Confronting the Past: Transformative Justice in St. Louis and Beyond

3 units

Legacies of historic injustice are among the world's most pressing problems. This rotating Ampersand course examines how communities understand and grapple with legacies of historic injustice, especially relating to colonialism, slavery, genocide, and other systematic violence, using strategies of community remembrance and repair to advance transformative justice. The course combines grounding in reckonings with historic injustice in the context of greater St. Louis with comparative engagement with other U.S. and global contexts. Engaging these issues from a variety of perspectives — spanning the humanities and social sciences, art and design, public health, law, and education — we will apply theoretical and empirical frameworks to existing or potential approaches to transformative transitional justice. Our core aim is to work together to consider and build comparative and collective understanding of community reckonings with the legacies of historic injustice, informing local, national and global reparative efforts. The 2025-2026 Ampersand on Reckonings with Historic Injustice combines a local focus on St. Louis with global studies in the U.K., engaging academic and community partners in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and Bristol and Liverpool, England. We will broadly engage and reconsider “The Troubles,” looking across U.S. and U.K histories of slavery and colonialism, and considering how local-to-global communities are confronting their legacies today.