Dalia Gebrial

Dalia Gebrial
Gebrial in 2020
Known for	Contributor to Novara Media, PhD researcher at London School of Economics Writing career
Subjects	Decolonisation postcolonialism marxist feminism gig economy climate justice
Academic background
Alma mater	University of Warwick (BA) University of Oxford (MSt) London School of Economics (MSc, PhD)

Dalia Louise Gebrial is a British political commentator, journalist, writer, activist, and researcher. She is a regular contributor to Novara Media, for which she presents and produces video content.^[1] She has contributed to other publications such as The Guardian,^[2] The Independent,^[3] The Washington Post^[4] and The Telegraph^[5] and appeared on Sky News and BBC Politics.

Education and career[]

Gebrial received a BA in English Literature from the University of Warwick in 2014 and an MSt in World Literatures in English from the University of Oxford in 2016.^[6] She is currently a PhD candidate at LSE researching topics of the gig economy under neoliberalism, climate justice, anti-racist social movements and the effects of gender and race on labour-based capitalism.^[7]

In 2017, Gebrial was the editor of a special issue of the journal Historical Materialism which focuses on identity politics. Gebrial co-edited the volume Decolonising the University, published by Pluto Press in 2018, with Gurminder K. Bhambra and in which they discuss how colonial thinking can be challenged inside and outside the classroom across the world's universities. The book was inspired by a movement of South African students in 2015 to remove another statue of Cecil Rhodes in the University of Cape Town, drawing comparisons and contrasts with the same issue in Oxford and how colonialism is fought in a former colony or its native nation-state. Likewise, in the book, Gebrial makes the argument that "the role of the historian is to simply 'reveal' facts about pasts that are worth revealing" through the role of the institution.^[8]

In February 2021, Gebrial co-authored the book Empire's Endgame: Racism and the British State with seven other anti-racist scholars dealing with issues related to race, the state, media and criminalisation of race. In the book, the authors discuss how the legacy of empire has been shaped by global capitalism and how the legacy of empire continues to influence contemporary events such as Theresa May's hostile environment policies and Brexit.^[9] Novara Media contributor Ash Sarkar called the book "rigorous, impassioned and urgent, this book punctures the puffed-up nationalist swagger of our government with an incisive critique of post-imperial decline".^[10]

Political views and activities[]

Gebrial describes herself as being an anti-capitalist and a feminist, and states that these two elements are interlinked. In her view, feminism cannot be compatible with capitalism.^[11]

While a student at Warwick in 2013, Gebrial participated in protests against the university for its alleged links to sweatshops in the Far East and South Asia who were involved in producing branded clothing for the university. She said that her support, along with other students, was to "take a stand against the exploitation of third world workers".^[12]

During her time at University of Oxford, Gebrial was involved in anti-racist activism to remove the statue venerating slave trader and British imperial officer Cecil Rhodes in 2015. Commenting on the movement, she said that "taking down the Rhodes statue would not immediately fix or reverse all of this" but that such a move would signal that the university wants to "seriously engage with this problem".^[13] Similarly, Gebrial at a 2017 Oxford panel stated that the existence of the Rhodes statue at Oriel College "stands as a metaphor for the empire", for which she rejected the idea of removing it simply to create a safe space and instead to be "representative of a wider change in the university".^[14]

This line of activism has been expanded more broadly to what Gebrial calls "decolonising the curriculum" to remove the colonial slant that has been placed on the teaching of British history in which there is little focus placed on historic black and brown voices both within Britain and in its colonies. This was partly inspired by her experience where she says "I studied history to A-level standard and I never once engaged with the Empire" and it is this that creates a "cognitive dissonance" in the general population where "people really don't know what the realities of the British Empire were".^[15]

Gebrial defended the removal of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol in June 2020.^[16]

From July 2016 to September 2017, Gebrial was the campaign co-ordinator of People & Planet, a student advocacy organisation focussed on creating solutions to the climate crisis across borders.

Works[]

Books[]

• Bhambra, G.K.; Elliott-Cooper, A.; Balani, S.; Nişancıoğlu, K.; Koram, K.; Gebrial, D.; El-Enany, N.; de Noronha, L. (2021). Empire's Endgame: Racism and the British State. (London: Pluto Press)

Edited books[]

• Bhambra, G. K.; Nişancıoğlu, K.; Gebrial, D., eds. (2018). Decolonising the University (PDF). London: Pluto Press.
• Paul, H. K.; Gebrial, D., eds. (2021). Perspectives on a Global Green New Deal (PDF). London: Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung.

Edited book chapters[]

• Gebrial, D. (2018), "Rhodes Must Fall: Oxford and Movements for Change" in Bhambra, G.K.; Nişancıoğlu, K.; Gebrial, D. (eds.) (2018). Decolonising the University (London: Pluto Press)
• Gebrial, D. (2020), "Socialist Strategy in the Age of Precarity" in Blakeley, G. (ed.) (2020). Futures of Socialism: The Pandemic and the Post-Corbyn Era (London: Verso)

Academic articles[]

• Gebrial, D.; Kumar, A. (2016). "Atoning for the past", Economic and Political Weekly 51(10)
• Gebrial, D.; Kumar, A.; Sarkar, A.; Cooper, A.; Iyer, S. (2017) eds. Special Issue "The Politics of Identity", Historical Materialism 26(2), p. 3-20
• Gebrial, D.; Kumar, A.; Elliott-Cooper, A.; Cooper, A.; Iyer, S. (2018). "Marxism and Identity Politics", Historical Materialism 29
• Bhambra, G.K.; Nişancıoğlu, K.; Gebrial, D. (2020). "Decolonising the university in 2020", Identities 27(4), p. 1-8 https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2020.1753415

References[]