I promised a colleague I would put this together so here it is. Whilst Whiteness Studies is multidisciplinary, I have given vague subheadings to help direct people to themes they are interested in … all these texts may well fit under multiple headings. — “[White people] have a deep emotional investment in the myth of “sameness,” even as their actions reflect the primacy of whiteness as a sign informing who they are and how they think. …

This essay comes from an entry I submitted for a call for papers about Bridgerton that I did not end up using. It’s essentially a first draft badly in need of editing, and I’m posting because people showed interest in what I was writing (it is definitely unfinished). — Context In June 2021, I submitted an abstract to a Call for Papers [CFP] about the Netflix programme Bridgerton. ‘Call for Papers’ is just academic jargon for submissions from prospective writers to an ad. …

This is an essay I wrote for my MA where I discussed race and epistemic violence in the English literary canon. Last March (2021), I delivered an online CPD session where I unpacked this a bit more, but have since had requests to see the essay. I have also added a postionality statement to show my thinking behind this work, making it open access after much deliberation! — My original essay was entitled ‘History is Written by the Victors: An Explorative Study of Epistemic Violence in the Context of Literary Canon’, somewhat me bending to the rules of the incredibly white heteronormative patriarchal codes of academia. The change in title matches that of the the session. Below you will find a glossary of terms for non-academic folks. Feel free to leave comments.

‘How working with a local community project forced me to rethink the Windrush Scandal — Previously published by the NN Journal — 29th May 2021 When NorFAMtoN CEO Shereen Ingram asked me to join her project to help members of Northampton’s Windrush Generation, I jumped at the opportunity without a second thought, to give back to the people that raised me. I am still firmly of the belief that the village raises the child and…

I wrote this poem inspired by the work I have come across by academic Sara Ahmed on Whiteness (and other things). This poem is named for her article of the same name. — I have also found the attached video incredibly useful for people less academic in Whiteness, which brings this to the mainstream. In order to have Blackness or Brownness, we must have Whiteness talking about racism puts the onus on the victim

I wrote this poem last year inspired by the these leaflets going around Bristol which got me thinking about Englishness and different White identities. This piece also somewhat comes inspired by a collection of essays called ‘White’ by Richard Dyer. — This would be an opportune moment to direct you to a great piece of poetry by Northamptonshire’s own Will Reid with his ‘My England’ A few months ago

I started writing a poetry book in lockdown about late Millennials / Generation Z, and this is one of the poems I came up with. — Yes, I wrote a poem about Pokémon … fight me. I have burned untold days on Leaf Green, Emerald and Heart Gold throwing balls at battle beasts for lols just to give myself a shock to the system that there’s more to life than 9 to 5 kids in 2016 spoke to me about Pokémon

I wrote this piece after a fellow student on my masters course posted a poem by Palestinian-American poet-journalist Noor Hindi called ‘Fuck Your Lecture on Craft, My People Are Dying’ — Additionally I also found it an incredibly sombre experience to attend a Free Palestine protest in Northampton in May 2021. IN PICTURES: Over 150 protesters march through Northampton town centre in solidarity with Palestine A spokesperson for Northamptonshire Police said: "The protestors have now returned to the top of Abington Street and…www.northamptonchron.co.uk

Working with Norfamton these past weeks on the Windrush Doorstep Befriending Team, it was interesting talking to Shereen on how the original critiques of the Scandal did not go far enough in their primary challenges to the Home Office. — Having grown up in close proximity to the Windrush Generation as a grandchild and great-grandchild of Jamaican and Grenadian migrants, watching the crisis unravel since 2018 struck a nerve. Before my paternal Jamaican grandparents moved from Staffs to Spain, I once upon a time would have been roaming around their…