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Conference to explore faith-based responses to racial inequalities

A transatlantic conference will examine racial inequality and injustice across the globe

Academics, community activists and religious leaders will come together at Birkbeck this week to attend a transatlantic conference focusing on faith-based responses to racial inequalities.

The ‘Repairing Community’ Transatlantic Roundtable on Religion and Race (TRRR) event will run at Malet Street from Wednesday 1 to Friday 3 July.

The TRRR conference is an annual gathering of prominent figures in the fields of academia, religion and activism that are committed to improving the lives of groups suffering from the impact of economic, political and social marginalisation. In recent years, the conference has also been held in Pretoria and Accra.

Delegates from the US, South Africa, Nigeria, France and the UK will attend the three-day conference, which will comprise a programme of plenary presentations, panel discussions and workshops.

Activities at the conference gravitate around a central question, specifically: What should be the response of people of faith to increasing levels of inequality, racism, and religious intolerance around the world?

Selected themes to explore this overarching question include:

  • Police violence and mass incarceration of black young people in the US and UK
  • Immigration and the treatment of African Migrants in Europe, South Africa, and North America
  • Intolerance and racism in mono-theistic traditions
  • Youth political and social activism in the US, UK and South Africa
  • The role of religion in tackling racial injustice

Dr William Ackah, lecturer in Community and Voluntary Sector Studies in Birkbeck’s Department of Geography, Environment and Development Studies, is co-convenor of TRRR.

Commenting on this week’s conference, he said:

“The events in Charleston, European Refugee Crisis, Wars in Syria, Iraq, Charlie Ebdo, and terror attacks in France today, make questions on the role of religion in social, economic and political life either as a positive force or negative pressing and urgent. What role can religious ideas play in healing fractured and divided communities.

“How does race intersect with religion to provide a focus for identity for marginalised groups and what are the consequences of these intersections? These are urgent questions being played out all over the globe at the present time.

“I hope delegates at this week’s conference will learn what is happening to marginalised persons in different parts of the world and that we can learn from each other’s experiences to develop knowledge, strategies and actions that will combat inequality, and injustice, and empower marginalised groups”

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