The Black MEDIA STUDIES EXPERT
Francesca Sobande (Sociology and Politics, 2013) is a senior lecturer in digital media studies at the School of Journalism, Media and Culture at Cardiff University.
My time growing up in Edinburgh in the 1990s was a vibrant patchwork of experiences and emotions, including when questioning who and what society perceived as being Scottish. When studying Sociology and Politics at Edinburgh (2009-2013), I learnt more about the history of Scottish politics and notions of national identity, while also doing independent research into the specifics of Black Scottish history.
Back in 2016, I was involved in the organisation of the inaugural 'Black Feminism, Womanism, and the Politics of Women of Color in Europe' symposium in Edinburgh, which was led by Akwugo Emejulu. I remember being so encouraged and excited about the prospect of that event happening. I had been in Scotland since 1991 and hadn’t seen anything like that in Edinburgh. It was clear that in the case of Black women, the demographic was changing: even though there still aren’t that many Black women in Scotland – people will dismissively refer to us as “statistically insignificant” - there is more of a critical mass now than in the 1990s. During the decades I spent living in Scotland, I had various experiences, some of which were my own and some of which I saw happen to friends and family. This made me want to do more research on the history and contemporary experiences of Black people there, particularly Black women.
There is no shortage of forms of structural oppression and challenges that Black women face in Scotland. For me, one of the big ones is often this assumption that racism isn’t an issue there. It is particularly the case that in public discourse, there is often this perspective that Scotland is significantly less racist than other parts of Britain and the world. Further still, there is sometimes this mistaken idea that there is no form of institutional racism in Scotland at all. So in the context of Britain, quite often the conversations to do with racism or the conversations to do with forms of oppression that Black women face, sometimes include the idea that "well, it is not that bad in Scotland". The problem with this is that people are quick to really weaponise this myth of Scottish exceptionalism against Black people and try to deny experiences of anti-Black racism and xenophobia, as well as Black women’s experiences of anti-Black sexism.
"The relationship between identity, culture, and geography is a complicated one which is shaped by many other factors, such as politics, history, and a sense of community."
So, the work of grassroots organisers has become crucial, especially the work of those who really maintain an uncompromised position to pursue equity for people who are most oppressed.
When I think of all the work and the history of Black people in Britain, it was so scarcely or never touched upon as part of my experiences of formal education. When I started researching it myself, it was just incredible and also frustrating to see how much stuff was there that is actively ignored by institutions. I think it can be a really incredible moment when you come across information, writing, and archival stuff that you never knew existed. There can also be this bittersweetness to it when you think about how long it has taken you to even find out about it and gain access to it, precisely because of how this stuff is so often dismissed elsewhere.
The relationship between identity, culture, and geography is a complicated one which is shaped by many other factors, such as politics, history, and a sense of community. Although I haven’t lived in Scotland since 2017, my experience of life and who I am is still distinctly influenced by the 20-plus years that I spent there.
I've realised that the relationship between my own identity and the country was one that was rooted in both a strong sense of home and a hankering to know more about the lives of Black people in Scotland throughout the centuries. For these reasons, and more, much of my work focuses on the lives and histories of Black people, particularly in the context of devolved nations.
I research, write, and teach about how digital media and technology impacts identities, and vice versa. This has involved reflecting on the rise of Black Scottish media, including podcasts, video blogs (vlogs), and different digital spaces that foreground the perspectives and work of Black people in Scotland.
My research on this includes the new book 'Black Oot Here: Black Lives in Scotland' co-authored with writer and curator layla-roxanne hill.
"Paying attention to how Black people in Scotland have collectively paved paths, our hope is that our research and book push against the idea that Black Scottish history is a history that belongs to a single authority or institution."
For years, we have collaboratively researched Black Scottish history and the contemporary lives of Black people in Scotland, such as by documenting the work of public figures and by highlighting the personal archives of Black people across Scotland’s different regions. We explore the relationship between notions of nationhood, Scottishness, and Britishness, including by discussing the different implications of the expressions “Black Scottish” and “Black in Scotland”.
We also consider broader questions: “What does it mean to be Black in Scotland today? How are notions of nationhood, Scottishness, and Britishness implicated in this? Why is it important to archive and understand Black Scottish history?”
Paying attention to how Black people in Scotland have collectively paved paths, our hope is that our research and book push against the idea that Black Scottish history is a history that belongs to a single authority or institution. Overall, 'Black Oot Here' is both a detailed scholarly account of, and clear-eyed ode to, modern Black Scottish history and the longer Black Scottish history that it is part of.
'Black Oot Here: Black Lives in Scotland' can be purchased from Bloomsbury. The following 30% discount code can be used at the checkout: BOHFSLRH22
The Shapeshifter
Laura Westring (Modern European Languages and EU Studies, 2009) is a speechwriter living in Stirlingshire.
Scotland is the gift my parents and grandparents gave me and, from that gift, I gained the ability to inhabit two worlds. The first world is terrestrial. Home will always be the muddy wellies and mist-clad waterfalls of this wild land. The second is celestial. As the descendant of Persian Bahá’ís, half of my identity comes from a place I’ve never physically experienced, a place where I imagine the air still vibrates with the breath of mystical poets like Rumi and Hafez.
I moved effortlessly between identities from an early age. I could morphe comfortably from being a granddaughter - greeted by the scents of dried limes and cardamom tea, kicking off my shoes to sit on woven depictions of paradise - to being just another Scottish teenager at a house party; nine of us piled onto a single bed, pinning up prom photographs, musing to the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.
The power to shapeshift, to drop my sealskin on the sand like a Selkie, made me resilient and reassured that I could move between two worlds whenever and however it suited me. If I felt left out at school, which was often, I knew there was a whole community of young Scottish Bahá’ís like me, from the borders to the Faroe islands, who saw me for me, as I collected their handwritten thoughts in a biscuit tin.
"My superpower was to charm and disarm my doubters with the absolute self-assurance of someone who had nothing to lose by trying."
My first lessons growing up in a Bahá’í household were that, as a girl, my thoughts and opinions mattered profoundly; that I had both a duty to excel and the agency to improve the world and that, through service and patience, I could inspire others to do the same.
When a classmate, or a teacher, or a colleague told me what I couldn’t do, or what I wouldn’t achieve, it only spurred me on to manifest my success more profoundly. A spread in ELLE magazine, a meeting with a head of state, a speech at parliament, a tech job, a broadcasting appearance: if there was a room I wasn’t supposed to be in, I walked straight in.
My superpower was to charm and disarm my doubters with the absolute self-assurance of someone who had nothing to lose by trying. The results were both intoxicating and addictive and, as a result, I burned myself out over and over again, eventually discovering that living between two worlds provides no shelter from having to live between two truths as well.
As a feminist in my twenties, I lived in liberation beyond the imaginings of my spiritual sisters in Iran, this was true. I had the freedom to pursue an education and a noble profession, arranging uplifting words for those in democratic power as a speechwriter. Yet it was also true that my European freedom was still not on a par with that of my male colleagues. From the very beginning of my career, I was caught up in an unseen battle. I not only had to perform better than anyone else for less pay, I had to be constantly vigilant of others' intentions.
The excitement of attending a world speechwriters’ conference as a young woman and a minority in 2015, will forever be tainted by the reality of being stalked for three days by a male counterpart at that conference. This wasn’t a surprise. I was used to delivering feminist speeches only to be harassed on the street afterwards but, after many years, those daily microagressions depleted my energy and the will to persist.
I pulled on my sealskin and retreated into the familiar, bronze depths of home.
Reborn in Scotland, I began writing a new chapter as a professional and a mother; openly sharing the secrets of the speech writing profession with young people and minorities; living with increasing confidence on my own terms, in my own world and at peace with my shape-shifting identity.
Visit Laura's personal website.
The New Scot
Rachel Weiss (MSc Knowledge Based Systems, 1990) is a personal and organisational development consultant at Rowan Consultancy, Perth. She is also co-founder of the Menopause Cafe.
For me, nationality feels fairly straightforward. I was born and brought up in London with a UK passport. So I was brought up thinking of myself as British. That's what our parents told us. But that was tempered by the fact that my dad, although he's white, was born of German-Jewish refugee parents. They came across in the 1930s due to the persecution in Germany, My mum had Indian parents, and grew up between India and Singapore. Both parents felt welcome in London, that Britain had welcomed them. They were proud of their UK passports, and they instilled in me a sense of being British, rather than English.
It was different when I moved to Scotland, and suddenly there were these distinctions. The question became ‘are you Scottish?’. The British word seemed to be negative or associated with England, it lost the sense that I attached to it of being these four nations together.
London was my home and I still love when I get off at Kings Cross, and suddenly I blend in, which I don’t feel in Scotland. I feel I don't stand out because it's just a melting pot of different nationalities, haircuts, fashions, you name it.
I can't think of anywhere in Scotland that I have felt that I don't stand out, even if it's a mainly Indian area, because I'm mixed race so I don't fit in there either. Whereas in London, I think mixed race is the fastest growing ethnic group so we're all odd, we’re all different, and that's great.
"I think there will always be people who will use microaggressions when faced with difference."
Here in Scotland we’re told by the government and the media that we’re ‘new Scots’ and as Scottish as the natives. I like the sentiment - it's very sweet if taken at face value. But I can't just suddenly feel Scottish. And if I did, wouldn’t that deny my other heritages? So for me it has to be fluid, not an either-or. I'm a mixture of different nationalities and different cultural heritages, all of which I value.
I feel welcome here most of the time - probably as welcome as I would feel anywhere.
I think there will always be people who will use microaggressions when faced with difference. Things that you just wouldn't notice unless you were primed for them. I remember when I was a student at Edinburgh University, which was when I first came to Scotland
My parents came up for graduation, one of the lecturers said to me afterwards, “Oh, now I know why you look like that.”
On the face of it, that is a perfectly innocent remark. He had clearly been looking at me during the year wondering where I fitted in, because I didn’t fit in to any of the obvious boxes - so when he saw my two parents, the penny dropped. But I felt quite hurt by what he said. And then I felt guilty about feeling hurt by it because here was a lecturer whom I respected, and he was making a purely factual comment. But it emphasised the fact that I look different and that he saw me as different, and I think that’s what hurt.
But universities in general have always been nice places for me because you get a mix of people from different countries, or at least open minded people and people who have travelled, who aren't quite as taken aback by differences.
"Coming from a family of refugees, we grew up knowing that other people had helped us when we arrived in this country."
I also have some privilege, since I’m middle-class and in the UK class often trumps race. I want to use that privilege to help others less fortunate than myself, and that’s informed my career choices and the voluntary work I do. Coming from a family of refugees, we grew up knowing that other people had helped us when we arrived in this country. People had been kind and welcomed us. So it feels like paying it forward.
So do I feel like a Scot, albeit a ‘new Scot’? No, I would feel a bit of a fraud saying that. I haven't even picked up the accent and I've lived here for 30 years!
But I do feel at home in Scotland and welcomed. I don't want to live anywhere else.
Learn more about the Menopause Cafe and Rowan Consultancy.
All opinions expressed are those of the individual and do not necessarily reflect those of the University of Edinburgh.
Photo of Rachel Weiss by Andrew Cawley for the Sunday Post.
Banner image: Adobe Stock.