Everything is political, decolonisation is an ongoing process Leena Nammari

It is the colonisers themselves and their people that need re-educating and have to start rethinking their own prejudices and assumed knowledge. The indigenous know their history and they hold on to it with the tools that they have on hand. They use storytelling, their unique clothing, their foods and cuisine and just existing on their lands as weapons against erasure.

What we need is a radical rethinking of what is considered accepted knowledge, of what is considered accepted education, and the need to readdress historical revisionism. Most of all, there is a great need to listen to indigenous populations and what they have to say about their colonisations and path to decolonisation. What is needed is to ask them, the indigenous, about their history and how they ended up where they are, especially as history is written by the victors, as Walter Benjamin is reportedly to have said.

Leena Nammari is a Palestinian artist printmaker based in Scotland. She has exhibited within Scotland and Europe, as part of group exhibitions and has had a number of solo exhibitions. She is a master printmaker, in all aspects of printmaking, and though her ideas predominantly are analysed and broken down through printmaking processes, she has also worked in film, photography, bronze and ceramics.

The talk will be followed by a wine reception in the Social Anthropology common room in School 5.

All are welcome!