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The Centre for Gender Studies is pleased to host a book launch roundtable for Dr. Rahul Rao's 'The Psychic Lives of Statues' with Eddie Bruce-Jones, Gargi Bhattacharyya, Kerem Nisancioglu and, Laleh Khalili. The roundtable will be followed by a small reception after.

From Cape Town to Bristol and Richmond, statues have become sites of resistance and contestation of our imperial past and postcolonial present. The Psychic Lives of Statues by Rahul Rao offers an insightful exploration of these global controversies, demonstrating that beneath their surface lie deeper struggles over race, caste, and the politics of decolonisation.

Rao takes readers on a journey through South Africa, England, the US, Ghana, India, Australia, and Scotland, revealing how statue controversies have dramatically rearranged the canon of anticolonial political thought. By examining these debates through a personal and literary lens, Rao addresses the multifaceted issues of justice, cultural memory, and belonging.

The Psychic Lives of Statues examines both the toppling of colonial statues and the raising of postcolonial ones, demonstrating that the statue form as a medium of representation and a bid for immortality is by no means obsolete. Engaging with artists, scholars, and activists, Rao provides fresh perspectives on how societies grapple with and reinterpret the past and present through iconography.

About the speakers

Rahul Rao is a Reader in International Political Thought in the School of International Relations at the University of St Andrews, and Professorial Research Associate at SOAS University of London. He is the author of two books – Third World Protest: Between Home and the World (2010) and Out of Time: The Queer Politics of Postcoloniality (2020), both published by Oxford University Press. He is a member of the Radical Philosophy editorial collective.

Eddie Bruce-Jones is a Professor and the Head of Department at the School of Law, Gender and Media at SOAS University of London. He has published in the areas of racial equality, migration law, and law and the humanities.

Gargi Bhattacharyya is a Professor and Director of the Sarah Parker Remond Centre for the Study of Racism and Racialisation at UCL. They write and teach on issues of inequality, social justice and state practices.

Kerem Nisancioglu is a Senior Lecturer in International Relations. He has researched and published on the relationship between Eurocentrism, capitalism, colonialism and race.

Laleh Khalili is a Professor of Gulf Studies at the University of Exeter. Her writings have examined the representations and practices of violence, politics of pleasure, gendered subjectivities, finance, collective memory, and the role of happiness in counterinsurgencies.