University of Glasgow Connect

My research fellowship with the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies

Dr Jennifer Leetsch from the University of Bonn's Centre for Dependency and Slavery Studies shares her experience of joining us in Glasgow for a short-term research fellowship with the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies.

In September and October 2022, I was fortunate enough to visit the University of Glasgow’s Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies on a short-term research fellowship. After years of pandemic stasis, it was invigorating to travel and meet colleagues in person, beyond Zoom rooms and digital platforms. The members of the Beniba Centre welcomed me with generosity, grace and open arms, and gave me the opportunity to dive headfirst into the University’s research community and to experience the city’s vibrant cultural scene.

"I can say that my work profited enormously from being embedded in the lively research community around the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies."

In one-on-one meetings and larger colloquia, I was able to share my research and learn from rigorous intellectual exchange. I presented work from my second book project on early Black Atlantic literature. Fusing perspectives from autobiography studies and the environmental humanities, I read late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century forms of black life writing from an ecocritical perspective. During my fellowship in Glasgow, I worked on a chapter on the slave narrative of Mary Prince. The History of Mary Prince was published in 1831, only a couple of years before the official abolition of slavery in the British colonies, and is the first narrative published by a black woman in Britain. The chapter thinks about the geographies and ecologies of the Caribbean, in particular the salt flats on the Turks and Caicos Islands which Mary Prince harvested for many years.

The members from the center helped me further shape my thinking on and around colonial and resistant ecologies and I am grateful for their engagement with my work. Meeting with historians who focus on the Atlantic slave trade and with cultural and literary scholars who work on environmental humanities topics provided exactly the right kind of interdisciplinary mix that is needed for a project like mine. I can say that my work profited enormously from being embedded in the lively research community around the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies and from the excellent archives, library collections and online resources provided by the University.

"My visiting research fellowship allowed me space and time to really focus on my research in a generative and productive environment"

Another highlight was to meet the visiting researcher Dr Sonjah Stanley Niaah from the University of the West Indies during her trip to Glasgow and to learn from her work. In addition, I was able to enjoy many of the exciting events in and outside the University, especially within the context of Black History Month. At the Glasgow Film Theatre, I saw the UK premiere of Lagareh: The Last Born, a film by Barbadian-Scottish artist Alberta Whittle, which explores racism and slavery. The screening was followed by a conversation between the artist and Dr Peggy Brunache, lecturer in the history of Atlantic slavery at the University of Glasgow and Director of the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies.

Multiple visits were made to curator Zandra Yeaman’s intervention at The Hunterian, the University of Glasgow's art gallery and museum. Titled Curating Discomfort, the intervention explores the museum collections with academics, educators, community activists and social justice campaigners. I commenced my stay at the University of Glasgow by immersing myself in the outdoor exhibition of work by South African visual artist Zanele Muholi, Somnyama Ngonyama (‘Hail, the Dark Lioness’), an ongoing series of self-portraits displayed in the University’s East Quad.

My visiting research fellowship allowed me space and time to really focus on my research in a generative and productive environment, to share my thoughts with interested and helpful colleagues, and it gave me the chance to create hopefully lasting links between Bonn and Glasgow.