It is weeks since George Floyd’s killing, and people are still talking about the Black Lives Matter movement.  This is the most sustained period of dialogue about racism and particularly about anti-Blackness that I have known in my lifetime.  I have heard it described on numerous occasions as an ‘awakening’ of many (White) people to the reality of what it means to be Black in our society.  While this continued focus feels positive, Black people have also suffered a backlash from ‘All Lives Matter’ folk and racists challenging this reality, and consequently there have been increased incidents of racism.  I have found the countless examples of racism being called out on social media devastating and examples of microaggressions so insidious they have exhausted me.  The hashtag #BlackintheIvory highlights the extent of racism for Black people working in academia – read some of them and just imagine experiencing that stuff day in and day out…  

At times over the last month, I have felt hopeful and positive about this ‘awakening’ to the reality of racism, about people feeling confident to talk more openly about race and racism, and at other times I have felt almost paralysed by the magnitude of the problem in our society.  It has been a very emotional time…

and…I…am…White. 

I cannot imagine the resilience needed to engage with these endless reports of racism as a potential recipient myself.  I cannot imagine the strength needed to keep speaking out about one’s own painful experiences in the hope that it might one day change someone else’s behaviour, while knowing that there have been ‘awakenings’ before and nothing changed. I was quite struck by an article in the Metro newspaper by Natalie Morris, a young woman talking about ‘the emotional impact of watching White people wake up to racism’ even though Black people have been talking about their experiences for decades (well, centuries).  We can’t expect Black people to be grateful that we are finally listening, in fact it must be pretty painful to wonder why White people didn’t feel they needed to listen before now.

But we are finally listening and talking about it, quite openly and in a much more honest way than I have known before.  The fact that many of the key books by the leading authors on race and racism have been sold out for weeks and, for the first time, Black authors are topping the UK book charts means that there are a lot of people trying to learn more about what it is like to be Black and what we, as White people, can do to be true allies.

This discourse is happening across the University too.  The number of people across the University who got in touch after my last blog wanting to learn more and committing to doing better was really encouraging.  And better than that, lots of people are also asking about what they/we can DO to make real change.

We have been working really hard to finalise our University Race Equality Action Plan; this is a list of actions that will be implemented across the University aimed at closing our BAME awarding rate gap and improving race equality for staff and students. It is almost ready, and when it is, we will share it, shout about it and we can start proving how committed we, at the University of Surrey, are to address these inequalities.

So, let’s keep talking about anti-racism, keep challenging ourselves to be better allies now and going forward (people of colour do not get to ‘check in and out’ of the reality of racism and nor should we!).  Let’s keep up the momentum so that our ‘new normal’ can be an anti-racist one.

Dr Emily Williams

Academic Lead for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion