An interview with Lesa Williams-George, Victoria University’s first Director of Equity, Inclusion & Transformative Practices
The Strand: You are the first person to hold this new position of Director of Equity, Inclusion & Transformative Practices at Vic. What does that title mean to you?
Lesa Williams-George: First, can I talk about what those words mean? So the words to me mean: they’re equity, equity is inclusive of all the human rights pieces, all the accessibility pieces, all the belonging pieces, […] inclusion is a part of the belonging that the university should be a place where everyone feels they belong. And they have space here. And that this is our space, the students’ spaces are very student-focused and student-centred. And then the transformative practices is about how do we do things in a way that honours equity and inclusion. And for the whole community, what do we need to learn? […] What do we need to change? And how do we get there? And what behaviours do I individually, and that’s everybody, I, as an individual, need to be aware of, mindful of, and present and right. How do I create space and hold space so that equity, inclusion, and accommodations happen? It’s up to the individual. And organisationally, what structures and policies and procedures do we need to support? […] The President is clear. We don’t want [to be] performative. We want action. We want things to be different. And that’s how I started, and I’m trying to figure out what are all the pieces are that need to be looked at and understood.
Many concerns have been raised about the content of Vic courses, especially when discussing professors like David Gilmour, leading to the development of an EDIA student working group last year with the Principal’s Office. How do you plan to ensure the principles of equity extend to Victoria University’s curriculums?
I’ve been asked to co-chair the group and to provide advice. We will be looking at exactly those pieces, looking at curriculum, creating some working statements and frameworks for what that’s going to look like. So, in fact, it’s at the early stages. We’re thinking about how to build in that community and have student representation […] What we struggle against is a Eurocentric model of ways of knowing and being. And who has empiricism of knowledge? I love epistemology, right, the origins of things and where they come from. So, a lot of my studies beyond the classroom have been going to Indigenous communities and learning from them. Because, I also teach, and so, I don’t have the right to appropriate Indigenous voices or the right to appropriate anybody’s voices. But Indigenous voices are very particular. And this is what Truth and Reconciliation and sovereignty is about. We have a history. We have beliefs. We have institutions that colonialism has supplanted. And the West has said, ‘This is what knowledge looks like. This is how we should be.’ But in the traditional African diaspora, which is in my roots, and in Canadian Indigenous diasporas, there’s ways of knowing and being that doesn’t always fit with the European model […] And so when this rugged individualism of “this is how our human being behaves, looks, thinks and talks”, that’s imposing your way of being and knowing onto vastly different groups of people, which negates their natural Indigenous ways of knowing and being. Until you know yourself and your identity, you don’t know if you’re inadvertently, unconsciously imposing or upholding the status quo […] It’s an assimilative process. I want to say that assimilation has been successful for me, because I wasn’t even aware of who I was. And I had to deconstruct the social knowledge of myself, and to own being in this Black body, being female, being intelligent, and being of a certain class. So, I have a certain privilege, and what that means to me as my identity and how I show up. That’s the struggle. And so to just throw this out, it’s going to cause dissonance. It’s going to cause some emotional, psychological, and psychosocial dissonance because it’s so different from what you think you believe […] I want to weigh into that carefully. Because you get pushback, resistance, anger, that’s why those conversations are hard. That’s why they’re difficult. That’s why we need to have an agreement about how we engage in this dialogue, because it impacts people. Because it’s up here, all this stuff is constructed up here in our head, but we behave and treat each other based on those things that we don’t even know we learn. So that’s the deep, deep science of deconstructing and transformation. But it has to come from a place of love, empathy, care. And, and, and it has to be dealt with very considerably and intentionally to end it’s my approach is a kind of approach to doing that. I think it’s big work […] So those are all questions that we ask ourselves and when we’re talking about inclusive, inclusive of different ways of knowing and being, and how do we make space for that in institutions of learning? How do we do that? I’m not an iconoclast; I’m a knowledge builder. […] I love what Emmanuel [College] is doing with the various cultures and various ways of knowing and being through the faith perspectives. I love what’s going on there, and it needs to filter out into all areas of knowledge in the university.
Vic has many student groups which focus on representing and uplifting the perspectives of marginalised and underrepresented students, such as the Equity Commission, Vic Black, Vic Pride, and VOICES. How do you plan on engaging with these groups in your work?
I think students are important to the work, and my approach is to hear people in their own voices because my perspective might be different. If I talk to the heads of the school, they have one perspective, but the students are essentially the end users. Now, it has to be inclusive and safe for staff, students, librarians, grounds people, and anybody who’s here needs to feel like they belong and are protected. But students are centred, and student voices are important. And there’s a little phrase I like to use, “not about us without us.” And I love data. And that would be straight data going to the people that are the most impacted, and hearing their perspective […] Because when people are part of the solution or part of the project, they get ownership, they feel engaged, and they feel valued. So that will be my approach. And I’m starting to meet the groups. Now I’m starting to talk to them, starting to see what interests them, what projects they want to do. So I’m very much in a look, listen, learn stance. It’s been three or four weeks, and I think I’m on track.
What legacy do you hope to leave behind at this institution?
I’m not a big dreamer. But if I had to leave a legacy […] I want to make sure I’m leaving a space better than how I found it, and do no harm. That I will leave something better, something that’s long-lasting, something that’s sustainable, something that is inculcated, and that every member of the community picks up and sees as their own and takes it on as a personal goal. And as part of their legacy to leave this university a little better than what we found it. So do good to improve it to make sure that equity and inclusion are felt, it’s seen, it’s heard. It’s a part of the fabric. It’s a part of the culture. And it’s a part of the way of being, and that every student, no matter what creed, what religion, what background, they come from, feel that they belong here, and this is their space.
