In collaboration with RACE.ED, Retrospect Journal published a special issue on the theme of “Race in Retrospective” in June 2021.

Drawing on contributors from a range of disciplines and backgrounds, our issue weaves an unofficial genealogy of race and racialisation at the University of Edinburgh, situating the ongoing work of RACE.ED in a wider context.

From the eighteenth century to the contemporary, our issue traces some of the ways in which race and racialisation have and remain embedded in our institution. Our contributors take on a number of live issues, including the racial disparities marked by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic; the legacies of David Hume; and contemporary demands for reparatory justice. We shift from the micro to the macro, from the experiences of Black womanhood in the academy to the structural racism that remains embedded across twenty-first century Scotland. This issue aspires to alter the conversation and focus minds onto the ways in which issues of race have and continue to mark the University of Edinburgh.

Read the Issue!

You can read the full issue here:

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Issue Contents

Making Sense of Silenced Archives: Hume, Scotland, and the “debate” about the Humanity of Black People, Dr. Chisomo Kalinga

Listening to the Dead: How Historians Study Race, Dr. Richard Oosterhoff

Spoken Gems: When Academia Meets Self-Care – A Conversational Piece, Dr. Katucha Bento & Dr. Azeezat Johnson

Craniology and Scientific Racism in Late-Nineteenth-Century Edinburgh, Professor Ian Harper & Professor Roger Jefferey

Race, Science, and the University of Edinburgh, Lea Gagliardi Ventre

Arthur James Balfour: The University of Edinburgh’s Imperial Chancellor (1891-1930), Dr. Shaira Vadasaria & Dr. Nicola Perugini

“Race Relations” and the Limits of Social Anthropology, Professor Jonathan Spencer

A “Little” Race Relations, Professor Robbie Shilliam

Scotland and Racial Inequalities, Professor Nasar Meer

Systemic Racism in Scotland increases Racial and Ethnic Minorities’ Vulnerability to COVID-19 Infection, Dr. Gwenetta Curry

The School of History, Classics, and Archaeology and Institutional Racism – An Interview, Lucy Parfitt & Jack Liddall

Wikipedia and the Problem with Neutrality, Dr. Suzanne R. Black

Race, Space, and the Radical Paradox of Academia, Lucien Staddon Foster

Confronting the Legacies of African Enslavement and Anti-Black Racism at the University of Edinburgh, Professor Tommy Curry & Dr. Nicola Frith

Race Equality and the Academy: this far and no more? Professor Emerita Rowena Arshad

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Check out the full Retrospect Journal archive here.