This project brings together Black and trans geographers from across the UK to undertake a workers’ inquiry responsive to the conditions shaping Black and trans geographical scholarship within the contemporary university. We will collectively develop long-term strategies and practical resources to safeguard the future of our scholarship.

In recent years racism and transphobia have been increasingly mainstreamed within UK politics. Hard-won legal protections for minority groups are openly contested, with some already being rolled back. This political context, combined with a profound financial crisis, is reshaping working conditions within UK universities. Within Geography the situation is particularly acute: departments have closed and academic posts are under threat. These developments disproportionately affect Black and trans scholars, who encounter discrimination, casualisation, and the marginalisation or devaluation of our scholarship within institutional decision-making.

Black and trans geographers therefore urgently need time and space to assess these threats and develop collective strategies to ameliorate their effects. The project responds by undertaking a workers’ inquiry: a collaborative investigation into the institutional, disciplinary, and political forces shaping the production of Black and trans geographical knowledge. The inquiry brings together scholars at different career stages who have worked on Black geographies and/or trans geographies in the UK. These fields provide complementary yet contrasting case studies: both are small, rapidly growing yet institutionally fragile areas of scholarship, which have followed distinct pathways to disciplinary recognition.

The project will convene two workshops. The first (“Past and present”) investigates how these fields were established and interrogates the institutional conditions that now threaten them. The second (“Futures”) develops a long-term strategy for strengthening and sustaining these areas of scholarship. The workshop will produce a graphic report outlining practical steps to support Black and trans geographical scholarship, alongside a special issue in an international, interdisciplinary peer-reviewed journal.