Though there’s widespread consensus that the slavery and colonization that characterize the history of European relations with Africa represent a legacy of grave injustice, there is much less agreement on how to redress that injustice. Professor M. Amah Edoh, who teaches in MIT’s Department of Anthropology, designed the course 21A.S01 Reparations for Slavery and Colonization with the goal of honestly facing the historical record and openly discussing how best to respond. Because she believes expertise is too often conceived of as something that flows “north-south” from the developed nations toward the developing world, she structured the course to embrace expertise wherever it might be found—recruiting guest lecturers from various disciplines and from institutions around the world, as well as activists currently involved in the quest for reparative justice. She even went a step further, sharing the lecture videos on YouTube while the semester was still ongoing and inviting viewers to contribute their own insights into how to deal with the ongoing legacy of historical wrongs. In this episode, Prof. Edoh describes the motivation for this innovative course structure and reflects on the challenges of grappling with such a sensitive subject.

Relevant Resources:

MIT OpenCourseWare

The OCW Educator Portal

Share your teaching insights

Professor Edoh’s faculty page

Course materials by Professor Edoh on OCW

21A.S01 Reparations for Slavery and Colonization on OCW

Open Learning story on 21A.S01

OCW YouTube playlist for 21A.S01

Africa’s Expertise (YouTube lecture by Prof Edoh)

African Futures Action Lab

How Africa Has Been Made to Mean (2020 episode of Chalk Radio)

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions

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Credits

Sarah Hansen, host and producer (https://twitter.com/learning_sarah)

Brett Paci, producer  (https://twitter.com/Brett_Paci)

Dave Lishansky, producer (https://twitter.com/DaveResonates)

Show notes by Peter Chipman

Connect with Us

If you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! 

Call us @ 617-715-2517

On our site

On Facebook

On X

On Instagram

On LinkedIn

Stay Current

Subscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. 

Support OCW

If you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! 

Credits

Sarah Hansen, host and producer 

Brett Paci, producer  

Dave Lishansky, producer 

Jackson Maher, producer

Show notes by Peter Chipman