The Centre for Reparation Research (CRR), which commenced operation in March 2017 and which was officially launched in October 2017, was created to promote research on, and engage in advocacy around the legacies of the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans, African enslavement, colonialism and its legacies in the Caribbean; and help to bring justice and positive transformation to societies affected by these legacies.
As the Centre for Reparation Research goes into its fourth year, it commits to continue to research, write and disseminate information on what has become a Global Reparatory Justice Movement. The CRR, therefore, supports and contributes to the implementation of CARICOM's Reparatory Justice Programme, which broadly seeks to foster public awareness around the lasting and adverse consequences of European invasion of indigenous peoples' lands, African enslavement and colonialism in the Caribbean. The CRR also supports long-standing reparatory justice advocates, including Rastafari, civil society groups and individual academics, politicians and national reparation committees/councils/advisory groups locally, regionally and internationally. The Centre has embraced an additional responsibility—working with DISCUS at The UWI and other educational institutions, including Caribbean high schools, to promote education on colonial legacies and the need for justice and repair. The Centre promotes advocacy for reparatory justice by building capacity, providing consultancies to CARICOM and other institutions, raising public awareness, and supporting activism around the Reparatory Justice programme.
The CRR embodies the goals of The UWI's Triple A Strategic Plan: to advance learning, create knowledge and foster innovation for the positive transformation of the Caribbean through access, alignment and agility. This is evidenced in the CRR's primary interlocking objectives:
Both these objectives grow out of an understanding that many of the injustices and adverse effects of colonialism in the Caribbean did not end with formal independence and still need to be addressed and repaired.
In achieving these objectives, not only will the result be increased awareness and advanced learning, but practical solutions to halting and reversing the adverse consequences of colonialism in the Caribbean. This will ultimately allow for the positive transformation of the region.
‘Access' refers to the need to make the University the place of choice, where alumni and non-student customers seek products and services for all things Caribbean. Access also includes the need to improve the quality of teaching, learning and student development, as well as to improve the quality, quantity and impact of research, innovation and publication.
The CRR reflects Access within the context of the Triple A Strategy, as its main goals include:
The research at the CRR points to how history continues to reverberate in the present, and how the present has been influenced by the past, thereby countering the “theory of distance” which suggests a disconnect. The research also bears in mind the practical ends of defining problems that are affected by a history of colonialism and where possible, recommend solutions to them. The research focus of the Centre is therefore the rigorous study of colonial legacies and their possible solutions.
In this regard, the CRR has partnered with the CARICOM Reparations Commission and the Saint Lucia National Reparations Committee to present a year-long Regional Schools Lecture Series which takes into consideration the CXC and CAPE curricula. The inaugural lecture was presented in September 2020. In addition to this lecture series, the CRR is at present in the final stages of the development of a joint Master's programme with the University of Glasgow.
Also, in keeping with the University being a global university that encourages diversity, the Centre has continued to host and collaborate on a number of seminars, workshops and conferences which bring together national, regional and international speakers.
‘Alignment' refers to the promotion of greater activism and public advocacy. It also refers to the improvement of academic and industry research partnerships, in seeking to promote a cohesive single UWI-brand consciousness.
The establishment of the CRR has already resulted in academic and industry partnerships and collaborations with corporations and institutions nationally, regionally and internationally. Advocates such as the National African-American Reparation Coalition in the USA, Global African Congress in the UK, and National Committees of the CARICOM countries, now have collaborative relationships with the Centre.
This also fulfils another main goal of the CRR which is the promotion of advocacy for reparatory justice by the building of capacity for:
The capacity of the CRR to promote advocacy is integral to its practical, solution-oriented and extroverted focus.
The CRR, therefore, takes very seriously its capacity to act as a consultant, a raiser of consciousness, as well as an activist on matters of colonial legacies and decolonisation. The CRR has been approached by industries and establishments with ties to slavery to assist them in managing their public response. Some of these partnerships have already resulted in the generation of funds for the Centre/The UWI.
‘Agility' refers to the desire to expand the physical presence of The UWI on all continents, to restore financial health to The UWI, to generate economies of scale and scope for The UWI, while fostering a creative, caring, accountable motivated and professional team. Under this heading The UWI also seeks to foster its digital transformation.
Though the CRR may not achieve a physical presence on all continents, there is the potential to make its presence—and that of The UWI—felt globally. In pursuit of this, the CRR has now established two international committees: an Advisory Committee and a Network of Scholars, which are comprised of members from academia and civil society.
The CRR is directed by social historian and Vice-Chair of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, Professor Verene A. Shepherd, CD, who is also a Vice-Chair of the CARICOM Reparations Commission.
The core staff is completed by Research Assistant, Ms. Gabrielle Hemmings, and Administrative Assistant, Mr. Floyd Williams. We lost the services of the project officer.
Dominique Doonquah
John shorter
In addition to the core staff, the Centre has also temporarily employed the services of two project-related Research Assistants, Ms. Dominique Doonquah and Mr. John Shorter, paid by funds raised from research initiatives.
Since its inception, the CRR has, for consecutive summers (June–August 2017 and 2018), hosted a Visiting Professor, Dr. Ahmed Reid, Professor of History at the City University of New York, who continues to aid the research work of the Centre.
The Centre also welcomed Mr. Jonathan Adams, member of the Guyana Reparations Committee, who assisted with the CRR's research activities between November 2018 and March 2019.
In the summer of 2019, the CRR was host to another Visiting Fellow, Mr. Chevy Eugene. Mr. Eugene is a PhD Candidate from York University in Toronto, Canada.
The Centre has also hosted a number of volunteers within the period under review. Since March 2020, due to COVID-19 protocols, volunteers do not work physically in the Centre.
At present, the Centre faces the globally-experienced challenges associated with COVID-19 in the execution of its mandate. The Centre, however, has been quick to adapt and has, since March 2020, managed to continue with all planned activities, though now mostly in a virtual space. The following is a sample of the activities in which the CRR has been involved since the last reporting period. These activities include events hosted by the CRR, or events hosted by our partners in which we collaborated, as well as presentations made by the Director or the research staff at events to which the Centre was invited to speak.
January 30, 2020
Symposium co-hosted with Rutgers University on “Climate, History and Responsibility: Climate Justice in the Caribbean”
February 6, 2020
Presentation on Reparation in collaboration with the Jamaica National Council on Reparation (NCR), at the Mico University College (the Director)
February 27, 2020
Annual Africa “Appreciation Day and Reparation Reasoning”, with guest lecturer Professor David Eltis, Emory University, USA
March 3, 2020
Presentation on Reparation in collaboration with the NCR at the
St. Joseph's Teachers' College (the Director)
May 11, 2020
Virtual Panel Discussion on “Algorithms and Artificial Intelligence” (with Expert, Prof. Ruha Benjamin and Dr. Ashley Taylor)
May 25, 2020
Virtual symposium on “Equity, Equality, Human Rights and Justice”
June 4, 2020
Keynote address on “Indigenous Peoples of the Caribbean” at the St. Martin Book Fair (virtually delivered by the Director)
June 5, 2020
Interview on Lucille Mathurin Mair's Biography at the St. Martin Book Fair (the Director)
July 6, 2020
Media engagement “From Apology to Action”, hosted by the CARICOM Reparations Commission (CRC) and moderated by the Director
June 12, 2020
Virtual symposium on “History Education” for secondary schools, in collaboration with the St. Lucia National Committee on Reparations
June 28, 2020
Presentation by the Director on “The Importance of History Education” at the Black Futures Forum collaborative event with the Institute of Caribbean Studies (ICS), The UWI, Mona
June 29, 2020
Radio interview with NewsTalk 93 FM (Jonessa Wright-Baker, Project Officer)
July 9, 2020
Presentation by the Director on “More than Statues: Colonial Relics in Contemporary Jamaica” at the virtual symposium “A Critical Engagement of the Symbols of Jamaican Nationhood” in collaboration with the NCR and the ICS
July 12, 2020
Presentation by the Director at the Global Afrikan Congress' “Reasoning on Reparation”
July 31, 2020
Interview with Swedish daily newspaper Expressen on the “Call for Reparation on Sweden” (the Director)
August 5, 2020
Television interview with Calabash TV, St. Lucia, on “The Unfinished Business of Emancipation: Reparation Now” (the Director)
August 6, 2020
Radio interview on Emancipation with Pearl FM 98.1 Pearl of the Caribbean, St. Martin (the Director)
August 19, 2020
Presentation by the Director to the Kiwanis Club of Friends Across Borders entitled “Women in Sam Sharpe's Army: Repression, Resistance, Reparation”
August 20, 2020
Interview with Mango Tea Podcast on “Colour Activism and the Reparation Movement” (the Director)
September 10, 2020
Virtual forum on “African Ancestry” in collaboration with the Institute of Law and Economics with Guest Speaker Dr. Gina Paige, President of AfricanAncestry.com
September 24, 2020
Inaugural lecture entitled "Reparation, Psychological Rehabilitation and Pedagogical Strategies" in the year-long Regional Schools Lecture Series, in collaboration with the St. Lucia Reparations Committee and the CRC (presented by the Director)
October 12, 2020
CRR's 3rd Anniversary Symposium entitled “The Indigenous Peoples and Colonising Deformities: Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean after 1492”
October 16, 2020
Presentation entitled “The Theory of Distance and its Impact on the Reparation Discourse” at the University of Maryland's Panel Discussion on Slavery Reparations (the Director)
October 27, 2020
Presentation entitled “Higher Education, Social Justice and Anti-Racism: University Curricula and Civil Society Agendas” at Clark Atlanta University's Virtual Seminar Series (the Director)
October 29, 2020
2nd Lecture entitled “The Myth of Extinction: Indigenous Peoples and Their Survival Strategies” in the Regional Schools Lecture Series
November 26, 2020
3rd Lecture entitled “Conquest, Colonisation and the Imperial Project” in the Regional Schools Lecture Series
November 29, 2020
Virtual forum on “The University in an Age of Activism”, in collaboration with the ICS (moderated by the Director, who also presented a paper on “Higher Education, Social Justice and Anti-Racism: University Curricula and Civil Society Agendas)
December 1, 2020
Virtual forum on “Reparation and Persons with Disabilities in the Developing World” in collaboration with The UWI Centre for Disability Studies (UWICDS; paper presented by the Director)
December 2, 2020
Presentation at the UK's Leigh Day Forum on “Britain's Slave Legacy and The Case for Reparations” (the Director)
December 5, 2020
Presentation entitled “Sugar and Slavery in Louisiana and the Caribbean” at a virtual forum by the Whitney Plantation, a museum in South Louisiana dedicated to the history of slavery (the Director)
December 6, 2020
Presentation made by the Director at the Annual International Conference of Fundashon Nos kier Boneiru bek (Foundation We Want Bonaire Back): “The Political Future, the Right of Self-determination and Reparation of the Caribbean and South America”
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