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Liverpool

Liverpool street sign plan to highlight city’s slavery links

By News & Current Affairs, Reparations

Liverpool could introduce plaques to give an “honest account” of places connected to the slave trade. By BBC News — Much of the city’s 18th Century wealth came from the trade involving British slavers transporting Africans across the Atlantic. Mayor Joe Anderson said paintings, street names and buildings in the city were “important parts of the historical record which should not be concealed”. He is calling for new signs to…

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John Harvard Statue

Harvard benefited from Antigua slavery. The two are talking about an education partnership.

By News & Current Affairs, Reparations

By Jacqueline Charles, Miami Herald — Harvard University and the island of Antigua and Barbuda are talking about an educational partnership following a letter the Caribbean island’s prime minister sent to the university requesting slavery reparations. A Harvard University spokesman confirmed to the Miami Herald that the school’s president, Lawrence Bacow, recently reached out to Antigua and Barbuda’s ambassador to the United States, Sir Ronald Sanders, to discuss how the prestigious university…

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The University of Glasgow is one of the oldest in the world but its new building was completed in the late 19th Century

Glasgow University’s ‘bold’ move to pay back slave trade profits

By Reparations

By Hannah Capella, BBC News — Glasgow University has agreed to raise and spend £20m in reparations after discovering it benefited by millions of pounds from the slave trade. It is believed to be the first institution in the UK to implement such a “programme of restorative justice”. The money will be raised and spent over the next 20 years on setting up and running the Glasgow-Caribbean Centre for Development…

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The Trump baby blimp is set to fly over London as part of mass protests against the U.S. president's state visit.

A Demagogue, Fascist, and Serious Threat: UK Mobilizes to Make Sure Trump Knows He ‘Is Not Welcome’

By News & Current Affairs

“Donald Trump is just one of the most egregious examples of a growing global threat. The far-right is on the rise around the world, threatening our hard-won rights and freedoms.” By Jake Johnson, Common Dreams — With the city of London effectively on “lockdown” in anticipation of the protests—complete with the now-famous Trump Baby Blimp—that are expected to flood the city’s streets on Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump touched down in…

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When Franco Rosso’s “Babylon” premièred at Cannes, in 1980, it was hailed for its soulful depictions of a community largely invisible in British media.Photograph Courtesy Kino Lorber Repertory / Seventy-Seven

What “Babylon” Captured About Racism and Reggae

By Editors' Choice

By Hua Hsu, The New Yorker — In June, 1948, the H.M.T. Empire Windrush docked in the Port of Tilbury, near London. Among its passengers were approximately eight hundred West Indian workers, mostly from Jamaica, who had come in response to England’s postwar labor shortage. Some planned to earn money and return home; others wondered what it would be like to stay. There was a lot of work to be…

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‘A reparative justice programme’ … Glasgow University has completed a two-year review of how it grew wealthy from the slave trade. Photograph: University of Glasgow

Reparations for slavery are not about punishing children for parents’ sins

By Editors' Choice, Reparations

Reparative justice, whereby communities are compensated for losses caused by the slavery or the Holocaust, is morally fair. By Julian Baggini, The Guardian — Justice requires a good memory, one that is both accurate and not self-servingly selective. But whether it is well-served by a long memory is more contentious. We know that many still pay the price for sins previous generations never paid for. But most agree with the…

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Vice Chancellor of The University of the West Indies (UWI) Sir Hilary Beckles

Glasgow University To Pay Reparations For £200m Extracted From Region

By Reparations

The Jamaica Gleaner — Vice Chancellor of The University of the West Indies (UWI) Sir Hilary Beckles has reported that The University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom (UK) is planning to pay reparations for £200 million (approximately J$34 billion) taken from the Caribbean. According to Beckles, who recently returned from the UK, “The University of Glasgow has recognised that Jamaican slave owners had adopted the University of Glasgow as…

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Imperial Federation Map of the World showing the extent of the British Empire. The Empire in red in 1886, by Walter Crane

British Empire is still being whitewashed by the school curriculum – historian on why this must change

By Editors' Choice

By Deana Heath, The Conversation — Jeremy Corbyn has recently proposed that British school children should be taught about the history of the realities of British imperialism and colonialism. This would include the history of people of colour as components of, and contributors to, the British nation-state – rather than simply as enslaved victims of it. As Corbyn rightly noted: “Black history is British history” – and hence its study should be…

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