Colonial Histories and Contemporary Racism: An Interview with Marta Araújo

Questions about inclusion and exclusion are some of the most pressing issues democratic societies are facing today. In February 2025, the Origins of Racializing Thought (ORT) project (Kone Foundation, 2022–2026) organized the seminar Acting Democratically: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on the Politics of Exclusion in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy at the University of Málaga.

The convenors Dr. Malin Grahn-Wilder (PI of the ORT project, University of Jyväskylä) and Prof. Rosario López (University of Málaga) were interested in fostering conversations on the rise of illiberal, racist, and xenophobic rhetorics, or the roles of race and gender in the historical debates over citizenship, among other topics.

Grahn-Wilder interviewed the keynote speaker Prof. Marta Araújo (University of Coimbra) on the topics of the conference. Araújo has conducted internationally recognized research on topics such as addressing colonialism and enslavement in history education, ethno-racial discrimination, and Islamophobia.

M. G-W.: Your lecture was entitled Enslavement and Race in Post-2020 Europe: History, Power, Education and Citizenship. Why did you choose this topic?

M.A.: In my academic work, I have focused on questions of race and racial equality in Europe, with a specific interest in education and, more recently, on the interrelation between public and school history. Following the killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, in Minneapolis, and the subsequent global protests highlighting historical injustices, there was a renewed public debate about the legacy of enslavement and the racial dynamics that continue to influence our societies which particularly interests me.

This debate includes discussions about how the education systems in many post-colonial European contexts have avoided or failed to adequately teach the historical origins of contemporary racism. However, this problem is not limited to education alone; in the European political discourse and policy initiatives over the past few decades it has been evident that there has been a reluctance to confront these colonial histories and their racial legacies.

At the same time, community organizations have been actively working to keep these memories alive and encouraging discussions about the social and institutionalized forgetting of enslavement. Hence, in my lecture, I explored how political debates, policy guidelines, and memorialization practices have addressed the history of enslavement, particularly at its intersections with race, national identity, and contemporary racism in various European contexts.

M. G-W.: Your lecture analyzed the ways histories of enslavement and colonialism have been addressed in Portugal. Can you give some examples of these shifting narratives?

M.A.: In my analysis, I wished to highlight the sociopolitical context shaping specific articulations of race and nation. To do so, I followed the circulation of a painting deployed to depict life in Lisbon in the 16^th century, in different public history initiatives and schoolbooks. The painting was initially deployed to depict a colonial history shaped by racial differentiations and hierarchies and progressively used to parade Lisbon as a pioneering example of intercultural contact and globalization – at a time in which political activism and social mobilization against institutionalized racism had become critical in Portuguese society.¹

I also aimed to situate my analysis of the shifting narratives about the painting in relation to the broader context of debates surrounding European colonial history. This context became especially significant after 2020, following the reactions of the European Parliament and the European Commission to the protests in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States and against institutionalized racism in Europe. To better understand these symbolic gestures, I examined the political frameworks deployed in history education prior to their public commitment to address racial equality.

M. G-W.: This lecture relates to your project Teaching the History of Enslavement and Race in the Colony-Metropole Nexus (2024-2027, Spencer Foundation). Can you tell us more?

M.A.: This is a project that I am coordinating at the Centre for Social Studies (CES) at the University of Coimbra. Although the research on international guidelines on history education and racial equality is not yet fully completed, we can draw some provisional findings. In particular, I have highlighted how traditional silences in scholarship have increasingly been challenged, leading to significant advancements in this field. This has contributed to a growing debate about the relevance of colonial history, including in classrooms across Europe. However, the Council of Europe’s disengagement from the histories of colonialism and enslavement – as crucial components of European history that continue to shape our societies today – is particularly concerning. This issue reflects not only a lack of political will to address past invisibilities but also an absence of actionable policy guidelines. Such guidelines would assist professional historians, educators, and schoolteachers in valuing cultural diversity and promoting racial equality in their professional practices and contexts.

¹ Araújo, Marta (2025), ”Crossings and Anchorages: The Circulation of the Painting The King’s Fountain and the Negotiation of Post-Colonial Racial Imaginaries in Portugal”, Social Identities: Journal of the Study of Race, Nation, and Culture, 1-19.