Abstract
This article critically reflects on anti-racist and anthropological teaching practices in a widening participation university. It argues that to make meaningful change to entrenched racism and awarding gaps in higher education, lecturers must take action and work towards embedding anti-racism into every level of the university structure. We propose using an ecological model with lecturers at its heart as a practical tool to support this work. Lecturers can begin by examining themselves and bring their vulnerabilities and openness to change to their different fields of connectivity – with students, with the curriculum, with academic structures, and with colleagues, across the institution. Such work helps challenge sedimented beliefs and practices and moves the institution toward becoming a more inclusive or pro-belonging university for students and staff alike.
Highlights
In this article, two white cisgender female anthropologists come together to discuss their practices of teaching in a widening participation university
The University of East London, where we teach in public health, positions itself as an ‘engine of social mobility [...] to further widen access to transformative higher education’ (UEL, 2020, p. 9) to its students; 70% of whom are racialised as Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (UEL, 2020, p. 1), or as we use in this paper, Global Majority
As Collins and Bilge (2020, p. 192) affirm, ‘oppressed people need education in order to become critically aware [so that they can analyse and oppose] their own subordination’. This mandate, together with regular discussions and reflections on how to decolonise teaching, curricula and assessment to be reflective of our students, is what drives us to transform our practice and offer this framework for others to do the same
Summary
Two white cisgender female anthropologists come together to discuss their practices of teaching in a widening participation university. 4) between students from varied social and economic backgrounds Within this context, The University of East London, where we teach in public health, positions itself as an ‘engine of social mobility [...] to further widen access to transformative higher education’ 192) affirm, ‘oppressed people need education in order to become critically aware [so that they can analyse and oppose] their own subordination’. This mandate, together with regular discussions and reflections on how to decolonise teaching, curricula and assessment to be reflective of our students, is what drives us to transform our practice and offer this framework for others to do the same
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