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Seminar on ‘Frontiers of Black Freedom: Internationalism, Americanism, and Anti-racist Solidarity during the 1930s’ (Dr Owen Walsh)
November 27, 2025 @ 10:00 am – 11:30 am
Join us in Taylor A08 or on Teams for a talk by Owen Walsh (History), who will present his brand new book ‘Frontiers of Black Freedom: Internationalism, Americanism, and Anti-racist Solidarity during the 1930s.’ In the aftermath of the 2020 Black Lives Matter uprisings, anti-racism appears as a key dynamic in global politics. This book examines how, in the decade before the Second World War and the framing of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, Black activist-intellectuals from the US confronted racial hierarchies at global and local levels by imagining and making alliances that stretched far beyond the transatlantic diaspora. Such efforts form part of the pre-history of later civil rights struggles, and ultimately lay groundwork for the present global resistance to white supremacy. Frontiers of Black Freedom excavates Black participation in multiracial political cultures on the US West Coast and connects this with the world-spanning travel of figures including the poet Langston Hughes, activist Louise Thompson, travel writer Juanita Harrison, novelist William Attaway, and others. Throughout, the book attends to the ways that anti-racist concerns are necessarily connected to – though not always in harmony with – struggles against capital, patriarchy, empire, and nation. Frontiers of Black Freedom argues that global anti-racist solidarity has been produced historically through cosmopolitan cultural projects, universalist ethical commitments, and internationalist political organising. Drawing on a wide archival base, the book establishes the US West Coast as a globally significant region for anti-racist thought and practice.
All are welcome – we’re a friendly, interdisciplinary group open to PhD students and staff alike!
