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SUMMARY:Black Heritage Voices 2026
DESCRIPTION:Black Heritage Voices is a conference dedicated to uniting professionals from Black communities working across the heritage sector\, including archivists\, researchers\, audience engagement practitioners\, community historians\, heritage programmers and those in leadership roles. \nThis year’s theme is Mapping Creole Worlds\, Diasporic Futures and the Stories Britain Forgot\, which centres creole identities\, hidden heritage and the afterlives of empire\, the stories that shaped Britain yet remain marginal\, obscured\, or selectively omitted from the national record.  By mapping creole worlds and the complex cultural exchanges that define African and Caribbean Diasporic experience\, the conference interrogates how contemporary Britain continues to negotiate visibility\, belonging and power. \nWe explore how these narratives intersect with neo-colonial realities\, where old hierarchies reappear in new forms from funding structures to museological practices and how they shape whose histories are elevated\, whose are overlooked and how heritage is framed for public consumption.  This lens opens critical conversations about cultural authorship\, archival responsibility and the need to reimagine the structures that hold our histories. \nThrough sessions focusing on creativity\, digital innovation\, community-led practice and the politics of historical interpretation\, Black Heritage Voices invites delegates to challenge dominant perspectives and contribute to a broader shift towards narratives that honour complexity\, hybridity and lived experience.  The aim is not only to recover what has been forgotten\, but to change the gaze\, asserting Diasporic stories as central\, not peripheral\, to Britain’s past\, present and future. \n  \nSpeakers for Black Heritage Voices 2026: \nProfessor Verene A Shepherd\, world-renowned historian and one of the Caribbean’s pre-eminent scholars and advocates for gender justice\, racial equality and non-discrimination and reparations.  She is currently one of the three vice-chairs of the CARICOM Reparations Commission. \nDr Stella Dadzie\, Black British feminist and activist.  She is a founding member of the Organisation of Women of African and Asian Descent (OWAAD) and co-author of The Heart of the Race: Black Women’s Lives in Britain. \nDr Michael McMillan\, playwright\, artist\, curator and scholar.  Known for the critically acclaimed The Front Room\, his interdisciplinary practice centres around the praxis of ‘the creative process\, ethnography\, oral histories\, material culture and performativity’. \nProfessor Stephen Small\, a Professor in the Department of African Diaspora Studies at the University of California\, Berkeley\, where he has taught since 1995; and he is Director of the Institute for the Study of Societal Issues.  He is a faculty member of the Black Europe Summer School – a two-week programme in Amsterdam\, founded and directed for Dr Kwame Nimako.  He earned his PhD in Sociology at the University of California\, Berkeley (1989).  His most recent book is In the Shadows of the Big House. Twenty-First Century Antebellum Slave Cabins and Heritage Tourism in Louisiana\, published by University Press of Mississippi\, in June 2023. \nDr Bob Ramdhanie\, an arts activist\, an arts researcher and a cultural producer\, who is totally committed to the nurturing\, creation and promotion of dynamic diverse arts practice.  He has been in arts management and a pioneer in the development of ‘black arts’ in the UK for over 40 years\, travelling extensively throughout Africa and the Caribbean and continuously building cultural bridges and creating opportunities for artistes to collaborate both ‘at home and broad’. \nDr Kwame Nimako\, founder and Director of the Black Europe Summer School (BESS) based in Amsterdam since 2007.  Dr Nimako has consulted with several private and public institutions including the National Institute for the Study of Dutch Slavery and its Legacy (NiNsee) in Amsterdam\, the Amsterdam Municipal Council\, and the Dutch Ministry of Home Affairs. \nProfessor Roshini Kempadoo\, media artist\, photographer and scholar.  She is Reader with CREAM (Centre for Research and Education in Arts and Media) at Westminster School of Arts\, University of Westminster and is represented by Autograph ABP\, London.
URL:https://www.serendipity-uk.com/event/black-heritage-voices-2026/
LOCATION:Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage\, 8 Bowling Green Street\, Leicester\, LE1 6AT
CATEGORIES:Heritage,On Now,Year Round Programme
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ORGANIZER;CN="Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage":MAILTO:info@serendipity-uk.com
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