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decolonise soas

15 Questions With Director Amos

15 Questions With Director Amos

Interviewed by Khadija Kothia Baroness Valerie Amos has been the Director of SOAS since 2015. The questions below are a compilation of student submissions, issues relating to current campus discussions, and personal questions about the director herself. 1. How will the financial situation affect current students? It won’t. We

UK Racial Profiling: My Experience as an “Abnormal” Migrant

UK Racial Profiling: My Experience as an “Abnormal” Migrant

Andrew Awad, MA International Studies and Diplomacy 42 out of 195 countries are chosen by the UK government for the compulsory “Police Registration” process. Don’t worry if you have an American, French, Scandinavian or any other “normal” nationality. I hate using the binary “normal/abnormal” but that is, in

Few Answers Materialise in Controversy Around SOAS’ Rare Buddha Statue

Few Answers Materialise in Controversy Around SOAS’ Rare Buddha Statue

Caren Holmes, MA Postcolonial Studies In March 2018, SOAS accepted a controversial gift from American alumni, Mary and Paul Slawson. The gift, a 13th-century Thai sculpture, housed within the Brunei Gallery, is estimated to be worth more than €60,000 but lacks documentation of its transactional history. Dr Angela Chiu,

The Erasure of Black History at SOAS

The Erasure of Black History at SOAS

This is an open letter to all students at my university. To start off Black History Month, I want to address the failures surrounding Black History in an institutional setting. SOAS has an excellent track record of omitting central points of its history, a history which has paved the way

It is not overpopulation that is killing our planet, it is overconsumption.

It is not overpopulation that is killing our planet, it is overconsumption.

Every year the Global Footprint Network calculates the Earth Overshoot Day or Earth Debt Day. This is the date that marks when humanity’s resource consumption for the year had exceeded Earth’s capacity to regenerate those resources that year. In 1987, the first year in which the EOD was

Decolonising the Curriculum: Students’ Union Priorities

Decolonising the Curriculum: Students’ Union Priorities

Ella Linskens, BA Arabic The results of the strategic priorities referendum places Decolonising the Curriculum as the Students’ Union number one priority. This result, alongside current movements such as Rhodes Must Fall and ‘Why Is My Curriculum White?” indicate a growing activism which questions remnants of colonialism within the university.

Election Interviews: Liberation and Equality

Election Interviews: Liberation and Equality

This year The SOAS Spirit decided to go further in our election coverage. The SOAS Students’ Union elections can be intimidating, whether you’re a candidate or just a regular student voter. Campaigning is intense, with much of candidates’ success being weighted on who has the widest friendship circle or