Students reflect on legacies of enslavement research

Alumna Toyin Akinkunmi and postgraduate student Tiger Chan have reflected on their experiences researching legacies of enslavement at Newnham College. 

The pair contributed to Newnham’s investigation into our financial and social legacies of enslavement as student researchers, and were initially unsure of finding any links in a women’s college founded after abolitiion. However, they discovered many founders came from the Liverpool/Manchester area and were connected to slavery through banking, merchant, and cotton textile families.

Tiger and Toyin detail the research process and explain key decisions, as well as highlighting the difficulties, five years on from the research. They sought to highlight how money flowed through communities, by mapping social connections. And to represent enslaved people with respect and accuracy. 

They write:

"We chose to let the presence of the enslaved people dwarf the famous Newnhamites, whose lives have been chronicled as valued history... Looking at the map and knowing we’re only seeing a tiny fraction of those whose exploitation built our College was an overwhelming sensation – as it should be."  

You can read their reflections in this blog for Cambridge University's collaborative legacies of enslavement community. And read more about Newnham College legacies of enslavement research programme.

• Photo shows Newnham Hall in 1875, courtesy of Newnham College Archive