

CONVERSATION | 30 Sept 2020 | 17:00 - 19:00 CET | Zoom online
This event is part of the ongoing series of conversations about race, racism and anti-racism in/and the museum, entitled A Future where Racism Has No Place. This series pays attention to how recent global anti-racism protests and mobilization have brought into question the responsibility of public institutions, not only in addressing ongoing forms of structural and systemic racism, but also in the role that they can play in the fight against racism.
Following on our first conversation with Secretary Dr. Lonnie G. Bunch III, Melanie Keen, Nawal Mustafa, Quinsy Gario, Stijn Schoonderwoerd and Wayne Modest; this conversation focuses on the notion of institutional racism and how we might reimagine our institutions to better cater to anti-racist work.
Some of the questions we hope to engage with, are:
While the scale and intensity of the current anti-racism mobilization were undoubtedly exceptional, the critique of museums could be seen to form part of a much longer history of institutional critique that have questioned their role in perpetuating colonial ideologies.
Sara Wajid
Julian Isenia
Malique Mohamud
Wayne Modest
Amal Alhaag - Moderator
Sara Wajid, is Head of Engagement at Museum of London working on the development of the new museum. She will start as Joint CEO of Birmingham Museums Trust in November 2020 alongside Zak Mensah. Sara and Zak met through the anti-racist museum network for people of colour, Museum Detox. Prior to working in museums she was a cultural commentator, editor and journalist specialising in cultural politics, race and representation. She is a trustee of the Pitt Rivers Museum and part of the Space Invaders feminist collective.
Wigbertson Julian Isenia, PhD candidate of cultural analysis at the University of Amsterdam and co-founder of Black Queer & Trans Resistance NL. He co-edited the special issue “Sexual politics between the Netherlands and the Caribbean: Imperial entanglements and archival desires” (Tijdschrift voor Genderstudies 2019) and co-curated the exhibition Nos Tei (We are Here) about forty years of Black Queer activism in the Netherlands. His latest article “Looking for Kambrada” received an honourable mention for the Gregory Sprague Prize.