SU historian Y. Hakan Erdem has been appointed to sit as a member in the International Scientific Committee for UNESCO’s Slave Route Project: Resistance, Liberty, Heritage. The ISC membership consists of 20 members from different regions of the world representing a wide array of academic disciplines and is renewed by half of its members every two years.
Launched in 1994, the Slave Route Project, according to UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova’s letter of invitation to Erdem has “five interlinked initiatives: a research programme in colloboration with academic institutions; an educational programme to develop pedagogic orientations and materials to facilitate the teaching of this history; a programme for the promotion of the African Diaspora’s contributions in the field of culture, arts and knowledge, as well as religion; a programme for the promotion of itineraries of memory; and, a programme for the safeguarding of archives and oral traditions related to the slave trade”.