The Windrush Scandal in a Transnational and Commonwealth Context: Project and Research Outputs | Manchester
- Event type
- Other Events
- Address
- Samuel Alexander Building: A7, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL
- Speakers
- Juanita Cox (IHR), Anthony Brown (Windrush Defenders Legal C. I. C.)
- Event dates
- Contact
- ihr.events@sas.ac.uk Email only
The 3-year AHRC funded project, The Windrush Scandal in a Transnational and Commonwealth Context (ending in June 2024), provides a unique study of the Windrush Scandal in Britain in the context of UK-Caribbean and Commonwealth transnational relations. In this talk Dr Juanita Cox will focus on research outputs and the resources which are being made available for use by academics, students producing undergraduate and postgraduate dissertations, secondary school teachers and interested parties outside of the academy.
This will include an overview of the project’s website, where audio excerpts from sixty major oral history interviews of one-to-four hours in length, are being made available alongside podcasts, and other educational material. The talk will also speak to some of project’s findings based on interviews with respondents from a wide range of backgrounds including: survivors of the scandal and their advocates e.g., church elders, lawyers, journalists, MPs, councillors, diplomats, community leaders, campaigners and activists; Home Office officials; Caribbean NGOs, academics and museum workers. Dr Cox hopes in doing so to offer a glimpse into the complex story of the Windrush Scandal from its long historical perspective.
Juanita Cox gained her PhD in 2013 from the Department of African Studies and Anthropology, University of Birmingham, and is a winner of the prestigious RE Bradbury Memorial Prize. She is currently working at the Institute of Historical Research (IHR) on a three-year, AHRC-funded project, The Windrush Scandal in a Transnational and Commonwealth Context. Cox has a keen interest in oral history as a research methodology working with Caribbean communities. She is a trustee on the board of the Oral History Society (OHS), the convenor of their Migration Special Interest Group (SIG) and a member of the OHS’s In Dialogue steering committee. Future plans include a jointly-authored monograph on The Windrush Scandal in a Transnational and Commonwealth context.
Anthony Brown was a respondent on the scoping project, which led to the three-year Windrush Scandal project. He had migrated from Jamaica to the UK in 1967 as a young child. He travelled to Jamaica in 1973, remaining there until 1977 in order to attend Jamaica College. When he returned to the UK without incident he attended North Trafford College. It was on applying to University in 1983 he was told he was an overseas student. This news was corroborated by the Home Office who furthermore determined he had no right to be in the UK and ordered his deportation. With the help of community campaigners, he won the right to remain. Problems with Brown’s status re-emerged in 2008 and were only resolved following the government’s pledge in 2018 to right the wrongs of the Windrush Scandal.
Brown graduated in May 2018 with an LLB hons in Law and is a co-founder of Windrush Defenders Legal Community Interest Company, which offers free legal advice to those who have been affected by the Windrush Scandal. He will talk about his experience of being involved in the project and the importance of advocacy.
All welcome- this event is free to attend, but booking is required.
