Jamaican director of UCL's slavery research centre: British racism is 'clear and sharp'

The UK continues the fiction that racial exploitation is in the past, says Matthew Smith. He hopes his London appointment will help change that

Matthew Smith did not plan to quit Jamaica. Until last year the historian, who previously headed the history and archaeology department of the University of the West Indies at Mona, near Kingston, had made a point of staying. I wanted my career to be an example that you don't have to leave," he explains on a video call. But when the directorship of UCL's Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slave-ownership came up, he couldn't resist. I couldn't think of a better job," he says. For me it was the perfect way to bridge research on the Caribbean with meaningful public engagement."

Smith, 46, takes over the reins of the centre at an extraordinary time. Awareness of the UK's role in slavery is arguably at an all-time high after the toppling of the statue of the Bristol slave trader Edward Colston in June.