Episode 8: Finding Expertise Everywhere with Prof. M. Amah Edoh
Though there’s widespread consensus that the slavery and colonization that characterize the history of European relations with Africa represent a legacy of grave injustice, there is much less agreement on how to redress that injustice. Professor M. Amah Edoh, who teaches in MIT’s Department of Anthropology, designed the course 21A.S01 Reparations for Slavery and Colonization with the goal of honestly facing the historical record and openly discussing how best to respond. Because she believes expertise is too often conceived of as something that flows “north-south” from the developed nations toward the developing world, she structured the course to embrace expertise wherever it might be found—recruiting guest lecturers from various disciplines and from institutions around the world, as well as activists currently involved in the quest for reparative justice. She even went a step further, sharing the lecture videos on YouTube while the semester was still ongoing and inviting viewers to contribute their own insights into how to deal with the ongoing legacy of historical wrongs. In this episode, Prof. Edoh describes the motivation for this innovative course structure and reflects on the challenges of grappling with such a sensitive subject.

Relevant Resources:

MIT OpenCourseWare
https://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm?utm_sou...

The OCW Educator Portal
https://ocw.mit.edu/educator/index.ht...

Share your teaching insights
https://forms.gle/XBwUwqn35abSdjNs8

Professor Edoh’s faculty page
https://anthropology.mit.edu/people/f...

Course materials by Professor Edoh on OCW
https://ocw.mit.edu/search/?q=Edoh&t=...

21A.S01 Reparations for Slavery and Colonization
https://anthropology.mit.edu/21A.S01_...

Open Learning story on 21A.S01
https://openlearning.mit.edu/news/glo...

YouTube playlist for 21A.S01
   • MIT 21A.S01 Reparations for Slavery a...  

Africa’s Expertise (YouTube lecture by Prof Edoh)
   • MIT X TAU Series: Africa’s Expertise  

African Futures Action Lab
https://africanfutures.mit.edu

How Africa Has Been Made to Mean (2020 episode of Chalk Radio)
https://chalk-radio.simplecast.com/ep...

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions
https://www.sessions.blue

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Credits

Sarah Hansen, host and producer (  / learning_sarah  )
Brett Paci, producer (  / brett_paci  )
Dave Lishansky, producer (  / daveresonates  )

Show notes by Peter Chipman