The Monument is the Struggle

The Monument is the Struggle
Funded by the Mayor of London’s Untold Stories, Diversity in the Public Realm Programme and Goldsmiths Impact Fund

Staff in Visual Cultures lead cross-departmental project on how histories of colonisation and enslavement register in urban infrastructures and social life.

For two years, researchers in Visual Cultures have led an inter-departmental group of staff, students, alumni and local residents on a research and impact project answering the question ‘how do the spectres of colonisation, enslavement and the plantation register in local urban struggle?

De-sedimenting colonial histories of the Deptford Dockyard The Monument is the Struggle explores how the logics of colonial administration, geography, finance and community organisation figure in contemporary urban spaces and communities. Local study groups set up with Goldsmiths staff work through reading sessions, walks, curricula, long term research projects and campaigns. A website and series of QR code plaques developed by Goldsmiths Computing in the neighbourhood will be released in the coming months to mark the ongoing relation to colonial history in the local area.

The project is led by Professor Jorella Andrews and Dr Janna Graham who are mobilising participatory methods for collective study using Visual Cultures practices including thinking with conditions, a process for collective analysis and cartography of historical forces in contemporary conjunctures and interviewing Images a phenomenological practice of working with material culture to mark historical and contemporary experiences in urban space.