I think Undisciplining Victorian Studies is an important but difficult task. The push to decolonize Academia has been ongoing for much longer than this year’s BLM movement. My experience in Ryerson English has been tinged by an attempt at decolonization. Many of my profs have made a strong effort to incorporate postcolonial, Indigenous, and subaltern writers and artists into their syllabi. I have read much less of the American and British classics than I’m sure I would have read at UofT. But there is always more work to be done. Figures like Pamela Colman Smith provide an important starting point for diversifying the Victorian canon and elevating the long-suppressed stories of the Other in the empire. That she was as prolific as she was and is still remains so obscure is saddening, but the work being done to uncover her history and influence is important. Whether or not PCS was a mixed race woman or not is only marginally important—a blood quantum cannot change the merits of her art and contributions to the culture. But she is only the beginning. There are generations of suppressed voices, neglected by generations of Euro-centric critics and academics who put all the value in white, British subjects.

The challenge is that, tragically, much of the work of the colonized no longer exists. An important aspect of colonial genocide is the destruction of the colonized’s culture. As such, sometimes the work of the colonized is simply not there. The bulk of the work, then, for decolonizing the Academy is in recovery. The Academy also needs to recognize its active role in colonization, and how it continues to benefit from its impact, and take steps to reconcile with that fact through breaking down the barriers that stand between higher education and communities that suffer under the legacy of settler colonialism, racism, and capitalism.