Hoping for support, Jackson forwarded it to his department head and close colleague, volcanologist Mike Burton - but he was disappointed by the response. He saw the e-mail as an attempt to malign him and his views. “I was very angry and upset by the e-mail,” says Jackson, who asserts that his public comments were not directed at the university. Schröder copied the e-mail to several high-level colleagues. The e-mail included a link to an opinion article calling institutional racism an ill-defined, unhelpful concept. He stated that UK-funded science is “definitely institutionally racist” and that senior white scientists do not recognize the ways in which racial biases permeate their institutions.įour days later, he got an e-mail from the university’s vice-president, Martin Schröder, who said he did not think the university was institutionally racist and that such language was counterproductive. A month into his job, Jackson was quoted in a BBC news story about the disproportionately low representation of Black people in UK science. But he quickly began to feel a lack of support from many colleagues. He was excited: “Manchester, as a city and an institution, meant so much to me because I’d spent so much time there,” he says. Last year, Jackson was hired by the University of Manchester as chair in sustainable geoscience. “I think it’s important to upset people for the right reasons.” “I’ve suffered more racism for being outspoken, but I think it’s absolutely worth it,” says Jackson. One letter calling him “a massive disappointment on the issue of race and identity within the UK” was sent to him, along with a book extolling the ‘benefits’ of slavery to Black people. When it was announced that year that Jackson would be the first Black person to present the Royal Institution’s Christmas Lectures, he received an onslaught of e-mails and direct messages saying that the decision was made ‘because he’s Black’ and describing it as an attempt at ‘woke virtue signalling’. His increased exposure came with abuse and criticism, which became more charged after the murder of George Floyd in 2020. “I’ve got a lot more privilege and protection than those who are more junior to me,” he says. He had also become vocal about anti-Black racism, speaking to media outlets about the structural biases that exclude and hold back Black scientists. From there, Jackson appeared in other documentaries while he continued his research. Jackson gained prominence in 2017, when he co-presented Expedition Volcano, a BBC documentary. He got a degree in geology at the University of Manchester and, later, a PhD at the same institution. He had never heard of university until it was brought up in passing by teachers and career advisers. He was born and raised in Derby, UK - a predominately white industrial city - to parents who had emigrated from the Caribbean. Jackson didn’t grow up with dreams of being a scientist. They’ve made him second-guess himself, but not too much: “I’m pretty thick-skinned.” Jackson has endured racially charged slights, such as showing up to a meeting to deliver a keynote address and being mistaken for an audio-visual technician. His research projects have been awarded more than £10 million (US$11.1 million) in funding, and in 2015, at 38 years old, he became, at the time, the only Black geoscience professor in the United Kingdom. Many people could look at Christopher Jackson’s career and assume that racism hasn’t held him back.
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