A Bermudian studying at Oxford University has organised a talk charting the history of Bermuda’s civil rights movement.

Alexa Virdi, who is studying for a PhD in international law, is a member of the university’s Race and Resistance Network, which teamed up with Oxford’s Pembroke College for the event on May 8 that will include a screening of Errol Williams’s documentary, When Voices Rise.

The screening will be followed by a question-and-answer session with Reverend Kingsley Tweed, a leader of the Bermuda civil rights movement, as well as Stephen Tuck, the Oxford professor of modern history.

Ms Virdi was keen for Bermuda’s history and “ongoing struggle for racial justice” to be given a platform. While attending the research seminars held by Oxford’s Race and Resistance Network, she suggested that they could screen the documentary.

“When I was a teenager I volunteered for Errol Williams and his team in making the documentary,” she said. “The film is very important as it documents the terrible history of slavery and segregation in Bermuda. It also captures the incredible bravery of the black people of Bermuda involved with the desegregation movement.

“The making of the film involved Errol interviewing older Bermudians who were pivotal in the desegregation movement. It was very powerful to hear the hours of testimonies of the courageous people involved in fighting against such a deeply entrenched system of oppression.”

Ms Virdi asked Mr Tuck to take part in the discussion owing to his interests, which include modern race equality struggles in Britain and America, the relationship between religion and racism, and the writing of national history.

He has written about and researched the American civil rights movement and his last book focused on Malcolm X’s visit to Oxford.

“There is not a big Bermudian community in Oxford, but people will be interested in its story,” Mr Tuck told The Royal Gazette. “I am really looking forward to it.

“This is a topic that will be completely unknown to pretty much everyone here.

“We will have a Q&A after the documentary with Rev Tweed and I will be chairing the Q&A. I hadn’t heard of Rev Tweed before and I have since looked him up.

“I saw he was an AME minister, a very influential one, and it just so happens there is a higher-level undergraduate course on African American churches, and segregation and inequality, which covers the AME church. Students from those courses will be particularly interested.”

Ms Virdi, who is from Warwick and left Bermuda a year ago to attend Oxford, added: “These events are important because the terrible history of slavery and segregation must not be forgotten, and those who had to fight so hard for their freedom must be honoured.

“Moreover, we live in a world where all manners of injustice remain pervasive, and this must be combated.

“Furthermore, Oxford University, like many institutions, is seriously underrepresented by non-white people.

“My husband attended Oxford as an undergraduate in the 1990s and, as a non-white person, experienced overt racial prejudice.”