Professor Shawn Sobers, Cultural Interdisciplinary Practice
I’m an anthropologist, so for me there’s no separation between the personal and the practice. That’s why I call my research heart work. Because it’s directly connected to me, myself, my cultural identity.
Through my work, I want to tell stories that need to be told. Some call them untold stories, but I prefer to call them unheard stories rather than untold, because often I’m not the first person ever to tell them, but I bring the stories to light in different ways. They’ve already been told in the oral tradition, so they’ve been heard, but not by everyone. Often communities don’t have the mechanisms to share these stories, tin the mainstream, in the media, or other formats. To get the stories out there for more people to hear. I’m keen to help them do just that.
The Emperor’s best friend
An example: a big part of my research work has been around a space in Bath called Fairfield House. It’s where Emperor Haile Selassie lived for four years when he came to England to campaign for allied support to liberate his country from Mussolini’s invasion. The Emperor left his former home Fairfield House to the city of Bath for aged citizens. My own parents spent much time there too at the day centre, when they were alive.
Back in 2016, I was at Fairfield House for an Ethiopian cultural day. I got talking to a lady around my mum’s age. Her name was Emeyou Teklamariam. She mentioned how her great grandfather used to live at Fairfield House. She told me his name: Blattenguetta Herouy. I knew about him because I made a documentary film in 1999 called Footsteps of the Emperor for ITV West, which featured his grave in Bath and the speech the Emperor gave at the graveside.
He was the emperor’s closest friend, his foreign minister, his trusted advisor. And at a time when the emperor was at one of his lowest points in his life following the invasion of his country , his friend Blattenguetta Herouy died. He was buried about 10 minutes down the road from where we were in Fairfield House. But when I mentioned it, Emeyou didn’t believe me. Nor did everyone else! She told me his body was now in Ethiopia, not Bath. And she was right, his body was exuhmed by the Emperor in 1947, butut his elaborate grave, which contains beautiful Ethiopian writing, is still there. To prove it, about half an hour after meeting Emeyou, I took her and her family and friends down to the graveyard, and they were shocked to see it there.
Restoring, re-telling
While there was no longer a body in the grave, and it needed repair, as the large cross and surroundings had all toppled over. Blattenguetta Herouy was a much-loved and respected man, so this was sad to see. So, after talking to the community, I secured some research funding for a project around Ethiopian culture and its connection to the city of Bath. I used some of this funding, as well as additional money raised, to restore Blattenguetta Herouy’s grave.
When the restoration work was finished, we organised an unveiling, with Haile Selassie’s grandson leading the ceremony. It was a very personal, significant moment for Blattenguetta Herouy’s family, many generations of which were present, and the wider Ethiopian community in the country.
Then, as a very generous thank you, the family invited me out to Ethiopia for a memorial service for Blattenguetta Herouy, and for his official reburial. I was also asked to say a few words. This was in 2023, seven years after I first met Emeyou, and 24 years after I first found the grave myself and featured in my film for ITV in 1999, (which was the first time the Emperor’s stay in Bath, and also anything about Blattenguetta Herouy, had featured on British television It is these forms of slow unravelling, moments of serendipity, and relationship building, that I find fascinating in research, and that I build into my work. Sometimes research projects can be quite fast, but even then, I look for the longer threads than can evolve and become something quite unknown in the future. For me that is where the beauty in research resides. As it lives and breathes and takes on a life of its own. Taken ownership by people and communities themselves, rather than me the researcher.
Little moments and small anthropology
Hopefully that shows you what really inspires and motivates me: sharing these unheard stories and helping to connect the dots between different generations. I call my work small anthropology. My way of seeing these little moments in history, these small details in life, and connecting them to now, to current and future generations.
And I’m much more interested in these small aspects of culture, because they still speak to bigger themes. For example, how central the radiogram was to life in my childhood home, and for many other Black British and working-class families. Or the souvenirs my mum collected, and what they meant to her – and their relevance to me, to our community, today. These everyday objects can tell us so much about our culture, heritage and value systems.
Our never-ending stories
I want to keep shining a light on these stories. To connect the dots from then, to now, to next generations. It’s so important that communities can tell and share their own stories. Because if they can’t, who will?
Contribution to the UN 2030 sustainable development goals
UWE Bristol is proud to align our research to the UN sustainable development goals. The above research aligns with the following goals:
