kick ass. Do not be intimidated by pretentious job titles. Assess someone according to how they treat you. Shouting has its place but save your voice for more meaningful conversation.

The very fact that Black people prosper in such a terrain is a testimony to our grace and buoyancy. People are survivalists in general, and as part of a majority that has been globally oppressed, we are masters of alchemy; turning pain into power, fighting, and finding the resilience to continue to invent whilst re-navigating and chartering our own course. The influence and power of Blackness is the most positively impactful across the world. This is success. This is revolution.

And remember… at the end of any day… most of us just want to have a place where we belong.

We are not bobbing above the surface… we are out here making waves.

– REVELATION, MOVING BEYOND SURVIVAL From an island in the Caribbean, to an island in the UK; people are, metaphorically, finding their way back home, carving out new spaces, acting through new visions, cultivating joy, and taking strategic action. Seeing the declaration of the lack of value in Black lives being played out in the media, the absence of empathy from others in our pain and the minimising and justification as to why we are brutalised, has had a paradoxical impact; anger can be disabling, it can turn in on itself, but it can also be an impetus to navigate positive change.

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DANCE, EMBODIED KNOWLEDGE AND THE RECLAIMING OF SPACES THE INFLUENCE OF THE COLONIAL PAST IS PRESENT IN COUNTRY HOUSES IN THE NETHERLANDS, THE UK AND OTHER EUROPEAN COUNTRIES, THAT ARE OFTEN FRAMED AS PLEASANT OUTINGS AND CAREFREE INDULGENCE IN AN IMAGE OF THE GLITTERING PAST. AT EVERY LEVEL, FROM THE FUNDS TO BUILD, THE WAY THESE BUILDINGS WERE CONSTRUCTED, WHEN THERE WAS MONEY TO RENOVATE THEM, THE FLOWERS IN THE GARDENS, AND WHAT HAS BEEN - AND IS STILL - KEPT INSIDE, COLONIAL TIES CAN BE FOUND.

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Place and Space Dance, Embodied Knowledge and the Reclaiming of Spaces — Farida Nabibaks

Such properties, often a cross between a museum space and a conservation property or a family home, have a certain responsibility towards visitors according to this past - even if this is new to many of the owners and visitors of these properties themselves.

It is important how we interact with these objects, as visitors to these places, as academics, and as people of colour with links to the Netherlands or the UK through the enslavement of our ancestors. How does the grand scale of the built environment relate to the ways we find our own presence as people of colour in these spaces?1

In eighteenth century paintings in which Black people appear, like the portrait of Margaretha Elisabeth Sophia van Stepraedt from 1740, which resides in Castle Cannenburch in The Netherlands, audiences have long been oblivious of the fact that they were made during the time of legal chattel slavery. The presence of the Black man in the shadow is not acknowledged in the title, nor in the tours and information at the site. This is the other side of the grandeur that these houses display. Those who were thought insignificant were left out.

Yara van Fraeijenhove and Rohiet Tjon Poen Gie. Cannenburch Castle. Photographer Danielle Corbijn.

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In our performances, as Reframing HERstory Art Foundation2 we give life to those that lived in obscurity.

We create a historical setting in which white and Black characters are both present. As audiences are not used to Black presence in a historical setting on stage, or in real spaces of significant (white) history, the experience clashes with the dominant narrative. To dance and perform in these places where Black presence was omitted, is taking up the space in the present, a reclaiming of the space to create a new and inclusive environment.

The past is transmitted through the dance and performance and the embodied presence of the performers. It comes to life in the present. Sharing the space with the performers, and each other, the audience is affected by the proximity, and the presence in the moment of what the performers are portraying. All present are an active part of the performance and can be physically and emotionally affected.

Such experiences can be live changing.

The decolonial process requires a dismantling of old standards, of what we hold to be true. This needs to be deconstructed by ourselves, in ourselves. A painful process, but necessary to build a new and diverse world.

In my performances I express deep feelings that are too painful to voice. Through dancing we give way to our embodied knowledge, related to unspeakable pain and emotions. The endurance of so many generations of enslaved and, in my case also, indentured labourers, before me, their traumas and insignificance in society. I needed to feel this to understand myself, and I needed this to heal myself. I cannot be empathic if I cannot feel. For us, as human beings, to be affected by our own shared history, and comprehend others, we need to experience feelings through our bodies.

– LEARNING TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE BODY The memories that our bodies sense, store and (re)perform are part of our collective memory. Western education rates the written word as the highest form of intelligent knowledge and holds old societal conventions, beliefs and judgements to be true, even if it causes hidden intergenerational trauma.

We are not susceptible to what our bodies communicate to us. We tend to ignore the different dimensions of corporeal experiences. In doing so, we hold a distorted perception of the past, which makes a distorted present and creates a distorted future. It influences how we relate to reality, our indebtedness to the stories that shape us and to what knowledge is or could be.

We need to learn to discern what intelligence is stored within our embodied being and investigate ways to bring embodied knowledge into our lived experience, by allowing our bodies to open up to intuitive and communicative layers (of our embodied being) through movement and dance. This will lead into a related creative practice which emanates from the embodied trauma of the colonial and slavery heritage.

We need to learn to discern what intelligence is stored within our embodied being and investigate ways to bring embodied knowledge into our lived experience, by allowing our bodies to open up to intuitive and communicative layers (of our embodied being) through movement and dance.

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Place and Space Dance, Embodied Knowledge and the Reclaiming of Spaces — Farida Nabibaks

Footnotes

Yara van Fraeijenhove and Farida Nabibaks. Cannenburch Castle. Photographer Danielle Corbijn.

1.

Based on the introduction of the joint lecture with Dr. Thalia Ostendorf during symposium Managing Imperial Legacies, University of Edinburgh, June 2022.

2.

Reframing HERstory Art Foundation is a musicand dance-theatre company that creates multi-disciplinary productions in theatres or smaller site-specific performances. Initiator and artistic director is a Surinamese-born performer, artist, philosopher, and researcher, Farida Nabibaks.

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World Polar. Street art in Valparaiso, Chile. Oliver Kenneybrew. Photographer Maya Brookes.

Place and Space Colourism in Reggaeton — Maya Brookes

COLOURISM IN REGGAETON IN RECENT DECADES REGGAETON HAS CAPTIVATED A GLOBAL AUDIENCE. DESPITE ITS SPANISH LYRICS, IT HAS REACHED WORLD DOMINATION AND HAS BECOME A MAINSTREAM GENRE THAT CONTINUES TO BREAK RECORDS YEAR IN AND YEAR OUT. BUT LOST WITHIN THIS PROUDLY LATINO GENRE IS THE MUSIC’S BLACK ORIGINS WHICH DIRECTLY REFLECTS THE COMMON IGNORANCE ABOUT WHAT IT MEANS TO BE LATINX AND THE INTERSECTIONALITIES WITHIN THIS BROAD TERM.

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Within the Latinx community colourism is an ever-present problem and an anti-Blackness sentiment within the community is often overlooked. The deep-rooted racism is hidden within the concept of the Latinx community being a mixed community, a union between indigenous, European and African origins, pushing the idea that “how can I be racist if we are all mixed?” This is when colourism comes into play.

Skin colour has such a strong relevance to one’s identity and terms such as “ blanquita” and “negrita” are still heard all over the Hispanic Latino world. By using language like this, a negative narrative surrounding Blackness is instilled into a person from a young age and can have a range of adverse consequences. With Blackness seen as negative thing it is hard for people to identity with their Black roots. Lots of Latinx people do not see themselves as Black, choosing to focus on the whiter aspects of their identity in order to fit in to the ideal that has haunted the community for generations, the whiter the better.

Reggaeton’s true origins are constantly debated since it is a fusion of various influences that pass from one place to another, mixing and weaving sounds to create the genre we know it as today. From its name it is self-explanatory the huge influence that reggae played in its foundation. But it was not just influenced by Jamaica sonically; the aesthetics of dancehall and the message it carried of being an artistic response to the hardship and poverty of their daily lives, music “ de la calle”, made it an underground sound that was extremely popular with young people. This new soundscape that was being led by Afro-descendants captivated audiences all over the Caribbean and Central America, particularly in Puerto Rico.

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To bring this sound from the underground to the mainstream it became internationalised to help make it a more marketable product. It went from no longer being Black-made music for Black people but music that resonated with the whole Latinx Diaspora. Thanks to artists such as the iconic Luny Tunes duo, Tego Calderon and especially Daddy Yankee, just to name a few, reggaeton soon rose to global fame. Music videos with flags from all over Latin America, with lyrics directly mentioning their countries, helped create a product that transcends nation and was something the whole Latinx community could identify with.

This was ideal for US consumption which was seeing an increase in Latinx immigration. However, this genre which started out inclusive, was simultaneously going through a process of blanqueamiento, in order to adapt it for the US and ultimately global consumption. Blanqueamiento’s aim was to change national identity, to “improve the race” towards a supposed ideal of whiteness, and this is what happened with reggaeton. The world was now being presented with the image of the reggaetonero as a white man, eradicating the negritude of the Latinx community and mitigating the contributions the Black community had made to the genre’s foundations.

When we look at the genre today, the reggaetoneros at the top are all white presenting: Bad Bunny, J Balvin, Feid.

With this white image being portrayed of a reggeatonero, it further pushes the idea that the Latinx community is white.

This also makes it much harder for Black artists to break through in the industry, as they are not seen as marketable within this genre.

Place and Space Colourism in Reggaeton — Maya Brookes

When we look at the genre today, the reggaetoneros at the top are all white presenting: Bad Bunny, J Balvin, Feid.

With this white image being portrayed of a reggeatonero, it further pushes the idea that the Latinx community is white.

Rene Perez, aka Residente, Bad Bunny and Benicio del Toro as they take part of a demonstration demanding Governor Ricardo Rossello’s resignation in San Juan, Puerto Rico (2019). Photograph Eric Rojas/AFP/Alternative Crop.

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Daddy Yankee and Sean “P. Diddy” Combs (2005). Photographer Rodrigo Varela/WireImage/Getty Images.

Place and Space Colourism in Reggaeton — Maya Brookes

However, this issue of colourism goes further than determining which artists manage to reach international fame. Those white-presenting artists who have succeeded to make a name for themselves abuse their privilege and do not use their influence to call out the music industry for its misrepresentation.

the reggaeton industry. However, in this situation, the right thing to do would have been to decline the award so that actual Afro-Latinx artists can receive the recognition they deserve. This is a prime example of cultural appropriation, as yet again Black artists are not even included in the award categories designed for them.

Earlier this year Time Magazine released a controversial interview with Puerto Rican sensation, Bad Bunny. Being Spotify’s most streamed artist three years in a row, he is highly influential and has played a key role in continuing the success of reggaeton. However, when asked about the issues of race and colourism present in the genre, his reply was extremely disappointing.

The problem with scandals like these is that it continues to erase the Afro-Latinx identity, selling the genre to the world as music created by white Latinos. The genre which is meant to represent Latinx in its fullness is being misrepresented and the core roots of the genre are being eradicated. What makes reggaeton so special is its fusion of different cultural influences. It is music which so many people can identify with, yet it is being marketed as something created by only one sub-group of a more complex identity. The highly prominent colourism in the Latinx community and therefore in the genre, works against what makes the Latinx identity so powerful, which is its rich mix of ancestry and origins.

Representing its Blackness is not neglecting its “Latinidad”, the various attributes shared by Latin American people and their descendants, without reducing those similarities to any single essential trait. Something can be simultaneously Afro and Latino and this combination is what makes it such a successful genre.

“Because I haven’t seen it or lived it, I can’t say. It’d be irresponsible of me to say yes. They asked me about if [’00s reggaeton superstar] Tego Calderón would’ve been bigger if he wasn’t Black. But in my eyes, Tego Calderón is the biggest singer in the industry.”

As someone in his position, this would have been the perfect opportunity to address an issue that has been overlooked for decades. You do not have to have experienced racism to be anti-racist, and his saying he hasn’t been a victim does not mean he cannot address the issue. He should be aware of the privilege that comes with his skin colour. If he claims to see Tego Clederon as a big star, he should be grateful for Black artists like him paving the way and shouldn’t neglect the additional struggles they would have faced to get where they did. This response is a clear example of not doing anything to stop these issues continuing into the next generations.

Another hugely problematic issue to hit the reggaeton industry was during the 2021 African Entertainment Music Awards. The prize for Best Afro-Latin Artist of the Year went to J Balvin, a white Colombian artist. Rightfully so, the criticism he received was enormous, which is not to say J Balvin’s contribution should go unnoticed. Over the years he has won several awards for the impact he has made in

References Chow, A. R., and Espada, M., (2023) Bad Bunny’s Next Move. TIME. Available at: https://time. com/6266349/bad-bunny-cover-story/ Accessed 31 July 2023.

Rodriguez, C. (2021). J Balvin recibe el premio al Mejor Artista Afrolatino del año y es criticado en redes sociales. Los 40. Available at: https://los40. com/los40/2021/12/28/musica/1640710644_711245. html?outputType=amp Accessed: 31 July 2023 Spotify (2022) It’s Here: The Top Songs, Artists, Podcasts, and Listening Trends of 2022 Available at: https://newsroom.spotify.com/2022-11-30/thetop-songs-artists-podcasts-and-listening-trendsof-2022/ Accessed: 31 July 2023

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NEW WRITIN

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New Writing

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The BlackInk New Writing competition returned for its fourth edition. Led by Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage and Writing East Midlands, the competition seeks to support Black writers of short fiction. The judging panel was Pawlet Brookes, Mike Gale, Henderson Mullin, Jacob Ross and Rashida Seriki.

We are delighted to publish the two winners of 2023, both demonstrating exceptional command of language and dialect whilst portraying facets of the human condition.

The Summer After — Shere Ross TILT — June Aming

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THE SUMMER AFTER

ON THE FIRST SUNDAY OF SUMMER, MARVA LISTENED TO CRICKET ON THE RADIO, THINKING OF HER DAD DOING THE SAME IN HIS HOUSE A FEW MILES AWAY. FOLDING A PILE OF CRUMPLED LAUNDRY ON HER BED IN HER LONDON FLAT, SHE HEARD THE SPECTATORS ROAR AND THE COMMENTATORS SPEAKING IN RUSHED CRESCENDOS. IT REMINDED HER OF SLOW CHILDHOOD SUNDAYS, WHERE THE CRICKET PLAYED FOR HOURS ON THEIR ONLY TELLY THAT CAUSED HER TO MISS PROGRAMMES, SHE COULDN’T LATER DISCUSS WITH HER SCHOOL FRIENDS. SHE PUT THE PASTEL TOWER OF LINEN ON THE BOTTOM SHELF OF THE TALLBOY AS THE SPECTATORS AT THE OVAL HOLLERED, DRUMMED AND BLEW HORNS. She stretched a single collarless blouse across her duvet and as usual zoned out as she ironed it. Then she raised it to the sunlight. A burst of fine creases remained around the crook of both arms. Satisfied, however, she unplugged the iron and placed the shirt on a hanger under her fitted suit jacket.

The match ended to long and loud applause. Soca theme music she’d always liked announced the post-match review.

When it ended, she turned the volume down. Scrolling through her phone logs she found her father’s number near the bottom. “Dial Dad?” the phone asked. She tapped the phone against her lips and glanced around the room. She eventually pressed dial. His phone rang only twice. She hung up. She threw herself onto the bed and buried her face in the duvet.

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On the radio the commentators, a Yorkshireman with a familiar voice and a younger, calmer-spoken man she didn’t know, discussed the final scores: the Windies had conceded and the test series was lost. “Lacklustre!” the Yorkshireman insisted of their performance, sounding appalled. She imagined her dad hearing this now as he sat at his kitchen table twisting away from his pocket FM radio in disgust.

His radio, which had followed him from room to room for decades, would probably have its long kinked aerial fully extended, far beyond the tabletop on which it sat. She could picture her dad irritated and waving his hand at the commentator’s voice, trying not to listen to the post-match analysis, but refusing to turn it off.

In her thirty-three years, she’d never bothered to fully understand test cricket scoring, but her father was die-hard.

He’d played throughout his schooling in Marie-Galante, but never looked at a bat in the UK. Increasingly there were fewer people he could talk cricket with, so she propped herself up onto her elbows and re-dialled. After several rings her father answered.

New Writing The Summer After — Shere Ross

“Hello”, he sounded wary. She wanted to hang up.

“Right.”

“Hellooo?” he said again.

“Me Dad.”

Her kettle whistled and she was grateful for the interruption.

Troy - she wondered how many more times her dad would slip and ask for him.

“Hi love, you alright?”

“But at the funeral, two of you, things seemed well?”

“Yeah. You busy?”

“Just friends Dad.”

“No love, no. Just the cricket - wasn’t expecting calls today so almost didn’t answer. You call before?”

“Well, that’s something” he said, not quite evenly.

“No” she lied.

Her stomach tightened – she missed the days when mum was there and their Sunday chats were just a chat.

“They wasted those overs” she said and sat up.

“Well” he said, “Unfit team. Players past it.”

“Next time, maybe.”

She rose from the bed and walked into her kitchen.

“How’s Troy, love?”

“OK I guess…well he was the last time we spoke”, she said carefully, startled by the question.

He switched his radio off and cleared his throat. She had his full attention.

“Your birthday, this week.” she said.

“Not bothering, love, no.” he said abruptly.

“Well, I can’t bake, so maybe just as well.”

He laughed.

She opened the pantry. On the bottom shelf was a small bottle of vanilla flavouring, cinnamon, caster sugar, baking powder and a packet of flour roughly torn opened. On the shelf above was her mother’s ring binder of recipes, two brand new baking tins and mechanical kitchen-scales.

“You go mass today?” she asked.

It was the third time he’d asked this since her mother’s death a year ago.

“Uh-huh, was a bit early, spent time with your mother’s church sisters while they arranged the flowers.”

Then she waited, hoping he’d remember.

“Mum would’ve gone home and come back, rather than do flowers.”

“Ooohhh, love! Sorry, sorry! He’s-a-good-boy-just-not-theone-for-you?”

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It reminded her of slow childhood Sundays, where the cricket played for hours on their only telly that caused her to miss programmes, she couldn’t later discuss with her school friends.

He laughed. “Expect she would.” He seemed to reposition the receiver as his voice became clearer, “ but they talked about her a lot - I think they miss her”.

The line went quiet. After a moment he said, “Sister Campbell said they’ve yet to find a replacement choir leader.

They’ll not enter the contest this summer. First absence in eighteen years.”

“Mmmm” Marva said, letting this sink in. Then she said, “where’s Mum’s tambourine?”

“Think I took it from the charity bag and gave it to Sister Charles...I can’t be sure though.”

Marva took some deep breaths, easing the panic slightly.

How much of him would be left in a year? In five?

She poured hot water into a mug and dragged a pine chair to the kitchen window. She sat and watched the sky above her garden. From the right, ragged clouds encroached on the cyan sky above the white basket handle of the Wembley Stadium arch. Sometimes glowing ghostly in the night sky, the arch was a beacon, but today she thought of the pigeon grey day last spring, when she had driven her mother home from the hospital. Her mother had leaned forward and peered up at the struts that would become the arch.

“You’d think I’d remember a thing like that” he said in the darker way he’d taken to referring to his lapses.

“It’s kinda ugly right now” her mother had said sniffing at it and then sharply sucked in her breath. Her eyelids squeezed shut; she bared her teeth and bit down on her lower lip against a wave of pain. Marva supposed then that her mother sensed she would not be around to see the finished arch and Marva had hoped, without fear or conflict, that she was right.

“Daddy I’ll call you back - someone at the door.” She said lying again.

Beneath the frown of the arch today, Marva’s small garden floor was spread with chalk white pebbles, dazzling in the

“I’m sure you did” she said, though given his recent behaviour she really wasn’t.

“All right love.”

156

New Writing The Summer After — Shere Ross

sunlight. Her mother preferred grass. Earthenware pots sat in the far corners, leaning slightly on top of the uneven pebble surface. The potted daffodils they held were paper dry headless stalks - her mother would have replaced them with something seasonal by now. Marva had finally deleted her mother’s number from her phone this week, but staring at her garden today she somehow regretted this. Back in the kitchen, Marva pulled out the cake ingredients. The handwritten carrot cake recipe was the fourth page inside the binder. The writing so like her own. No greaseproof paper! It would be easier to just clean the cupboards today and skip the cake, but she clapped her hands and intoned, “I can do this!” Calm again, she balanced the phone on the microwave and redialled “Dad”. She washed and dried her hands while it rang and then used her knuckle to put the phone on speaker.

“Hi.” “Didn’t have to rush to call back.”

“No fine. What else you been up to?”

“Er, The back yard. Haven’t felt like it till now, but the mower’s on the blink, so that was that.”

“You need to leave that old thing outside for the scrap metal men... Dad you there?”

She took the butter from the fridge.

“We talked about this before didn’t we?” he said darkening again.

“Briefly.” She said lightly, not wishing him to dwell.

“Right.” He sighed.

After a pause he brightened a little, changed the subject and said “Did I tell you Cheryl’s leaving me?”

Cheryl who? She tapped a knife on the work surface trying to recall. “Weekend carer?” she guessed.

157

In her thirty-three years, she’d never bothered to fully understand test cricket scoring, but her father was die-hard.

“Yep. Retiring to the South Downs in six weeks. Told her she’s not forgiven! Wanna buy her a little something before she goes.”

“I remember.”

“I can do that.”

“S‘OK - it was a good evening.”

Marva paused remembering what she had meant to say before going to the fridge.

“Aubergines, wasn’t it? ‘Stead of beef.”

“Dad - better we do the garden together when you’re ready…OK?” “Yeah, course.” He agreed more easily than she expected.

“You sound busy, love.”

“Cleaning cupboards.” She lied again not wanting to admit to making the birthday cake in case it didn’t work out. She pushed the hard butter off the knife with an index finger on to the scales.

“Your mother cleaned cupboards on the first day of summer.”

“I know. I learned some good habits - just not the kind to find their way to a man’s heart” said Marva inflecting mock tragedy into her voice. It worked. He laughed. When he stopped laughing he said, “No reason why a man shouldn’t find his own way to the kitchen. I often did.”

“Exactly!”

“I remember that lasagne your Troy made us. Your mum made him write the recipe right there at the table - only vegetarian meal she’d make.”

158

“Sorry love.”

“And courgette and swede.” She confirmed really not wanting to remember any of this.

“Lovely!” He said.

Marva tipped the sugar and butter in a glass bowl she’d never used. Despite her efforts, the wooden spoon made only a dimple in the hard surface of the cold butter. She put the bowl down and stood back from the kitchen counter feeling flustered.

“Marva love?”

“Still here,” she said then changing track she added, “can I have your ironing board Dad?” “Ironing board?”

“I could do yours...if you trust me to.”

He paused.

“No love. It’s alright, I can manage.”

New Writing The Summer After — Shere Ross

“Just gardening then, next Saturday?”

“Umm, cornmeal porridge.” She said lying once more.

Marva pulled two eggs from the fridge.

“What’s for pudding then?” He chuckled instantly and then uncontrollably. She was glad. She beat the sugar with the now softened butter and stayed on the subject.

“Wish there were two of you.” He said his voice broke a little.

“We tried for years before you and after.”

“I know.” Said Marva placing the sugar and butter in the microwave. Having lots of cousins, being an only child had never really bothered her, but her parents had never got past it. She watched the microwave timer count down from thirty seconds, whilst flicking glances through the glass door at the yellow block – its planed edges smoothed and fell away as it warmed.

“Pudding? More porridge of course…with a pinch of nutmeg…if I can find it and its in date.”

He wheezed and tried to stop laughing by saying, “Sor-ry, love, hon-est, I’m sor-ry.” He coughed as his laughter petered out.

“A brother for you would be nice about now – you shouldn’t be cutting grass for me!” He said.

The cake mixture looked familiar just not as creamy, smooth nor as pale as her mother’s. She thought of checking YouTube for tips before adding the eggs. Her dad sounded recovered from his laughing fit so she thought it safe to say, “I can use mum’s wellies, I’ll buy a hover mower, cos they’re lightweight. We can take it in turns. How’s that?”

The pitch of his voice had climbed and was studded with frustration. Marva didn’t respond.

He exhaled long and deep. It was now familiar to her – the simultaneous sound of his defeat and acceptance.

“BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!” Screamed the microwave. She removed the bowl.

“We’ll order take out then love.” He insisted,

She was too distracted to change the subject.

“Cooking?” He asked after a pause and almost recovered.

“And I’ll bring cake.” She said. “Kidding!”

Then she cracked the eggs into a cereal bowl and beat them with a fork.

159

TILT

I LEARN FROM YOUNG THAT GOD DON’T LIVE IN POOR MAN HOUSE. I GREW UP IN A HOUSE THAT TILT SO BAD, IF YOU STAND UP STRAIGHT YOU FEEL DIZZY. I DIDN’T KNOW MY FATHER; DIDN’T WANT TO REMEMBER MY MAN-LOVING MOTHER AND I TRY TO FORGET ALL THE TIMES MY FACE DOWN IN THE DIRT WITH A MAN’S BOOTS ON MY BACK.

Forget, forget. That is all I really try to do. Sometimes that makes it hard to remember just who you are. I can tell you what I think now, and every junction that brought me to this destination. I can tell you there is no such thing as “matters of the heart”. What matters is who you align yourself with in this life. You could choose to beat up a drum, dance up with feathers around your waist and mud on your skin, jump in a boat and sail back to Africa or point your pinky and sip your tea. Thinking that this life is not black and white, that there are shades in between where happiness exists. Forget that too. That is not true.

What I will not forget is 1939. That was the year I was born. Not crawl out from my mother’s use up body. That happen in 1923 in the tilted house deep down in Fyzabad village. That is a time I choose to forget. In 1939, the man my mother bring to live with us was involve with The British Empire Workers’ and Citizens Home rule party deep, deep.

The leader of this new trade union, Tubal Uriah Butler, ‘Buzz Butler’ talk with fire on his tongue and the police say that he causing people to riot and kill. My mother say that before any kind of bacchanal could take place, is best I go to her sister’s house in Diego Martin for a little while. I know the man she was with like to feel he big in the trade union, always walking around with his chest guff up, like he was somebody to be proud of. When the police were raiding homes looking for people in the union he hide in the lavatory in the back of Miss Springer house for five days. I used to laugh to myself that he must feel at home surrounded by all that shit.

160

In the same year 1939, they arrest Butler and things calm down but my mother never send for me to come back.

After that, like my Aunt, I chose to have nothing to do with my mother.

The first time I arrived at Aunt Fan house she scarcely put her two thin arms around me. Her stretched out arms were black and cold, like burnt ice. Then she step back, bend her head forward and look me up and down and then straight at me. I stare into her eyes and I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Her eyes were empty, like they were shut down.

But her mouth, it couldn’t lie. If you look hard enough you could see her lips twist up at the sides.

“We will certainly have to do something about that hair.”

These were the first words I heard from this woman I had just now meet. All I could do was smile back.

Picky hair. That is how I later heard Aunt Fan describing my thick head of hair. She said it like she just swallow a spoonful of thick cod liver oil and vomit was coming up her throat.

I never did anything fancy with my hair. From age six I learn to plait it tight, sometimes making ridges ripple across my skull. There was no one to do it for me. My mother didn’t care how I look or what I was doing. Most times I end up with a zig zag part across my head that make the girls in the village laugh. From then I spend hours just combing, brushing, parting, trying to get this thing right. Trying to brush away any reason for laughter. So, when Aunt Fan say she want to do something with my hair I was confuse.

New Writing TILT — June Aming

At the very edge of her forehead Aunt Fan’s hair was like mine: thick and bushy. But then it change. It started to stick out straight like a cocoyea broom. A black, coarse cocoyea broom with patches of grey. But it was pulled in a tight ponytail that ended at the top of her neck looking neat, neat, neat.

Aunt Fan was a neat woman. Tall, thin and she stand up so straight that she look as if she had a plank of wood stick down the back of her dress. She seem to be the exact opposite of my mother. My mother was short and round. A toolum; black, bitter candy they make from burnt molasses and roll into a ball. But my mother didn’t step off any candy counter at the parlour. My mother was like the oil in the ground. She would break through the surface: black, hot and spewing everywhere. From her mouth came the very raw, crude substance that made our village popular, that made my grandparents get on a boat from Grenada with their two children and travel across the rough seas to this island of Trinidad in search of a better life. My mother warn me not to bring up the Grenada to my Aunt and when I ask why, her man friend give me a hard blow across my face. I was vexed and nurse that bruise for days, but I couldn’t swell up my face and show my anger. That would be begging for another blow from either one of them. At that point I was glad I was leaving, but now when I was faced with Aunt Fan I wasn’t so sure.

“Come inside.” One of Aunt Fan’s thin arms reach across my back and push me up the dirt path towards the small, wooden house. “Only one grip you have?” she ask.

“Yes,” I answer, because all my things fit in a small, black grip my mother asked one of our neighbours to borrow. Dumped and crumpled inside were two skirts, two blouses, two panties, my Sunday church dress that never went to church and my black teeth plastic comb and four ring clips for my hair. I was wearing my only bra and my only shoes, a pair of washy congs pasted with whitening.

When we got into the house I was given a room behind the kitchen. There was just enough space for a small bed and a place for me to rest the grip on the ground. There was no door and the huge window facing the back yard was covered only with chicken wire. Two pot hounds stood on hind legs to look in at me, spit dripping off their tongues like they thought I was dinner. Aunt Fan ordered me to open the grip and then she twist up her mouth as I throw out everything.

She walk out of the room fast, her broad bottom jiggling from side to side below her straight back. I could hear her suck her teeth. When she came back, she had a red flowered skirt and a red jersey with a stretched-out neckline hanging over her arm.

161

Aunt Fan was a neat woman. Tall, thin and she stand up so straight that she look as if she had a plank of wood stick down the back of her dress.

She seem to be the exact opposite of my mother.

“Put this on. It belongs to your cousin Shari. She wouldn’t mind. Shari has plenty, plenty clothes. Her God father works on a ship and he is always going to America and bringing back nice, nice things for her.”

Aunt Fan was smiling into the air at some dream painted up in the corner. She stared up for a couple of seconds before she woke up and remembered me standing there. “You must be hungry, dear. Get some rest and when you wake up you will get something to eat.” With that she left for the kitchen.

I take off my clothes with the pot hounds still watching through the window. I try to shoo them away but they wouldn’t even self bark. These dogs were looking at me with people eyes, judging me standing there in my bra and panty in a room like a cage with chicken wire windows. There was a noise in the backyard, a zandolee or something, and the pot hounds take off for whatever was out there more colourful and interesting.

162

I finish changing and I didn’t know what to do. Aunt Fan had said to get some rest so I curl up on the bed and try to close my eyes. I was sixteen but I feel like I was six again.

Soon I could hear the clinking sound of dishes being moved around and slippers shuffling across the floor and Aunt Fan’s voice talking loud.

“Oh God, my sister is something else. One man after another, like she’s in an Iron Band. As if she has to test out each piece of pan to see which one she wants to play. But now, she has met her match. I hear that man, who thinks that he is this big thing in the trade union will bring plenty trouble to her broko doorstep.”

I hear the sound of an iron pot dropping onto a burner, the swish of a matchstick and then the whoosh of flames.

“Well, trouble made a visit by her house and then continued to mine, strolling in with a grip with only two panties. Imagine, only two panties. What kind of nasty woman would have a child of sixteen with only two panties? You tell me! I only hope that girl knows how to take care of herself when her monthlies come, because I borrowed that bed from Shari’s father and I know that good-for-nothing woman he has will kick up a big stink if there is a pin-prick drop of blood on it.”

New Writing TILT — June Aming

I was starting to feel uncomfortable lying on my left side but I was afraid to turn onto my right because next thing the bed creak and Aunt Fan would know I was awake. I didn’t know her yet but she seem to be the kind of woman you didn’t want to get vex.

The smell of burning sugar filled the air, followed by a loud sizzling as what I imagined to be meat dropping into the pot.

A big puff of grey smoke rose up to the ceiling and start to float towards me like a rain cloud. Aunt Fan was talking to someone or herself. I couldn’t tell.

I felt shame to be hearing the talk and wish I could really just go to sleep. Maybe even not wake up. Just close my eyes and go straight to hell. My mother always said that was the place I would end up. I always wonder how you could go to hell when you don’t even believe that heaven exist.

“I’m so glad I moved out of that hell hole called Fyzabad. Dee would’ve only pulled me down to her level. Look at how she has Elsie living. The girl still has her head picky like some bush person. I thank God my Shari came out with goodish hair.”

I must have dozed off because the next thing I know, Aunt Fan was shaking me. I get up stupid to see her smiling down as if I was her own precious daughter. I start to think that what I had just heard was a dream. I didn’t know what to think. Maybe she could un-tilt, untwist and understand me.

And maybe after all that, she could love me.

I was starting to feel uncomfortable lying on my left side but I was afraid to turn onto my right because next thing the bed creak and Aunt Fan would know I was awake. I didn’t know her yet but she seem to be the kind of woman you didn’t want to get vex. With my mother it was a slap, a punch, a blow, or you get push down to the ground follow by a kick in the back.

The way I just heard Aunt Fan speak, I knew that her words could bruise just as bad as any fist on your face.

163

WINDRUSH: A SCANDAL FROM THE START IN 2017, NEWS BEGAN TO EMERGE IN THE UK PRESS OF THE TRUE COST OF THE HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT POLICY. BRANDED AS A MEANS TO CURB “ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION”, THE POLICIES WERE EMPLOYED BY THE HOME OFFICE FROM 2012 ONWARDS TO MAKE IT AS DIFFICULT AS POSSIBLE FOR PEOPLE TO STAY IN THE UK WITHOUT LEAVE TO REMAIN. BUT WITH OVER HALF A CENTURY OF CONSTANT IMMIGRATION REFORM, THIS BUREAUCRATIC MINEFIELD WAS POISED TO STRIP THE RIGHTS AWAY FROM BRITISH CARIBBEAN PEOPLE WHO HAD LIVED ALMOST ALL THEIR LIVES IN THE UK. WE HAVE COME TO KNOW THIS AS THE WINDRUSH SCANDAL, BUT THE TRUE SCANDAL BEGAN LONG BEFORE.

164

The arrival of HMT Empire Windrush, coinciding with the British Nationality Act 1948, has come to symbolise a generation of Caribbean migration to the UK. The presence of a Pathé film crew has cemented this moment into the collective consciousness as the advent of British multiculturalism. However, a more nuanced picture in the press can be traced through the pages of the Kingston Gleaner. By the start of the twentieth century, there already existed a significant Caribbean community in the UK, with eminent activists such as Harold Moody, CLR James, Una Marson, George Padmore and Amy Ashwood Garvey1.

With the outbreak of World War II, the Gleaner published a series of articles and letters discussing how Caribbean people should “make themselves useful” to “ help the Mother Country”2 . Over 16,000 people travelled to support the war effort and the Caribbean community in the UK increased significantly.

Spotlight Windrush: A Scandal from the Start — Pawlet Brookes

A Caribbean family arriving in the United Kingdom. 19 May 1962. Photographer Mirrorpix/Alamy.

165

Following the end of the Second World War, demobilisation took years and the headlines of the Gleaner are not too dissimilar to that of today with reports of the high unemployment in the Caribbean, strikes, worker shortages in the UK and an international cost of living crisis.3 In March 1947, 108 passengers took the opportunity to return with the HMT Ormonde, a troopship repatriating Caribbean ex-servicemen. As early as June 1947, reports were highlighting the lack of jobs and accommodation available to African Caribbean workers4, emphasising that only “skilled workers” were needed , but “skilled” was coded language for white. In January 1950, Vere Johns exposed the reality that 86,000 men and women from European countries (many of which had been considered enemies not five years prior) had been working in the UK since 1947, whilst British citizens in the Caribbean were denied adequate opportunities; “fifteen thousand jobs in England offered to West Indians womanhood would have meant untold blessings to these territories. 14,000 billets in England’s factories would have meant happiness to 10,000 West Indian people at home.” 5 As the British government was forced to admit that whilst they may not have wanted the support of its British overseas subjects, it was needed and in April 1951 the Gleaner declares “Jobs Open for Jamaicans in Britain – thousands of vacancies exist”. So began the racist immigration policies that blew hot and cold in the faces of its “children of empire”.6

166

Within twenty years of when the British Nationality Act had opened its borders, the Commonwealth Immigrants Act of 1968 imposed controls on the right to abode in the UK unless oneself or one’s parents or grandparents were born or adopted of a naturalised/registered citizen in the UK. Aimed to prevent immigration of East African Asians from Kenya and Uganda, the ruling was undeniably racist. It was considerably easier for some to remain free from controls by demonstrating recent UK ancestry (i.e. they were white), whereas restrictions were enforced on citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies (most of whom were Black or Asian). This was further compacted by the Immigration Act (1971) which carried over the requirements for the right to abode whilst introducing the concept of patriality, which implemented controls regardless of whether or not one had a British passport. The British Nationality Act (1981) abolished automatic citizenship for anyone born in the UK and introduced language changes. Patrials became “British Citizens”, whereas citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who were non-patrials became “British Overseas citizens”.7 During this time, the concept of what it means to be British had already changed irrevocably for many people, culturally, if not legally.

Spotlight Windrush: A Scandal from the Start — Pawlet Brookes

During this time, the concept of what it means to be British had already changed irrevocably for many people, culturally, if not legally.

Demonstrator during a protest in support of the Windrush generation in Windrush Square, Brixton. 20 April 2018. Photographer Thabo Jaiyesimi /Alamy.

167

Time passed and many Caribbean born people continued to live their lives unaware that a perfect storm was brewing. In 2010, the Home Office destroyed disembarkation cards from the 1950s and 1960s, many belonging to people who had arrived as children and travelled on their parents’ passport.

With the implementation of the Hostile Environment Policy in 2012, people were suddenly asked to prove their Britishness with the Home Office demanding at least one piece of official documentation for each year they had resided in the UK, when school and health records were minimal, in order to prove their right to remain. Treated without dignity, people lost their jobs, their homes and access to healthcare. The Home Office admitted to wrongly deporting at least 83 people. But these issues are nothing new. As stated by David Lammy8: “This revelation from a whistleblower reveals that the problems being faced by the Windrush generation are not down to one-off bureaucratic errors but as a direct result of systemic incompetence, callousness and cruelty within our immigration system.”

With the exposure of the Windrush Scandal in the UK press

by Guardian journalists Amelia Gentleman, Gary Younge and others, it forced the Home Office to change tack, at least superficially.

The scandal is not over. To date only 12.8% of eligible claimants have received compensation from the scheme established to support them9 and 104,725 members of the Windrush generation are still alive in England and Wales today10. As far as racist immigration policies are concerned, Jamaica is the only country with the King as head of state that requires a visa to enter the UK. As for the Caribbean perspective, Kevin Isaac, the high commissioner of Saint Kitts and Nevis, had alerted the Foreign Office to a potential issue with the policies as early as 2013, to no avail11. This perspective will remain unheard until the British establishment remembers that the relationship between Britain and the Caribbean stretches back four hundred years12 and not just seventyfive, and questions the UK’s right to remain in international territories.

168

Footnotes 1.

Anonymous. Thursday 3 March 1932. Tribute from England for Miss Una Marson’s “Tropic Reveries”. The Daily Gleaner. Kingston, Jamaica. pp. 17.

2.

Wint, T. K., Saturday 16 September 1939. How to Help the Mother Country. The Daily Gleaner.

Kingston, Jamaica. pp. 12.

Rose. L., W., Saturday 16 September 1939. Mr Bustamante’s Message to the Workers. The Daily Gleaner. pp 12.

3.

Cost of Living

4.

Monday 9 June 1947. Few Jobs in UK. The Daily Gleaner. Pp. 16

5.

Johns, V. Thursday 12 January 1950. ‘Britain’s Square Deal to Aliens is Raw Deal to Us.’ The Daily Gleaner. pp 8.

6.

Thursday 5 April 1951. Jobs Open for Jamaicans in Britain – thousands of vacancies exist. i The Daily Gleaner. pp 1.

7.

Thomas, L., and Neale, D., (2021) The Immigration Act 1971: Celebrated or Flawed?

Gresham College. Available at: https://www. gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/immigration-act Accessed: 1 August 2023.

8.

Gentleman, A. (2018) Home Office destroyed Windrush landing cards, says exstaffer. The Guardian. Available at: https:// www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/17/ home-office-destroyed-windrush-landingcards-says-ex-staffer Accessed 1 August 2023.

9.

Human Rights Watch. (2023) UK: “Hostile” Compensation Scheme Fails ‘Windrush’ Victims Available at: https://www.hrw.org/ news/2023/04/17/uk-hostile-compensationscheme-fails-windrush-victims Accessed 31 July 2023.

10. Duncan, P., Swan, L., and Scruton, P., (2023) Windrush 75th anniversary: the arrivals from the Caribbean who helped reshape Britain. Available at: https://www. theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jun/23/ windrush-75th-anniversary-arrivals-caribbeanreshape-britain#:~:text=The%20latest%20 census%20also%20reminds,England%20 and%20Wales%20in%202021.

Accessed 31 July 2023.

11.

Gentleman, A. (2018) Revealed: depth of Home Office failures on Windrush. The Guardian.

Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/ uk-news/2018/jul/18/revealed-depth-of-homeoffice-failures-on-windrush.

Accessed 31 July 2023.

12.

St Kitts was the first Caribbean island to be colonised by the English in 1623.

Spotlight Windrush: A Scandal from the Start — Pawlet Brookes

Empire Windrush (Circa 1940s). Vintage Postcard. Archival. Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage.

169

2023 IN NUMBER 4%

of the population of England and Wales identify as Black.1

12%

of statues unveiled in the UK in the last year commemorate Black people.2

3

times as many Black households are in the lowest income group than in the highest income group.3

8%

of science undergraduates yet just 0.6% of science professors in the UK are Black.4

£18.62 trillion

is owed by Britain in reparations to countries in Americas and the Caribbean.5

40%

of women who identify as Black Caribbean have a higher-level qualification.6

12.8%

of eligible claimants to the Windrush Compensation Scheme have received compensation.7

104,725

members of the Windrush generation still live in England and Wales.8 170

2023 In Numbers

N RS Footnotes 1.

In more detail this breaks down as Black African (2.5%), Black Caribbean (1%), Black other (0.5%). It is also important to recognise people who identify as mixed white and Black African (0.4%) and mixed White and Black Caribbean (0.9%) are not included in this figure. Other ethnic groups break down as Asian (9.3%), white British (74.4%), white other (7.4%), other mixed (1.6%) and other ethnic groups (2.1%).

Office for National Statistics (2022) Population of England and Wales: Census Data. Available at: https://www.ethnicity-factsfigures.service.gov.uk/uk-population-by-ethnicity/national-andregional-populations/population-of-england-and-wales/latest Accessed 30 July 2023.

2.

5.

Mahon, L. (2023) £18 trillion – what Britain owes in reparations.

Time to pay up. The Voice. Available at: https://www.voice-online. co.uk/news/features-news/2023/07/28/18-trillion-what-britainowes-in-reparations-time-to-pay-up/ Accessed 31 July 2023.

6.

Of the 59 public sculptures revealed in 2022, seven depict Black people. This is a significant shift, as in the previous year just 2% of public sculptures were named individuals from global majority backgrounds.

Long-term analysis of households between 2016 – 2019 show that when households are divided into five equally-sized groups, or quintiles, there were three times as many Black households in the lowest income quintile (31%) as in the highest income quintile (10%). Where a household contains people from different ethnic backgrounds, the ethnicity is assigned to the person with the highest income.

7.

In all academic fields, just 160 of the United Kingdom’s 22,855 professors are Black, a figure that has not changed from previous years. Yet in science this figure is disproportionately lower.

Gibney, E. (2022) Data show that the representation of scientists from marginalized ethnicities dwindles at each stage of UK academia. Nature. Available at: https://www.nature.com/ immersive/d41586-022-04386-w/index.html Accessed 31 July 2023.

Opened by the Home Office in 2019 to compensate members and relatives of people who migrated to the UK from the Caribbean between 1948 and 1971 for losses and hardships they suffered as a result of not being able to prove their lawful status in the UK after government immigration reforms in 2010.

Human Rights Watch. (2023) UK: “Hostile” Compensation Scheme Fails ‘Windrush’ Victims Available at: https://www.hrw. org/news/2023/04/17/uk-hostile-compensation-scheme-failswindrush-victims Accessed 31 July 2023.

Office for National Statistics (2023) Income Distribution. Available at: https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/workpay-and-benefits/pay-and-income/income-distribution/latest Accessed 31 July 2023.

4.

This is above the national average of 34% of people over the age of 16 years have a higher-level qualification (Level 4 and above). By comparison 27% of Black Caribbean men have the same qualification.

Office for National Statistics. (2023) Ethnic group differences in health, employment, education and housing shown in England and Wales’ Census 2021. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/ peoplepopulationandcommunity/culturalidentity/ethnicity/articles/ ethnicgroupdifferencesinhealthemploymenteducationandhousing showninenglandandwalescensus2021/2023-03-15 Accessed 31 July 2023.

Briggs, G. (2023) Public sculpture 2022 report reveals increase in diversity. Art UK. Available at: https://artuk.org/discover/stories/ public-sculpture-2022-report-reveals-increase-in-diversity Accessed 30 July 2023.

3.

The Battle Report, which follows momentum from CARICOM for a 10-point plan for reparations takes into consideration loss of life, uncompensated work, psychological damage and gender violence.

When including other countries involved in the slave trade, the total figure for reparations due comes to £83.53 trillion.

8.

This figure specifically identifies Caribbean-born people who arrived before 1971 and were resident in England and Wales in 2021, at the time of the census. The government’s label of “Windrush Generation” identifies arrival in the UK as between 1948 and 1971.

Duncan, P., Swan, L., and Scruton, P., (2023) Windrush 75th anniversary: the arrivals from the Caribbean who helped reshape Britain. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/ jun/23/windrush-75th-anniversary-arrivals-caribbean-reshapebritain#:~:text=The%20latest%20census%20also%20 reminds,England%20and%20Wales%20in%202021 Accessed 31 July 2023.

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COMING SOON Books Dispatches from the Diaspora: From Nelson Mandela to Black Lives Matter Gary Younge Available Now A powerful collection of journalism on race, racism and Black life and death from one of the nation’s leading political voices. Dispatches from the Diaspora is an unrivalled body of work from a unique perspective that takes you to the frontlines and compels you to engage and to ‘imagine a world in which you might thrive, for which there is no evidence.

And then fight for it.’

African and Caribbean People in Britain: A History Hakim Adi Published: September 2023 Charting a course through British history with an unobscured view of the actions of African and Caribbean people, Adi reveals how much our greatest collective achievements - universal suffrage, our victory over fascism, the forging of the NHS - owe to these men and women, and how, in understanding our history in these terms, we are more able to fully understand our present moment.

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Sing A Black Girl’s Song: The Unpublished Work of Ntozake Shange Published: September 2023 Never-before-seen unpublished works by awardwinning American literary icon Ntozake Shange, featuring essays, plays, and poems from the archives of the seminal Black feminist writer who stands alongside giants like Toni Morrison and Alice Walker, curated by National Book Award winner Imani Perry, with a foreword by New York Times bestselling author, Tarana Burke.

Kin: Rooted in Hope Carole Boston Weatherford Published: September 2023 A powerful portrait of a Black family tree shaped by enslavement and freedom, rendered in searing poems by acclaimed author, Carole Boston Weatherford and stunning art by her son, Jeffery Boston Weatherford.

Coming Soon

The Race to be Myself Caster Semenya Published: October 2023 Olympic and World Champion runner, Caster Semenya offers an empowering account of her extraordinary life and career, and her trailblazing battle to compete on her own terms. Banned from the sport she loved because she was labelled ‘different’, Caster Semenya is finally ready to share the vivid and blisteringly honest story of how the world came to know her name.

The Racial Code Tales of Resistance and Survival Nicola Rollock Published: September 2023 An unprecedented examination of the hidden rules of race and racism that govern our lives and how they maintain the status quo. Interweaving narrative with research and theory, acclaimed expert Nicola Rollock uniquely lays bare the pain and cost of navigating everyday racism and compels us to reconsider how to truly achieve racial justice.

Manorism Yomi Sode Published: November 2023 Impassioned, insightful, electric, Manorism is a poetic examination of the lives of Black British men and boys: propped up and hemmed in by contemporary masculinity, deepened by family, misrepresented in the media, and complicated by the riches, and the costs, of belonging and inheritance. It is also an exploration of the differences of impunity afforded to white and Black people and to white and Black artists.

A Deep Dive into Black British Culture from the Perspective of a Musician and Black Woman VV Brown Published: December 2023 A bold declaration of this singular artist’s intent as she begins her fearless new journey with an anthem that speaks boldly about identity and the conflicts of this cultural experience.

Dispatches from the Diaspora. Gary Younge.

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Autoportrait – Molenbeek (2007-2011) Hélène Amouzou. Courtesy of Autograph.

Coming Soon

Claudette Johnson Until 14 January 2024 The Courtauld, London, UK One of the most significant figurative artists of her generation, Claudette Johnson creates larger-thanlife drawings of Black women and men that are at once intimate and powerful. For over 30 years she has consistently pushed herself to create the most authentic renderings of her sitters, addressing both Black bodies and interior lives and lending them a profound sense of presence. Featuring significant early works alongside new drawings, this exhibition will offer a compelling overview of Johnson’s pioneering career and artistic development.

Exhibitions AKAA - Also Known As Africa 20 - 22 October 2023 Carreau du Temple, Paris, France For its eighth edition, AKAA is highlighting curatorial practice in the context of a fair and its market, led by Artistic Director, Armelle Dakouo. The initiative aims to change the impact of curatorial practice by building an artistic community and raising the visibility of artists. Included in the line-up are the finalists of the ellipse prize 2023, Parmenas Awudza, Clément Gbegno, Ras Sankara, Koffi Seble and Thierry Tomety. All are emerging artists based in Togo and created work in connection to the theme Dreamy Memory.

Habib Hakallie: Black Pen Portraits 20 October – 10 December 2023 Attenborough Arts Centre, Leicester, UK Habib Hajallie champions figures from ethnically diverse backgrounds that have been conspicuously omitted from traditional British portraiture. He specialises in the use of the everyday medium of black ballpoint pen to celebrate figures that should be given a greater visibility. Born in south east London, his work is often informed by his Sierra Leonean and Lebanese heritage.

Karrabing Film Collective: Night Fishing with Ancestors 7 October 2023 - 14 January 2024 Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, London, UK Goldsmiths CCA is proud to present an exhibition of films by the Karrabing Film Collective, a grassroots Indigenous media group of approximately 30 members living in the Belyuen Community, in Australia’s Northern Territory. The exhibition comprises existing works, and a new film, Night Fishing with Ancestors (2023), which will be seen for the first time in the UK. Connecting the four films on display is the concept of theft; both of the traumatic historical theft of land and children, but also an ongoing theft of a future through environmental degradation.

Hélène Amouzou: Voyages Until 20 January 2024 Autograph, London, UK Autograph is developing the first UK solo exhibition of Hélène Amouzou’s evocative self-portraits. These hand printed photographs are a crucial document of a migrant who has grappled with notions of freedom, exclusion, and bureaucracy – an attempt to recapture her identity and sense of belonging. Voyages raises important questions: what does it mean to seek refuge, what does belonging feel like, what does it mean to live in limbo, what burden does the body carry as a result? The Togolese-born, Belgium-based artist’s distinctive imagery is created through long exposures, contemplating the complex emotions of displacement and exile.

175

176

Douche contemplative (2022) Parmenas Awudza.

Coming Soon

Exhibitions continued

Armet Francis: Beyond the Black Triangle Until 20 January 2024 Autograph, London, UK For more than four decades, Armet Francis’s mission in photography has been to document the African Diaspora. A Jamaican-British photographer with an acute understanding of Black consciousness, his images are life-affirming moments that celebrate the resilience and survival of African Diasporic cultures. Francis emmigrated as a young child from Jamaica to Britain in the 1950s. This experience of being unrooted, and politically alienated produced a profound sense of dislocation and impact on his life. Feeling culturally displaced, Francis turned to photography as an aid to share his desire to connect with the rich and diverse Pan-African world.

Nengi Omuku: The Dance of the People and the Natural World 7 October 2023 - 4 March 2024 Hastings Contemporary, Hastings, UK The first solo institutional exhibition of Lagosbased artist Nengi Omuku spans five of Hastings Contemporary’s eight galleries, and includes works made between 2021 and 2023 that probe Omuku’s love of nature and the ways in which it provides her with a sense of safety and serenity. From 2021’s Lighthouse through to her latest, Days gone by (2023), the series focuses on a sense of re-immersion in nature.

John Akomfrah: Arcadia 30 November 2023-2 June 2024 The Box, Plymouth, UK A major new multi-screen film commission by visionary filmmaker John Akomfrah, Arcadia explores the themes of colonialism, capitalism and the global implications of climate change. Akomfrah will represent Great Britain at the prestigious 2024 Venice Biennale, Italy.

The Time is Always Now. Artists Reframe the Black Figure 22 February - 19 May 2024 National Portrait Gallery, London, UK A major study of the Black figure – and its representation in contemporary art. The exhibition, curated by Ekow Eshun (former Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts) showcases the work of contemporary artists from the African Diaspora, including Michael Armitage, Lubaina Himid, Kerry James Marshall, Toyin Ojih Odutola and Amy Sherald and highlights the use of figures to illuminate the richness and complexity of Black life. As well as surveying the presence of the Black figure in Western art history, we examine its absence and the story of representation told through these works, as well as the social, psychological and cultural contexts in which they were produced.

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CALENDAR HIGHLIGHTS 2024

178

Date

Event

Location

27 December – 3 January

Afrochella

Accra, Cape Coast

15 January

Martin Luther King Jr Day

USA

24 January

World Day for African and Afrodescendant Culture

Worldwide

24 – 28 January

International Conference and Festival of Blacks in Dance

Memphis, Tennessee

February

Black History Month

USA

1 February

Abolition of Slavery Day

Mauritius

3 February

Heroes Day

Mozambique

9 – 17 February

Carnival

Trinidad, Brazil,

8 March

International Women’s Day

Worldwide

11 March

Moshoeshoe Day

Lesotho

29 March Boganda Day

Central African Republic

7 April

Karume Day

Tanzania

22 April

Stephen Lawrence Day

UK

27 April

AfroFest Bristol Music Fest

Bristol

29 April

International Dance Day

Worldwide

29 April – 4 May

Let’s Dance International Frontiers

Leicester, UK

30 April

International Jazz Day

Worldwide

22 – 31 May

Dak’Art Biennale

Dakar, Senegal

5 May

African World Heritage Day

Across Africa

21 May

Afro-Colombian Day (Día de la Afrocolombianidad)

Colombia

Calendar Highlights 2024

Date

Event

Location

21 May

World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development

Worldwide

1 June

Madaraka Day

Kenya

June

Afro Nation 2024

Portimão, Portugal

19 June

Juneteenth

USA

22 June

Windrush Day

UK

June/July Black Europe Summer School

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

July

Australia

Blak History Month

1 July Keti Koti “Break the Chains”

Oosterpark, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

3 July

Unity Day

Zambia

18 July

Nelson Mandela International Day

Worldwide

August CARIFESTA

Saint Kitts and Nevis

1 August Emancipation Day

Bahamas, Belize, Bermuda, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kits and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Turks and Caicos Islands

3 August

Emancipation Remembrance Day

UK

9 August

International Day of the World’s Indigenous People

Worldwide

23 August

International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition

Worldwide

25 – 26 August

Notting Hill Carnival

London, UK

October

Black History Month

UK

October - January

100 Black Women Who Have Made a Mark Leicester Gallery

20 November

Black Consciousness Day (Dia da Consciência Negra)

Brazil

10 December

Human Rights Day

South Africa

26 December – 1 January

Kwanzaa

USA 179

The Interview

GINA YASHERE

GINA YASHERE IS AN AWARD-WINNING COMEDIAN. HAVING FOUND HER FEET IN THE PIONEERING BLACK BRITISH COMEDY SCENE OF THE 1990S, SHE HAS GONE ONTO SUCCESS IN THE US BOTH IN STAND UP AND AS A WRITER OF THE CBS SITCOM BOB HEARTS ABISHOLA. HERE, SHE SHARES AN INSIGHT INTO HER CAREER ALONGSIDE HER AMBITIONS FOR THE FUTURE. 180

The Interview Gina Yashere — Interview By Pawlet Brookes

– YOUR PATH TO FINDING A CAREER AS A COMEDIAN AND WRITER WAS NOT AN OBVIOUS TRAJECTORY. CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THOSE FIRST STEPS INTO COMEDY? PARTICULARLY IN THE 1990S WHEN BLACK BRITISH COMEDY REALLY WAS PAVING THE WAY. When I first came into comedy in the 1990s, it was an exciting time, there were lots and lots of clubs. I could open a copy of that week’s TIME OUT magazine and literally go down the list of all the clubs. It would have a phone number of whoever’s promoting that night. I would just call them up and pester them for shows and if they said “call me back in a month”, I had a little filofax, and I’d write the exact date and call them back a month later.

The Black clubs were more of an event, they weren’t just weekly clubs. They were usually a monthly event or something big. People would get dressed up and we would get paid a little bit more money. Those were super fun to do and that helped me to create an act much quicker. You had to come correct, otherwise they would boo you off. That was an exciting time.

I really enjoyed the beginning in the 1990s because it still felt very fresh. There were not as many comedians as there are now because it wasn’t seen as a stepping-stone to fame. It was just people that wanted to do comedy and do it well. Make people laugh and maybe earn money while they were doing it. Now it’s a lot more business-like. It’s a lot more mercenary.

Gina Yashere. Photographer Steve Peirce.

181

– YOU ALSO OFTEN DRAW ON THE DICHOTOMY OF THE BLACK BRITISH EXPERIENCE. CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THIS A LITTLE MORE AND HOW YOU NAVIGATE AND CELEBRATE WHAT IT MEANS TO BE BLACK BRITISH?

– FROM EARLY SKETCHES THROUGH TO THE SITCOMS, WE CAN SEE THE IMPACT OF YOUR LIFE AND FAMILY IN SHAPING YOUR WRITING. DO YOU HAVE A PROCESS FOR HOW YOU CHOOSE THEMES, CHARACTERS AND SUBJECTS FOR YOUR WORK? HAS THIS CHANGED OVER THE YEARS? I’ve never really had a process of how I choose themes.

From my stand up, it’s usually stuff that’s happened to me, stuff that interests me, stuff that makes me angry, stuff that makes me laugh.

My process of writing, when I first started out, I would write all my material out by hand, word for word. I used to have piles of notebooks where, before a show, I’d write a comprehensive bullet point list of the jokes I was going to do and the order I was going to do them in. Then I would memorise that bullet point list. When I’m on stage, I would go through the list, doing jokes one by one. I’d make sure I did a map of where the story was supposed to go and map the jokes in in that order.

But as I became more experienced, sort of 10 years in, I stopped doing that and just started letting it flow more on stage. Just go out on stage and go in with the crowd and see what I felt like doing at the moment. I might do a set one day where I start with one joke and the same night do another show and do a completely different routine or start with a different joke, just to play with the order and the flow. To experiment, picking subjects for sketches and characters they were always based on family and friends and people I knew. I’ve always done what I know.

182

Being Black and British, especially in America, when I first came here 16 years ago, people were just unaware of the fact that Black British people really existed, mainly because the TV and movies came from a specific middle-class white viewpoint. People just didn’t know we exist, it was great to bring awareness of that. Obviously, it’s changed as more and more Black British actors are taking Hollywood by the horns and crushing it. That is how I celebrate, I always go on stage and be myself, I’ve never been anything but myself. Being Black and British is a huge part of that. I have never tried to change that for any particular audience.

– DO YOU THINK IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOT TAKE YOURSELF TOO SERIOUSLY? I’ve never taken myself too seriously. I’m a comedian. You know, my job is to comedise. I’ve always been a person of humour. It is important not to take yourself too seriously, otherwise it doesn’t help. If you’re a person who is supposed to be creating humour, if you have no humour, when it comes to yourself, then you can’t create humour for others, because then you’re just punching down.

– DO YOU THINK YOUR WORK IS SOCIO-POLITICAL COMMENTARY? I suppose my work is socio political commentary. I never started out that way. I have never seen myself as a political comedian. I am a Black, female, queer child of immigrants, now an immigrant myself living in another country. When I talk about my experiences, whether it be homophobia, racism, you know, whatever experiences I’ve had in life, then obviously it becomes political, just by virtue of who I am. I’m a walking political statement. But my first port of call has always been to entertain. You know, if I’m educating you at the same time, well, that’s a bonus and you’re learning stuff while you’re laughing. But my first port of call has always been to make people laugh.

The Interview Gina Yashere — Interview By Pawlet Brookes

I really enjoyed the beginning in the 1990s because it still felt very fresh. There were not as many comedians as there are now because it wasn’t seen as a stepping-stone to fame.

Gina Yashere. Photographer Steve Peirce.

183

Being Black and British, especially in America, when I first came here 16 years ago, people were just unaware of the fact that Black British people really existed, mainly because the TV and movies came from a specific middle-class white viewpoint.

– IN 2021 YOU PUBLISHED YOUR MEMOIR CACK-HANDED, WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR FAVOURITE MOMENTS OF YOUR LIFE AND CAREER SO FAR? – THIS EDITION OF BLACKINK IS EXPLORING THE THEME REPRESENTATION, RELOCATION AND REVELATION. WHAT DO THESE WORDS MEAN TO YOU? Representation - I’ve always tried to be a beacon of representation in whatever I’ve done. When I was back in England I hated always being the only Black woman or only Black comedian on shows. I always saw myself as a mentor for younger comedians coming up. People like Judy Love, Kojo, Slim and Mr C, all will attest to the fact that they could always pick up the phone to me and ask for advice on how to get into the industry and navigate it. I’ve always been about representation and getting as many of us through the door as possible. I’m even doing that with my sitcom in America [Bob Hearts Abishola], you know, getting as many Black people through the door as possible. Not just as actors and performers, but writers and producers.

Relocation - I’m all about relocation. If you’re not appreciated where you are, move to where you can be your best, be fully appreciated and fulfil your potential. That is what I’ve done and I advise anybody to do the same. I’m all about relocation if you’re feeling stunted or stagnated, where you’re at.

The definition of revelation is making something unknown, revealed. The last few years especially since 2020, George Floyd, all the horrible things that have happened. I’m not even going to say that’s unknown. But what we’ve done is peel back the pretence, that people had of not knowing what we’ve been going through. For me, since 2020, specifically, revelation has, has been big, not so much for us, but definitely for other people.

184

Yes, I wrote my book cack-handed, which is now out on paperback. It was very cathartic. Even though I speak about lot of difficulties that I’ve gone through in life, I’m a comedian, so the book is still entertaining and funny.

There are so many highlights of my career. Like just getting on a plane and going to America, knowing that I’m on the final of a talent show that could get me to a wider audience.

Knowing that I’ve got a two-year visa in my back pocket to make my fortune in America, which has been a dream, since I was a kid. That was definitely one of the highlights of my career.

My travels, going to places like Malaysia and Singapore and Hong Kong, and finding an audience of people that just love what I do, and keep calling me back. There is no language barrier when it comes to comedy… well, as long as they can speak English, so that’s kind of bulls**t. But you know, humour has no barriers, that is what I’m saying.

Obviously, you know, finally getting a TV show off the ground in America, that represents my people and my culture. I’m able to put forward an image of us, which is more in keeping with what we are, rather than what other people assume we are. That has definitely got to be the biggest highlight of my career so far. But the love of stand up is still strong. When I go to a theatre or comedy club, wherever in the world and the shows are sold out with people coming to see me, it’s a highlight every time, every time. I feel blessed and grateful that I get to do something for a living that I love and make money from it. Make a living doing something I love, 99% of the people on this planet don’t get to do that.

The Interview Gina Yashere — Interview By Pawlet Brookes

– DO YOU HAVE ANY WORDS OF WISDOM FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE INTERESTED IN BECOMING A COMEDIAN OR WRITER? Listen to your own voice. Don’t try and copy other people, don’t plagiarise other people. Write about what you know and work hard. Don’t get into it for the wrong reasons, like you just want to be a flash in the pan, famous person.

It doesn’t happen that way for 99.9% of the people in this industry. You have to have a real passion for it and not be in it for fame or money. You have to really want to do this, you have to have something deep inside you, that makes you want to do it regardless of whether you’re earning money from it. You know, I would drive from London to Manchester to do a show for free and then sleep in the car on the way back because I couldn’t afford a hotel room. That was true love of the art and you have to have that to make it in this industry.

That’s my advice. Love what you do, really have a passion for it. Don’t plagiarise other people.

– WHAT DO YOU HAVE COMING UP NEXT? ARE THERE ANY PROJECTS YOU ARE CURRENTLY WORKING ON? Well, right now, I’m on strike with all my fellow writers and actors in Hollywood. But I’m waiting for the studios to come to their senses so I can get back to work, on season five of my sitcom, Bob Hearts Abishola. I was talking to various studios about turning my memoir into a TV show, there’s a lot of interest, so in my downtime I’m working on my own stuff and writing the script for that. I mean, this is all contingent on the strike and is insane but I’m also working with other Black writers on their projects. My next thing is now to exec produce other Black writers and bring their work forward and oversee that. I want to be like a gate that other Black writers can get into the industry. That’s what I’m going to be working on in the future.

Gina Yashere. Photographer Steve Peirce.

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