An Antiguan-born history professor at the prestigious Columbia University in New York will speak about slavery, reparations and the Caribbean at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) on November 8.
According to VCU, Dr Natasha Lightfoot, who studies the African Diaspora will visit the university to discuss “slavery and reparations across the Caribbean, as well as issues in Black life.”
VCU said Lightfoot will speak on the topic, “The Unfinished Afterlives of Slavery, Freedom and Reparations in the Caribbean” in the University Student Commons Theatre.
Her address, which is free and open to the public, is sponsored by VCU’s Department of History and the Alexandrian Society.
Lightfoot is a former executive board member of the Association for the Study of the Worldwide African Diaspora, and her published works include the “Troubling Freedom: Antigua and the Aftermath of British Emancipation” (Duke University Press, 2015).
She also has served as a member of the Association of Caribbean Historians, the Conference on Latin American History, the American Historical Association and the Organization of American Historians.
Lightfoot’s awards and fellowships include honours from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Ford Foundation.
Dating to the 1960s, the Alexandrian Society was among VCU’s oldest student academic organizations, and emphasises the importance of Atlantic history, with scholarship that falls under the umbrella of equity, inclusion and diversity.
VCU has hosted numerous lectures and symposiums, and its membership is open to all students, regardless of background or specialisation.