Edinburgh's history, rooted in the Scottish Enlightenment, excludes the troubling realities of wealth built on the labor of enslaved individuals. The University's inquiry into its own legacies confronts this normative narrative, revealing financial gains from slavery and support for racial pseudoscience. This challenge to the prevailing narrative recognizes a complex history involving both oppression and complicity, particularly as many Scots are reluctant to reconcile with these truths. Black and Brown Scots, alongside anti-racism movements, acknowledge long-denied histories even while facing national defensiveness and minimization.
The University of Edinburgh's review of its legacies of enslavement and colonialism confronts the stories we were told and continue to tell, revealing uncomfortable truths.
Scotland's history has been framed as one of marginalization, yet many family histories indicate a more complex relationship with empire, characterized by excluded truths.
The inquiry into Edinburgh University's history focuses on its financial gains from plantation slavery and the ways Enlightenment thinking justified racial hierarchies.
Many Black and Brown Scots found that the inquiry provided confirmations of truths long lived and denied, despite ongoing denial and discomfort within the nation.
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