Tarik Oumazzane, Teaching Associate in History, Faculty of Arts
1. What curricular changes did you make?
Whilst teaching many seminar classes for our survey History module ‘Roads to Modernity, 1789-1945’, I felt that an important opportunity had been missed to introduce students to diverse analyses, methods and perspectives.
In order to find out more about what students thought of the module, I held classroom discussions and conducted an online survey (n=200 students). The main outcome of the students’ discussions was that the module content and the recommended readings had a Eurocentric bias. For example, one student stated “I’d like to see more content that does not centre around Europe. History from the Middle East would be interesting”. Another student declared “I would like less eurocentric topics, especially when the module is about different roads to modernity.” Yet another student recommended “More non-european topics, there's a heavy euro-centric approach to 'modernity' that leaves out other nations ideas of it”.
I presented these results to my colleagues in our departmental meeting which enabled us to have an open discussion about how we could diversify curriculum for different modules.
I was asked to convene ‘Roads to Modernity’. I revised its contents and teaching methods. The changes that I introduced included diversifying the module content (to include the Haitian Revolution, the revolutions in Latin America, Pan-Islamism, Pan-Arabism, Pan-Africanism). I was able to create space for a comparative examination of feminism in Britain, India, the USA and the Middle East.
The revised curriculum impacted on the types of histories that we teach and how we make room for gender history, history from below, cultural history and social history. For example, we now study the Second World War from the perspective of refugees, women and children. In revising the module, I tried to diversify its teaching team too.
2. What challenges and issues did you face?
The main concerns that were raised were about the dangers of over-politicising the curriculum and not allowing students to explore and learn from established traditions of thought. Additionally, there were more pragmatic concerns about accessing books and resources to teach a different curriculum, as well as the lack of preparation and planning time to make more substantial changes.
I recognised those concerns and to a large extent I agreed with them. Hence, I was able to emphasise that my plan is to diversify ‘Roads to Modernity’, including established traditions of thoughts , but introducing our students to wide and new analyses, methods and perspectives.
I explained that the process is undertaken in phases, through dialogue with my Head of Department, my colleagues and our students and communicated as an experimental process. So far, I have been able to manage any arising challenges and instead create a collaborative team.
3. What can we learn from your experiences about decolonising the curriculum?
I prefer the word diversifying the curriculum.
Firstly, it is important to create space for students to discuss and question what they are studying and to take their voices into consideration when designing the curriculum. Many students applauded the fact that staff had listened and responded positively to their concerns about the Eurocentrism of the curriculum.
Secondly, changing the curriculum is a gradual process and requires a long-term commitment to enable cooperation to be created, motivate colleagues and stimulate other changes. It is important to listen to the concerns of your peers and to support and signpost them to resources when they seek your help.
Thirdly, it is important to experiment with different teaching and learning approaches to examine the diversity of our past. We should also make greater use of the expertise of colleagues with subject and country specialisms and not think that you need to be an expert on all subjects.
Finally, diversifying curriculum is not just a tick box exercise – it needs personal commitment and a belief in inclusion, equality and justice.