SOAS launches investigation after director’s use of N-word

SOAS University of London has commissioned an external investigation into allegations of anti-black racism following the furore over its director’s use of the N-word in a video call with students.

SOAS students launched a petition calling for the resignation or dismissal of Adam Habib, who joined the institution only in January, following the exchange. Professor Habib issued an apology but emphasised that he had mentioned the word while explaining that action would be taken against its use, and had not used it in a pejorative way. Students had complained that lecturers had used the slur and that their complaints had been ignored by the university.

In a statement issued on 16 March, Marie Staunton, chair of SOAS’ trustees, said the board had learned of the exchange “with concern” but wanted to “use this moment to affirm and commit to action being taken by SOAS and by Adam Habib as our director”.

Ms Staunton said SOAS had asked Judy Clements, a former chief executive of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education, “to conduct an external investigation into complaints we have received”.

“This will include unexplored and unactioned complaints about anti-black conduct across the school and how those affect students’ learning outcomes and staff work environment,” Ms Staunton said.

“This is…a focused investigation on issues that students raised in the Thursday 11 March all-student meeting and their concerns about how those were discussed in that meeting.”

Ms Clements previously led a review of student complaints and disciplinary processes at SOAS in 2018-19.

Ms Staunton said SOAS’ leaders would work alongside a race, accountability and listening action steering group to engage black staff and students “to organise listening spaces designed to identify the major strategic and practical shifts that need to occur in the institution”.

And she said Professor Habib “has reaffirmed to us that he will focus his time listening to black colleagues and students, to help to educate himself, and to keep on learning”.

“If black staff and students feel comfortable, an external facilitator will be arranged to facilitate a dialogue as part of a learning and listening exercise that centres the concerns of the black and black diasporic world,” Ms Staunton said.

In the video call, Professor Habib was told by a black student that he could not use the N-word because he was not a black man and did “not face the trauma and the oppression of black bodies, what we go through 24/7 for the last 500 years”.

Professor Habib explained that the word was used in his native South Africa, where “when someone uses it, the context matters”.

Professor Habib, former vice-chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand, succeeded Baroness Amos as SOAS director earlier this year.

chris.havergal@timeshighereducation.com