Anti-Racist Scholar-Activism

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Anti-racist scholar-activism raises urgent questions about the role of contemporary universities and the academics that work within them. As profound socio-racial crises collide with mass anti-racist mobilisations, this book focuses on the praxes of academics working within, and against, their institutions in pursuit of anti-racist social justice. Amidst a searing critique of the universitys neoliberal and imperial character, Joseph-Salisbury and Connelly situate the university as a contested space, full of contradictions and tensions.

Drawing upon original empirical data, the book considers how anti-racist scholar-activists navigate barriers and backlash in order to leverage the opportunities and resources of the university in service to communities of resistance. Showing praxes of anti-racist scholar-activism to be complex, diverse, and multi-faceted, and paying particular attention to how scholar-activists grapple with their own complicities in the harms perpetrated and perpetuated by Higher Education institutions, this book is a call to arms for academics who are, or want to be, committed to social justice.
This book is relevant to United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 4, Quality education

Reviews

For the undercover guerrilla scholars, thieves for reparation, freedom-dreamers and those pretending professional compliance while living another secret life, this is your book. Treasure it as a record, guide and manifesto. Share it with your best-loved comrades and take heart. But dont show your boss.
Gargi Bhattacharyya, author of Rethinking Racial Capitalism: Questions of Reproduction and Survival

This is an excellent and welcome addition to literature on racism, activism, and higher education, and a unique resource for university students who are trying to navigate higher education institutions and think through the contradictions, tensions and possibilities of being in the university, but not necessarily becoming of it, while committed to a politics of anti-racism. A necessary and compelling book.
Aziz Choudry, editor of The University and Social Justice, Activists and the Surveillance State

As a polemic on commitment and agency and an irreverent critique of the neoliberal university, Anti-racist scholar-activism is not just one book but many. A primer on the history of anti-racist thought, and a consideration of the epistemology and pedagogy of anti-racism. Expect to be provoked on this rollercoaster of a read.
Liz Fekete, Director, Institute of Race Relations

Including compelling readers to understand more fully the theories, meanings, and significance of the foundational organising concepts of the book anti-racism and scholar-activism Joseph-Salisbury and Connelly engage scholar-activist readers to reflect critically about our own work through the experiences of their study participants. Who among us has not faced situations described in the volume, but how can we better understand those, do better work, and become more authentic as we face dilemmas and contradictions as scholar-activists These are the interventions the book makes into the readers lives. Ending the book with A manifesto for scholar-activism challenges us to examine our praxes and is emblematic of the clarity of their own.
Margo Okazawa-Rey, Professor Emerita, San Francisco State University

'Anti-racist scholar-activism needs to be on the shelf of every scholar that would like to use at least part of their work to make a difference in the struggles against racism and other social inequities.'
Thiago Bogossian, University of Surrey, Ethnic and Racial Studies

'Readable, timely, thought-provoking, and action-provoking, particularly action on the part of academics to serve marginalized communities and communities of resistance.'
Rebecca Scott Yoshizawa, Studies in Social Justice, Volume 16, Issue 3

'Anti-racist scholar-activism provides a welcome opportunity to connect and confer with academics who share similar values, experiences, frustrations and anxieties, as well as to gain practical guidance on how to more effectively fight for racial justice within the confines of the university. Perhaps most significantly, it instils a renewed sense of purpose, reminding us of why we do this work and who we do it for.'
Alex Rajinder Mason, The Sociological Review

'Weaving together the voices of PhD, early-career, and established academics, Joseph-Salisbury (Univ. of Manchester, UK) and Connelly (Univ. of Salford, UK) describe the current and potential path toward anti-racist scholar-activism within higher education. They implore readers to problematize this designation, acknowledging that the concept itself is challenged by those who fall into the category. The authors explore how academics can work within and against the neoliberal-imperial-institutionally-racist university by sharing research, resources, and other social capital with community groups; challenging the inequitable structures within higher education; decentralizing the pursuit of knowledge; increasing community accessibility; using a lens of critical pedagogy; resisting the commodification of time and knowledge; and committing to reflective and reflexive praxes. They acknowledge the backlash many academics, especially scholar-activists of color, might face from these actions and advise ways to navigate this through making strategic moves within individual contexts and forming networks of allies across and outside the university. Though the authors leave readers with the principles to guide the dynamic nature of anti-racist scholar-activism, they never abandon the duality of complicity and dissent, a reality that those committed to anti-racist scholar-activism must continually manage.
--J. L. Newman, Erie School District

Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students and faculty.'
CHOICE, October 2022 Vol. 60 No. 2

Author Bio

Remi Joseph-Salisbury is a Presidential Fellow in Ethnicity and Inequalities at the University of Manchester

Laura Connelly is a Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Sheffield