Dr Hannah Jones will draw from her forthcoming book to discuss ignorance practised by society at large,
In 2015, Hollywood star Ben Affleck was exposed for having edited the presentation of his ancestry on family history show Finding Your Roots, because he did not want to reveal that he was descended from a slave-holder. Affleck's search was part of a wider popular interest in ancestry tracing, boosted by ease of access to digitised archives, online forums and increasing use of DNA matching technologies. Sociological research into amateur genealogists has demonstrated that for many, the pursuit of identifying their ancestors springs from a desire to understand one’s identity and place in the world. But what happens when that search reveals uncomfortable information about how we come to be who and where we are? Can encounters with difficult ‘family’ histories be an analogical tool for thinking about the trajectories of historical racism that produced and normalised the everyday (classed and gendered) white supremacism of today?
This talk draws from my forthcoming book, Violent Ignorance, about everyday ignorance practised by society at large, and how this manifests in violent consequences; about how we can recognise that the political is personal, and how we can find ways to bear that - without minimising or ignoring the unbearable ruptures and injustice in which we are all implicated. The talk will consider how haunting by blame and shame appears through the lens of family history work, in terms of ancestors who were both oppressors or oppressed. With attention to work on power and its intersections of race, class, gender and nationality, I point to ongoing refusals to recognise the violence of historical legacies and eruptions on intimate, national and global scales, and their consequences.
Hannah Jones is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Warwick.
Hannah's research interests focus on questions of racism, migration control and belonging, and on practices of policy-making, critical and participative research methods, and public sociology. She has previously conducted research on multiculture and multiculturalism, local government policy-making, community cohesion policy, migration policy, voluntary and community sector organising, regeneration and urban studies, and diversity and inequality.
LSE holds a wide range of events, covering many of the most controversial issues of the day, and speakers at our events may express views that cause offence. The views expressed by speakers at LSE events do not reflect the position or views of The London School of Economics and Political Science.