Kehinde Andrews
Kehinde Nkosi Andrews (born January 1983) is a British academic and author specialising in Black Studies. Andrews is a Professor of Black Studies in the School of Social Sciences at Birmingham City University. He is the director of the Centre for Critical Social Research, founder of the Harambee Organisation of Black Unity, and co-chair of the UK Black Studies Association. Andrews is the first Black Studies professor in the UK and led the establishment of the first Black Studies programme in Europe at Birmingham City University. Early life and education Andrews is of British African-Caribbean heritage. He earned a PhD. in Sociology and Cultural Studies from the University of Birmingham in 2011. His thesis was entitled Back to Black: Black Radicalism and the Supplementary School Movement. Journalism, media appearances, and personal views Andrews regularly appears in the media discussing issues of race and racism, colonialism and slavery, and British nationalism. He contributes to The Guardian, The Independent, New Statesman, CNN, OpenDemocracy, and often appears as a guest on the BBC and Good Morning Britain. In 2016, Andrews criticized universities in the United Kingdom for institutional racism, specifically the lack of diversity in students' assigned readings. The following year, Andrews spoke at the Oxford Union, arguing that British education perpetuates racism. He also gave a TEDxYouth talk in Birmingham entitled "How to Stay Radical within an Institution", exploring how Black Studies can exist within the historically racist institution of the university. In 2019, Andrews took part in a debate on whether or not the West should pay reparations for slavery at Intelligence Squared. He also spoke about his book Back to Black in the John Hope Franklin Center for Interdisciplinary and International Studies at Duke University and gave a talk at Tate Liverpool on the role of Black radicalism in the United Kingdom and the United States. In that year, Andrews appeared on Good Morning Britain, where he argued that the Royal Air Force bombing of Nazi Germany constituted a war crime and equated the racial views of Winston Churchill to those of Adolf Hitler. Andrews narrated the film The Psychosis of Whiteness, which explores race and racism through cinematic representations of the slave trade. In July 2019, Andrews criticized the idea that prominent non-white members of the Conservative Party automatically represent racial progress, saying that a "cabinet packed with ministers with brown skin wearing Tory masks represents the opposition of racial progress". In May 2020, Andrews was a guest on Russell Brand's YouTube channel discussing racism in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd. He was also interviewed by the Los Angeles Review of Books discussing Malcolm X and the question of violence in Black radicalism. In August 2020, Andrews joined calls to drop "Rule, Britannia!" and "Land of Hope and Glory" from the Last Night of the Proms, stating that the lyrics contained "racist propaganda from a time where Britain was the leading slave-trading nation in the world". In June 2021, Andrews described Elizabeth II as "the number