Assistant Professor of Africana Studies Nigel Westmaas presented a paper at the American Historical Association conference held January 4-7 in Atlanta. His paper, "Scholarship and Resistance: Walter Rodney's Impact and Influence on student rebellion in Guyana" evaluated the role of the author of Groundings with my Brothers and How Europe Underdeveloped Africa on the student movement in the South American republic before and after his assassination in 1980. Westmaas's paper was part of a panel under the theme: Race, Repression, and Resistance: Postwar Student Movements in International Perspective.
While intersecting with Rodney's scholarship, the paper argued that various student rebellions and unrest were connected to Rodney's denial of a place in the university system and his overarching political role in the 1970s. Rodney's rapport with students, he contended, was derived from his unconventional approach to all authority, whether specifically political and/or administrative/academic.
The paper traced the Guyanese historian's attempts to work in his homeland, reactions from students and faculty, especially at the university level, and his overall impact, best encapsulated by the Caribbean novelist George Lamming: "It is the supreme distinction of Walter Rodney that he had initiated in his personal and political life a decisive break with the tradition he had been trained to serve."
