{"id":156,"date":"2020-06-17T16:12:04","date_gmt":"2020-06-17T15:12:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/?p=156"},"modified":"2020-06-17T16:12:06","modified_gmt":"2020-06-17T15:12:06","slug":"diversifying-our-collection-our-response-to-blacklivesmatter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/2020\/06\/17\/diversifying-our-collection-our-response-to-blacklivesmatter\/","title":{"rendered":"Diversifying our collection: Our response to #BlackLivesMatter"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Since we took over the running of the Medicine in\nLiterature collection, we\u2019ve been working to broaden its perspective by adding\nbooks on health, illness and medicine written by people of colour and other\ngroups who are marginalised by systemic discrimination, such as the trans\ncommunity and people with disabilities. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The current global discussions surrounding systemic racism and inequality have reaffirmed our commitment to this work but also made us re-evaluate the ways in which we\u2019re doing this, to make sure we\u2019re doing this in the right way, asking the right questions and looking in the right places for new resources to add to the collection. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve written this blog post to outline the work we\u2019re\ngoing to do to address some of the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter\nprotests and also highlight some recent additions to the collection by writers\nof colour. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As our library’s medical students will go on to treat people from all walks of life, the main aim of Medicine in Literature<\/em>, and the wider Medical Humanities, is to help develop a deeper understanding of how a person’s experiences, values, and culture can affect their health. In addition, our students come from diverse backgrounds and we want to ensure they see themselves reflected in our resources. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since we became curators of the collection we\u2019ve prioritised diversifying the collection\u2019s resources to ensure it\u2019s inclusive in its representation of the patient population, and that it gives voice to a variety of experiences and reflections on the human condition from a breadth of social and cultural viewpoints. To this end, we\u2019re committed to continually reassessing our collection to ensure it includes voices from underrepresented groups in society who are marginalised because of ethnicity, class, gender, dis-ability or sexual orientation. The conversations and debates arising from the Black Lives Matter protests have made us consider whether we could be doing this more effectively, and we wanted to outline some of the ways in which we’re going to shape our collection in future in response to these issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firstly, we\u2019ve resolved to be much more proactive in seeking out new additions to the collection by Black authors and other under-represented groups, rather than waiting for people to recommend them to us. We\u2019ll be keeping up to date with releases from independent publishers owned by people of colour (there\u2019s a great list here<\/a>) rather than relying mainly on newspaper reviews, book prize shortlists and Amazon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Secondly, we\u2019ll be seeking to add more resources to the collection specifically looking at the impact of racism and discrimination on mental and physical health. We\u2019ve recently added the non-fiction anthology The Colour of Madness<\/a><\/em>, which brings together the experiences of people from BAME backgrounds with lived experience of mental illness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thirdly, we\u2019re committing ourselves to personally reading much more widely in our search for books to add to the collection. To begin with, we\u2019ll be working our way through the Diverse Spines reading challenge<\/a> booklist and adding any books from this list that would be a good fit for the collection. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As mentioned above, we\u2019re committed to educating ourselves\nand amplifying Black and other underrepresented voices in the Medicine in\nLiterature collection, and sourcing new material ourselves rather than relying\non others to do this work for us. However, if there is a book or author that\nyou feel would be a good addition to the collection, we always welcome recommendations\n\u2013 you can use the suggestions box on the front page of this guide to get in\ntouch with us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are some recent additions to our collection by Black authors \u2013 we\u2019ll be adding new resources as soon as we\u2019re back at work in the Walton Library. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Freshwater<\/a><\/em> by Akwaeke Emezi
Human: Voices of Tomorrow’s Doctors<\/a><\/em> edited by Tolu Kehinde
Stay With Me<\/a><\/em> by Ay\u1ecd\u0300b\u00e1mi Ad\u00e9b\u00e1y\u1ecd\u0300
Nervous Conditions<\/a><\/em> by Tsitsi Dangarembga<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re aware that we have a long way to go in diversifying our collection \u2013 it\u2019s an ongoing concern for us and we\u2019re continuously reading, learning and educating ourselves on issues related to this. For more information about the University’s response to the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter movement, click here<\/a>.
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Since we took over the running of the Medicine in Literature collection, we\u2019ve been working to broaden its perspective by adding books on health, illness and medicine written by people of colour and other groups who are marginalised by systemic discrimination, such as the trans community and people with disabilities. The current global discussions surrounding […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7567,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorised"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7567"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":159,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156\/revisions\/159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/medlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}