Socially Just Academia (@socialjustacad) is a new project within Equity Unbound (@unboundeq), originally named Inclusive Academia.
This open, networked, long-term project will be a series of listening sessions, conversations, and workshops aimed at dismantling oppression and promoting decolonial and antiracist practices in academic institutions, research practice, curricula and teaching practices. This project idea arose as a continuation of an Equity Unbound event held on June 30, 2020 entitled “Inclusive Citation, Inclusive Academy?” where participants expressed a need to continue the conversation and build a community around these important issues.
Academia is often a hostile space in both implicit and explicit ways for IBPOC (indigenous, black and people of color) academics, staff and students alike, as well as those from lower-income and colonized countries (whether in the past or present, impacted by coloniality). Epistemic and social injustices are persistent/pervasive despite concern and previous efforts to address these challenges. This collaborative and collective work will consider the challenges faced both in our local and institutional contexts as well as a broader global context. We seek a pathway for decolonial, intersectional and anti-racist practices in knowledge-making and community engagement within and beyond ‘the academy’, while recognizing that previous institutional efforts at promotion “inclusion”, “equity” and “diversity” have been problematic, and that even the term “academy” has elitist connotations we must question and dismantle.
Anyone with a role or an interest in “dismantling oppression and promoting decolonial and antiracist practices in academic institutions, research practice, curricula and teaching practices” is welcome. If you care about these issues and would like to listen, participate and/or take action, whether you have experience or not, whether your role currently permits you or not, you are welcome. This invitation is open for early career, senior and retired academics, university support staff, students (graduate and undergraduate), parents, NGOs and anyone with a stake in higher education or even education as a whole. You are welcome. Feel free to invite your colleagues and students.
**Launch event October 9th (details and recording here)
To join the Socially Just Academia community, click here.
The Facilitators of the Project (alphabetical order of last name) are:
- Tutaleni Asino, Oklahoma State University @tutaleni
- Maha Bali, American University in Cairo, Egypt @bali_maha
- Leslie Chan, University of Toronto, Canada, @lesliekwchan
- Jose Cossa, Penn State University, @zeca72
- Kim Fox, American University in Cairo, Egypt @KimFoxWOSU
- Doris Jones, American University in Cairo, Egypt
- Benita Moolman, University of Cape Town, @BenitaMoolman
- Jasmine Roberts, Ohio State University @ProfJasmine
- Mia Zamora, Kean University, USA @MiaZamoraPhD
This project is funded by the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, and is supported by the following institutions: Equity Unbound; the American University in Cairo (Egypt); Kean University (USA & China), Ohio State University (USA), Oklahoma State University (USA), Penn State University (USA), University of Cape Town (South Africa), University of Toronto (Canada).
