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University of Gloucestershire Celebrates Black History Month

The School of Humanities at the University of Gloucestershire has teamed up with Black History Month Cheltenham, a partnership made up of the local borough council, the African Community Foundation and Cheltenham West End Partnership, to put on a number of events to celebrate Black History Month. Black History month takes place in October every year and its purpose is to celebrate the contribution that black, African and Caribbean communities have made on both a local level and across the globe. Black History month gives us all a chance to rescue stories that have been discarded, correct stories that have been mistold and elevate stories that have been downplayed.

At the University of Gloucestershire, we try to do our bit and this year we’re opening our annual History competition to everyone! To coincide with Black History Month, we’re asking people to nominate individuals in any or all of the following three categories: ‘Unheard Voices in Black History’, ‘Creating New Black Icons’ and ‘Celebrating Local Black Heroes’. To be in with a chance of winning a Kindle Fire Tablet please visit www.historyglos.wordpress.com and let us have your entries by 12 noon on 27 September 2015.

The Indian Ocean Slave Trade
Professor Glyn Campbell, McGill University, Montreal
Gloucestershire Historical Association for Black History Month

Monday 5th October, 7.30pm-8.30pm
Park Campus, Teaching Centre
Tickets: £3 – students free

Much has been written and discussed about the Atlantic slave trade between the west coast of Africa and the Americas, but the Indian Ocean slave trade is much less well known. One of the few international authorities on the subject, Professor Glyn Campbell from Montreal, will be making a brief visit to the UK in October, and has made time to talk during Black History Month.

No booking required – pay at door.

For further information visit www.hagloucestershire.btck.co.uk.

Bonnie Greer: A Talk on Disruption and Insouciance
Followed by an interview with Lucy Tyler, Academic Course Leader: Creative and Critical Studies at the University of Gloucestershire
Wednesday 14th October, 6.30pm-8.00pm
Francis Close Hall Campus, Room TC001
Tickets: £5 – staff/students free

Bonnie Greer OBE, playwright, novelist and critic is one of the most well known and accomplished writers of our generation. She has appeared as a panellist on television programs such as Newsnight and Question Time, and has served on the boards of several leading arts organisations, including the British Museum, the Royal Opera House and the London Film School. It is a real honour she has agreed to be a guest speaker during Black History month in Cheltenham this year.

“We tend to talk a great deal about the past, but what about the future? What tools from the past can we recognize and utilise – things that might seem “improper” and “unacceptable”, that are, in fact survival mechanisms, and beautiful.”

For further information and booking please visit www.yourstudentsunion.com/ents/event/2752/.

Marcus Garvey: Foolish Fanatic or a Great Leader of the Black Masses?
Professor Neil Wynn, Professor of 20th Century American History, University of Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire Historical Association for Black History Month
Monday 19th October, 7.30pm-8.30pm
Oxstalls Campus, Lecture Theatre LC003
Tickets: £3 – students free

The charismatic Marcus Garvey was born in Jamaica, and later lived in the USA, the UK and Jamaica. He is a national hero in Jamaica, and Martin Luther King described him as “the first man on a mass scale and level to give millions of Negroes a sense of dignity and destiny”; yet one of the co-founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) in the USA could describe him as “without doubt, the most dangerous enemy of the Negro race in America and in the world”, and as “either a lunatic or a traitor”. So, dangerous fanatic or great leader? Professor Wynn considers the evidence.

No booking required – pay at door.

For further information visit www.hagloucestershire.btck.co.uk.

Gary Younge: Free at Last: Reclaiming the forgotten stories of Black History
Tuesday 20th October, 7.00pm-8.30pm
Francis Close Hall Campus, Room TC001
Price: £5 – staff/students free

Gary Younge, a feature writer and columnist for The Guardian and The Nation, is the author of several books such as No Place Like Home: A Black Briton’s Journey Through the American South (1999), and The Speech: The Story Behind Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s Dream (2013). His writing both in relation to the civil rights movement, race in the US, and current global affairs, make him one of the key voices on race relations in our time. After 12 years living in the USA Gary is moving back to the UK and has agreed to be a guest speaker during Black History month in Cheltenham.

Black history is not a subgenre of history. Nor does it stand apart from other histories. It makes no more or less sense than American history, Jewish history or Tudor history. Nor is it any more or less diverse – black historians don’t agree on everything just because they’re black. Partial, interconnected, necessary, it is the world’s history told either about or through the prism of a particular group of people.

For further information and booking please visit www.yourstudentsunion.com/ents/event/2753/.