Black History Month 2023 in the libraries

posted by Olivia Warbey | 09/10/2023

The focus for this year’s Black History Month is the theme ‘Saluting Our Sisters and the #WEMATTER movement.

Black women have played an important role in British life for centuries, but we don’t know much about them. Their stories are not told in schools and rarely told in higher education. It’s time to celebrate their achievements and introduce as many people as possible to the many black women who have not be recognised for so long.

The Black Lives Matter movement has shone a light on black history in the UK and the Decolonising initiatives that have happened in the education sectors, including the University of Lincoln are beginning to uncover uncomfortable truths as well as campaigning for a change in the narrative more widely. This is crucial to dismantling systemic racism.

1948 saw the arrival of the Windrush generation but black women were already in the UK from as early as the 1700s. What do we know about these women? We should learn from them and be inspired by their courageous and resilient lives.

The library provides many resources to research these amazing black women. In addition to books displayed in both the main library and the Ross Library (Ross Lucas Medical Sciences Building) we have two fantastic displays and a joint reading list which celebrates 6 remarkable black women from British history (display in the main library) and many books in the whole library collection (Ross Library). Scan the QR code or copy the URL: https://rl.talis.com/3/lincoln/lists/3EC37ACE-65FD-2860-8B97-325BB3EEC761.html

We also have trials to two fabulous databases:

ProQuest Black Studies brings together award-winning content into one destination that can be used for research, teaching, and learning. Combining primary and secondary sources, leading historical Black newspapers, archival documents, government materials, video, writings by major American Black intellectuals and leaders, and essays by top scholars in Black Studies, this easy-to-use interface will enable students to find the resources they need, by topic pages, timelines, source types and more.

Qwest TV is Quincy Jones’ video streaming network celebrating Black & Global music through premium documentaries, concerts, archive gems and interviews.

Access both these databases on the Library page https://guides.library.lincoln.ac.uk/az.php under ‘New Databases’