July 2020

This week we are posting personal blogs from students and staff in History at the University of Northampton. Today’s post is by Joseph, a first year History Undergraduate. 

When you look back in history and you see black people as slaves, then you see them segregated and treated as second class citizens and you think how crazy it must have been and maybe you think you would never support such a society. Yet the truth is, that society never changed, it just put on a new face to keep people quiet while the system digested innocent black lives.

Fortunately, this has finally been brought into the light of wider audiences. I have split this into three sections of what I can see are the key issues and debates around it.

Denial: individuals who use examples of white people being killed by black people are doing such in an attempt to divert conversation away from talking about black murders by white people, and to put the BLM in a nice box because it is easier than admitting you have racist traits that you dislike.

These deniers, are no different to the likes of David Irving and other historians who tried to say that the Holocaust didn’t happen, they, for their own reasons have an agenda which they won’t admit to but could be sourced from internalised racism due to personal experiences or just to be controversial in order to create some reaction.

To put simply, those who now want to share problems that white people face by black people, you didn’t care before George Floyd, so why do you care now? Other than, for some unknown reason, you wish to move the spotlight away from the Black Lives Matter movement and towards a fight that you were quiet about until now. Unfortunately, these people may not care because black people have been criminalized to such an extent that perhaps sympathy no longer exists.

‘All Lives Matter’: This ridiculous idea can be stopped.

Nowhere in the BLM slogan is the word ‘only’ used, ‘Black Lives Matter’ is a plea to governments and institutions to ensure that they treat black people as human beings. If you stand by ‘All lives matter’, then it is probable you’ve never feared being treated differently in society.

This leads to me to an exercise where I hope you will see where I am coming from. I am a gay man and as part of the LGBTQ+ community am considered a minority citizen, one in five people in this community will experience a version of hate crime, cases of same sex couples being beaten or even killed are prominent but not necessarily widely published.

If I was beaten up based on my sexuality and started a movement called ‘Gay Lives Matter’, would you stand up and say, ‘No. Straight lives matter too’? Of course, they do, but that’s not the fight that is being fought because there is no fight.

Equally, if a sexually assaulted woman consoles in a man, he doesn’t respond saying ‘well men get sexually assaulted too!’. Yes, they do and its awful but its not the current issue at hand. To avoid saying ‘Black Lives Matter’ is to disagree with the cause itself, you are disregarding one statement to make it another- ‘All lives matter’. Therefore, you disagree that black lives matter and are in turn a racist.

The Riots: the most precarious, sensitive and in my opinion the only real area of debate is the issue around the riots.

To analyse George Floyd and who he was, as some people have, is to almost make a justification to his horrific death, something the deniers or outright racists are quick to argue.

With the benefit of hindsight, modern society can be proud of past protests that sought basic human rights, especially in the case of the women’s suffrage movement in the early twentieth century. Split into two groups, the Suffragists who used peaceful methods and the Suffragettes who used violence, they desired the vote for women, what is now considered a basic human right.

I want to highlight some of the methods used by the Suffragettes to claim the vote: in 1909, a suffragette whipped a young Winston Churchill, attacked the Prime Minister’s car, attempt to burn down a theatre in Dublin with the Prime Minister inside, and art galleries, banks and post office windows were smashed, telegraph wires cut preventing communications, post boxes blown up and railway stations burned down with a placard of ‘Votes for Women’ on the side.

These actions are extreme, yet their movement is seen as the original ‘girl power’.

Moreover, in 1969, a police force raided the Stonewall inn, a gay club in New York. Fed up with constant police harassment and discrimination in society, the LGBT crowds, as well as neighbours attacked the police forcing them to shelter within the Inn where the rioters then attempted to set it alight. This acted as catalyst for the Gay Liberation Front.

Therefore, historically violence to achieve an aim came hand in hand with protest and movements, today we are proud of the suffrage movement, they’re martyrs and people to look up to as they fought for change, yet we look at the riots today as unnecessary and extreme.

Perhaps in fifty years’ time, 2020 will be the year of change and we, just as with the suffragettes and with Stonewall, will overlook the specific actions but consider the long term and long-awaited desire for change. The Pankhursts’ followed the phrase, ‘Deeds not Words’ which makes you question, would you really listen to a problem or would you only listen if something was actively done?

However, this is happening today, so mindsight is not our friend. Vandalism and public disorder including the defacing of monuments is not appropriate nor beneficial to the cause. The most prominent being Winston Churchill, he is a national hero and yes you can argue him being a racist, but one has to contextually bear in mind that this was the early and mid-twentieth century, thus it is safe to say that near enough everybody in that period can be considered a racist because this was a period of intense nationalism.

The abuse on police is also not acceptable, I feel some, particularly adolescents are involved due to their own personal grievances and whom wish to exploit the current situation to start on the police rather than fight for the cause. Just as one black criminal does not represent all black people, not all police are brutal.

The pandemic seems to have been forgotten. The mass protests have led to very large groups meeting and not complying to social distancing guidelines, this is disrespectful to those fighting on the front line in hospitals as well disrespecting those who have lost their lives to the disease as well as their families.

What can be taken from all of this is that this is finally the breakthrough, people have been shocked into action, an action that needs to tread carefully to ensure their cause and support is not. People are now talking openly about racism and how far back this type of persecution has goes. Use of political force has broken families without any opposition for the very reason that in the past black leadership has been suppressed intensely, every time they stand up, they are crushed, but not this time.

Joseph, First Year History undergraduate, University of Northampton 

Today we start a series of personal  blog posts from staff and students reacting to the killing of George Floyd and the protests here and around the world. The first of these is from Ursula, who has just completed her second year of study for a degree in History at the University of Northampton. 

NB: Ursula’s blog contains language that some readers might find offensive, I’ve not edited it out because they are her words and are in context. 

My mother and I

As a 47-year-old white woman I have never known life without racism. It saddens me that today it is still so apparent and prevalent within society and you know what the saddest part is, its that racism is taught, children learn it from an early age. I have lost count of the number of times over my life that I have had to speak up and tell classmates, relatives, friends or colleagues that they cannot use words like that in front of me and now as a mother in front of my children it is not acceptable.

They tend to look at me perplexed that I do not agree with them a white person surely I too should hold the same views at them, because that it was they have been taught, what they know and they know no difference due to ignorance and how they have been brought up. I am of an age where the words ‘half-caste’, ‘paki’, ‘coon’, ‘nigger’ were just a few of the terms used to describe those of a different colour to my own white skin. 

I think back to the programmes on television ‘Love thy neighbour’ and ‘Mind your language.’ If these where show today there would be outrage and rightly so. But this is what I grew up with. Yet I was lucky I was different I learnt to not judge by colour but to treat everyone equally with respect for we are all equal. Why?

I am lucky not just because my mother was a product of an affair with an American Serviceman so she has olive skin, brown eyes and lovely fuzzy afro hair. My sister and I growing up were in awe of her hair especially in the seventies when it was at its afro peak best. I was lucky because of where I lived I had friends who were a mixture of races and religion growing up on a council estate in Essex and although not many went to my school they attended The Catholic Primary School I still played out with them and lived on a mini multicultural street.

I saw prejudice and racism first hand and got into many a scrape for it.

One memory I have is aged 18 at sixth form college two white lads were picking on a black lad outside class we were waiting to go in, I couldn’t hear what they were saying at first but as more people came to wait outside they became more brazen and cocky and so there insults became louder. I soon realised they were not going to stop so had I waded in.

I then got the insults and was called a ‘nigger lover’, and for a few weeks afterwards, I was taunted just because I tried to stop them to make them see they were wrong however their racial education had started at home and the foundations of prejudice there had already been laid.

I have many a time, unfortunately, stopped people in their tracks spouting racism, normally by saying ‘how can you say that’, they then want to know what my problem is? 

And then I tell them about my mum and they say oh but that’s different because you are white! So because I am white and not obviously mixed-race, I am accepted. So being white = privilege and acceptance.

 I have witnessed my mum dye her hair a lighter colour and iron it to make it straight or have it plaited off her face so people could not see her wonderful afro hair as it would count against her. I have seen her carefully choose what to wear and what bus we are to catch into town to protect us from racist comments, I have even heard her say that she is just looking after us, rather than admit she is our mum, to protect us growing up.

She struggled with her mental health partly due to her heritage. Unfortunately, so much so my sister and I ended up in and out of foster care and then I ended up in children’s home when my sister was sent to boarding school, which I later joined. Racism is ignorance people have no idea of the effect it has upon others,  for me, it is all about education.

Education is the key not just at home but within schools. Our own history is littered with racism from the slave trade and how we wanted to be the biggest empire so invaded other countries to build a formidable empire.

The History and English Literature Curriculum needs to be upgraded as they are seriously lacking with regards to black history, racism, black authors.  We must start to educate future generations at primary school and continue it into secondary school.

We cannot eradicate racism overnight but we need to change the attitudes of those around us and this can only be done by speaking out and education, for ‘ignorance is bliss’ but it is no excuse.

Ursula, BA History 2nd Year

Last week we showcased a series of blog posts written by History (and Joint Honours History) students at the University of Northampton. Today we have another, from Amelia, who has just competed her first year at Northampton studying History and Media Production. Again, this is a very personal reflection and it contains language which might cause offence out of context. 

Thank you for inviting us to share our thoughts on the recent events in the USA and the issue of racism in our society.

My Grenadian Grandmother arrived in this country in the ’50’s and would be described as part of the Windrush generation. My British-Guyanan Grandfather would have done the same, except he pretty much immediately joined the military. Those parts of my history I know almost nothing about, I just know that’s how my mother got here.

My White father was adopted in the 1960’s by a clerk and a WW2 Sailor, that’s how he got here, then in the 1990s they had my sister and I.

I was five years old when I asked my mum if she knew she was supposed to have made me White when I was in her tummy. At this age in school, I was being asked to sit at the back of the room because the smell of my hair moisturiser made my teacher feel sick.

I was seven or eight when the concept of ‘poo-skin’ was brought to my attention. I was in secondary school when I was first told to ‘go back to my own country’ and eighteen when someone shouted ‘nigger-bitch’ from their car when I was walking into a shop. So, you can see, from an early age, I knew I was different and even at that young stage I could feel the difference was that, I was less worthy.

For the experiences I have shared above, I know racism exists in this country.

Yet, over the years I have learnt how to be a good British Black kid, to not mention the racism or the comments, to take it on the chin and keep pushing, to make fun of myself before other people could, to tell the racist jokes first before someone else did, to make White people feel comfortable around me by letting them know if their offensive comments came out accidentally I was ‘not like the others, you can say what you want in front of me’.

That was how I survived my situation, and I am deeply ashamed.

This is an important point because in my opinion its one of the main differences growing up in Britain vs America. In America they are open about their racism so if you are Black you kind of know where you stand, but in Britain, we are extremely good at pretending there is no issue at all, which makes gaslighting even more common.

When you experience your life in this way it has effects on your mental health, self-esteem, self-worth. I was sixteen when I first attempted suicide and that is not a coincidence, it is also not entirely down to racism either.

What will help us going forward is for society to understand that racism becomes part of your personal context and effects the way you conduct and value yourself, this does not mean we throw personal responsibility out of the window, there are plenty of choices I decided to make that stopped me from succeeding in life.

When I started going out to clubs and bars, I made more friends, gay friends, mostly White. They called me Black Amii so they could tell me apart from the other girls called Amy, my other Black gay friend, they called Shanigga, because her name was Shanice. We welcomed it, we were in, we were not equal but we were in, and that was enough for us at the time.

I’ve managed to live the majority of my twenties avoiding the topic of racism in my everyday life because it has always felt like a losing battle.

There are no words to describe to White people what it feels like growing up feeling like you do not belong, feeling like you should any day be returning to the country you are from where you will feel welcome and be whole, a dream-like state you can put yourself in to avoid the truth that you are from Britain and the Brits don’t want you.

Soon I’ll be thirty and it is only now that I know I am supposed to be here. I am almost thirty years old and I genuinely believed I did not have a right to be in this country!

Maybe I should have picked up a book, maybe I should have done more to educate myself, maybe I should have been stronger. Maybe.

The problem is my mother is not of dual heritage, she has two Caribbean parents and has dark skin, so you can imagine upon hearing my experience how much worse hers were and are, especially growing up Black in the ’70s, you can imagine the effects of her experiences. She was in no position to teach me or my sister how to be proud of our heritage because she had spent her whole life being told it was ugly and nothing to be proud of. We are all trying to do better now.

Why did I not have the tools to fight back? Why did I not have the knowledge to tell my bullies that my ancestors were invited to this country by their ancestors and together they re-built Britain from the ground up. I lived in the heart of Bristol for two years and had no idea the streets I walked on were once walked on by slaves!! I feel such shame at my ignorance.

I have got no idea how we remove this deeply ingrained disease that is racism in our society but I’m pretty sure it starts with knowledge. I never imagined I’d make it to university but I plan to learn about how I got here and how the story of my ancestors’ ties into the world we live in now because I know for whatever reason, that side of the story has been omitted from history. If I can change that in any small way I hope I get the opportunity, I hope that by studying History I will gain the knowledge I need to teach others and I hope that by studying Media Production will learn about the mediums in which I can present and share them.

It has taken hours to write this because it is in my very nature to shy away from these difficult conversations because of the pain it evokes, I have no energy to argue with anyone who doesn’t want to hear my story and understand there is more to be done. I have felt this so deeply I have been unable to say one word on the murder of George Floyd for fear I would lose the White people in my life I have spent so many years trying to be accepted by.

Again, I am so ashamed of my silence and so sad that I have spent portions of my life wishing I was White because I didn’t know my skin was beautiful. I am trying to do better now.

When I see my White allies share their messages of support online it brings tears to my eyes because it is something I have always wished for and never seen. For the first time I have hope that I can share my experiences without being shut down or questioned, gaslighted. I have even reached out to some of them to thank them for their support. (Can you imagine having to thank someone for not being racist?) But I do thank them, because it is not easy to argue with your friends and family on an issue that does not directly affect you, so to those that have done just that, you have made a difference to me and many other Black people who were absolutely certain that George would die and the world would watch and forget.

It fills me with hope, that for some reason THIS murder of a Black man in the USA has caused this global uproar, it feels like something is different this time, that people really are taking notice. Perhaps its COVID, perhaps the world is so still and silent for once that we’ve been able to open our ears and hear each other. I feel the world has had the rug ripped from underneath it change is coming, a change that will make this world a better place for us ALL.

Amelia, BA History & Media Production 

On 12 May every year the Mass Observation Project asks people living in Britain to keep a diary and submit it for posterity. They are building up a wonderful social history archive. Lecturer Rachel Moss has documented hers on her blog here.

Meanwhile, our undergraduate student Ursula Watkins submitted the following:

May montage by Rahul Pandit, Unsplash

My Day 12th May 2020

I started my day at 7 am I snuck out of bed hoping no one else was up to have a bit of quiet time on my own. My youngest was already up watching telly. So I had a cup of coffee and started my exercise routine today was circuits 30 minutes of a mixture of cardio, weights and planks. I exercise every morning apart from Saturdays and Sundays which helps get the blood pumping and the endorphins flowing.  Breakfast was porridge made with a tablespoon of high protein yoghurt mixed in and almond milk with blueberries.  A nice healthy start oh and a cup of green tea. Today was exam day.

My first exam at home. I went upstairs to try and get my room all ready for the exam and to emulate exam conditions as much as possible. My husband had a plan to keep the boys occupied and downstairs for the duration of my exam. There are of course issues with having an exam at home

1. Distractions from noises outside or within your home.
2. You cannot emulate exam conditions at home however hard you try.
3. Knowing you can go get a cup of tea or a biscuit if you really want too.

I am pleased to say I managed to ignore the call for tea and biscuits!

So sat ready in my bedroom awaiting the witching hour of 9.30 am when the paper was released.

Then six questions to look at and choose two from – decision time

The first essay written, quick spell check and read through

The second essay started partway through you think- nope not liking this press delete and choose another question, not my finest moment as suddenly you realise you have put yourself under extra pressure. The clock is ticking the minutes slip away and before you know it you have finished it checked it and submitted it with time to spare. You wait patiently for the submission email to ping into your inbox and then check your submission did go through and look at your similarity 2%. As you wander downstairs to put your phone on and it pings with messages from fellow students asking how it went and you realise that maybe it could have been better but what’s done is done and you cannot change it now so you focus onto the next. It reminded me that it is very similar to when a person puts you down and you come back with a come back its good but not brilliant but will do and then sometime later you think of something better that you could have said instead.

Lunch is next cheese on toast you want comfort food and then to clear your head so a walk to the shops is in order and a trip to the bakers for a treat.

I then check social media twitter and Facebook and read the governments update about children returning to school as I have a son in year 6 this will affect our house and my son.

Then its time for a cuppa and my treat and to watch a bit of TV nothing too taxing just something that you can watch and switch off from the mental stresses of the day.

I started to think of mt next exam on Friday and the fact that I really needed to revise so did the dutiful thing and went to revise. I had gone from the First World War to Crime and Punishment.

Before I knew it, my boys were asking me what was for tea as they were hungry so it was time to check the cupboards and fridge and fix tea. I decided to make meatballs as my boys love them, although I cheated with a shop brought sauce. So homemade meatballs with a  tomato and basil sauce and garlic bread was cooked then demolished.

Then the usual tidying up of the kitchen gets underway. I hate to come downstairs in the morning to a dirty kitchen or a sink full of dirty dishes. My sons went off to play a board game for half an hour before I would allow them to go on the trampoline and after my tea had gone down I went for a nice long soak in the bath.

8 pm is the youngest’s bedtime and we read a story about a lion and a mouse. It was really good about speaking out for yourself whatever your size. 8.30 pm eldest to bed he goes up on his own now too big for stories at bedtime.

Then its time for me to watch a bit more Telly. I don’t tend to watch lots of programmes just a few programmes that I like and tonight its “The A Word” on at 9 pm. Its another great episode and I just love Christopher Ecclestone who plays Maurice in it, he plays a great part.

Then its bed to sleep ready for another day.

The internet has been filled with blog posts reminding us of the importance of self-care during the Covid-19 crisis. But what does comfort actually mean, both historically and today? Ruth Barton, one of our PhD students, explores.

What does “comfort” mean to you? A cup of tea? A cuddle? Or something more complicated? (Image: Annie Spratt, Unsplash.)

At the time of writing, it has been just over eleven weeks since I began my PhD at the University of Northampton and nine since the start of the lockdown measures which saw severe restrictions placed upon pretty much every aspect of our lives. For the first couple of weeks I was in a constant state of fear and panic (from both the PhD and the pandemic if I am completely honest) but once I realised that this was not sustainable or healthy I started to think about what, if anything, I could take comfort from during these uncertain times (It also ties rather nicely in with my PhD project which is looking at eighteenth and nineteenth century elite comfort).

For me initially the most important thing was that the people I care about were safe. My elderly father had already, at the start of March, made the decision to self-isolate by ending his weekly trips to the supermarket and his jazz club, and the daily visits which my brother and I have both made to him for the last eleven years soon morphed into an evening Skype call, and our Sunday morning chats over coffee, cherished by all three of us, replaced by a group video call. So, even before lockdown I was comforted to a certain extent by the fact that my close family were safe, and we had done as much as we could to make sure that it continued that way.

I was also safe in the knowledge that measures had been put in place which meant that both my team at work and I were able to work from home. Whilst this can create its own problems, we have all adapted well and are managing our workloads despite the drastic change in our working practices. Again, knowing that the people I care about (I consider them my work family) and responsible for were safe at home was a huge relief.

In the eighteenth century, the family unit was pivotal in providing comfort. (Image: Adriaan De Lelie, Jan van Loon and His Family, 1786
Amsterdam: Museum van Loon.) 

This, in the early days, was enough. But prolonged physical separation from the people I care about affords little comfort, no matter how many times I try to convince myself that a video call to my Dad is just as good as seeing him in person or that a quick group chat with my team is an adequate replacement for the daily interaction that we would normally enjoy. In my master’s dissertation on elite family emotions that I completed last year, I argued that the family unit was pivotal in providing emotional comfort, that the physical proximity of family and kin was a source of both comfort and contentment. This, I believe, remains relevant yet at a time when it is sorely needed, it is cruelly denied to so many of us.

So, in what else could I find potential comfort? In early March, naively, I pinned my hopes on the scientific advisors to the Government. But as the weeks turned into months and the number of deaths increased exponentially, this vague hope turned into a numb feeling of disbelief and growing despair.

And so, I wondered, what do others find comfort in? Could those same things help me? However, the more I searched the less comforted I became:

• the weekly ‘clap for carers’ which started out as a thank you to key workers, increasingly felt almost like tacit approval of failed Government policy.
• the focus on fundraising efforts in aid of the NHS only highlighted to me the desperate state that our inadequately funded health service must be in if it was required to rely on the exertions of an elderly war veteran to raise much needed funds.
• the jingoistic, flag-waving ‘celebrations’ of VE Day and the subsequent public displays of dancing and singing did nothing to assuage my feelings of unease.
• the Queen, who was described on Twitter by the comedian Adil Ray as ‘a remarkable person’ who ‘genuinely shows leadership and provides comfort in the most challenging of times’, I must confess, has thus far failed to provide me with any solace.

Despite all this, I do appreciate how incredibly lucky I am and I certainly do not take this for granted, so I try to look to the little things for comfort and when I have the occasional wobble they often help.

The comfort of listening to music. (Image: Elice Moore, Unsplash.)

I take pleasure from a new daily routine that allows me to have music playing all day whilst I work, that now no longer involves a tedious drive to and from the office and which means I can wave to my neighbours throughout the day when I see them out of my window. Lockdown has also given me the opportunity, which I have never had, to spend a lot more time with my partner. Pre-pandemic, during  the week I left the house at 6.30am and usually arrived home 12 hours later, now we have breakfast, lunch and dinner together which is something in our 27 years together we have rarely been able to do other than at weekends and during holidays (and it is also rather lovely to discover that he does still enjoy my company after all these years).

And as we take these first tentative (and yes, scary) steps out of lockdown I will hold onto these small pleasures and I hope that I will continue to gain comfort from them as and when life slowly regains some semblance of normality.