Black History Month

Below you can find some of our previous Black History Month events:

Black History Month Lecture 2026, Professor Tanniemola B. Liverpool, University of Bristol

Wednesday 11 November, 2pm, MCS0001, followed by a drinks reception.

Detours and shortcuts: journeys in non-equilibrium statistical mechanics

Professor Tanniemola B. Liverpool will give a talk exploring his research in non-equilibrium statistical mechanics and reflecting on his academic journey.

Professor Liverpool’s research focuses on mathematical descriptions of complex fluids, including membranes, polymers and gels. He is increasingly interested in “soft biological matter”, such as DNA, proteins, the cytoskeleton and gene regulation, and the organising principles behind this highly complex, active or “living” state of matter.

In this talk, Professor Liverpool will introduce the broad themes of his research and share insights and reflections from his academic career.

Black History Month Lecture 2024, Dr Nazar Miheisi, King's College London

Friday 25 October, 3pm in the Scott Logic Lecture Theatre, followed by a drinks reception.

Averages with arithmetic weights: Ergodic theory meets number theory and analysis

The ergodic theorem asserts that for a measure preserving transformation $T:X\to X$ and an integrable function $f:X\to\R$, the averages $(f(x)+f(Tx)+\dots+f(T^{N-1}x)/N$ converge as $N\to\infty$. There has been a very active decades long programme to extend this in various directions. Most notably, by considering averages along subsequences and weighted averages. In this talk, I will discuss several results in this direction, some old and some new, and connections to number theory and analysis. In honour of Black History Month, I will also highlight the contributions of some inspiring black and minority ethnic mathematicians along the way.

The talk will be mostly introductory and is intended to be accessible to advanced undergraduate students.

Please click here to watch a recording of Dr Miheisi's talk.

Black History Month Lecture 2023, Prof Jacqueline M. Hughes-Oliver, North Carolina State University

Wednesday 8 November, 2pm online.

Lessons from the Life and Work of David Blackwell

David Blackwell was a pioneer and a trailblazer. In this talk, I will share bits of his early life, to create context for the person he became. I will also briefly review some of his statistical and probability contributions. Professor Blackwell's early involvement in Statistics as a discipline provided clear evidence that everyone can make valuable contributions, no matter their societal labels. Surely, this rich heritage in Statistics has allowed us to rise above other disciplines to be a diverse community. Or has it? To help us address this question, I will review published data on the diversity of our community within the United States. I will also stress lessons gleaned from Professor Blackwell's life.

Black History Month Lecture 2022, Dr Lassina Dembélé

9th November 2022, 2pm online and in the Scott Logic Lecture Theatre.

From Muhammad al-Fullani's magic squares to Gauss' quadratic residues to Langlands programme

In this talk, Dr Lassina Dembélé will discuss the works of three mathematicians from three different continents and use this as a metaphor to discuss his own mathematical trajectory. This will be a colloquium talk.

Dr Lassina Dembélé received his PhD from McGill University, Canada. He held various research positions at Brandeis University, University of Calgary, Institute for Experimental Mathematics at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Dartmouth College and University of Luxembourg. He also spent time at the University of Warwick as a Marie-Curie Fellow and an EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellow. He joined King’s College London in January 2022.

Please click here to watch a recording of Dr Dembélé's talk.

Black History Month Lecture 2021, Dr Angela Tabiri

13 October 2021, 2pm online.

Femafricmaths : Documenting the stories of female African mathematicians

The Black History Month, also initially known as the African American History Month, is a month-long tradition of celebrating the achievements of the black community. It began as a way for remembering important people and events in the history of the African diaspora. The event is celebrated every year in October in the UK.

To celebrate the contributions of black role models to the field of Mathematical Sciences, the department of Mathematical Sciences, Durham University is pleased to have Dr Angela Tabiri as our guest speaker.

Dr Angela Tabiri is at present a Google AI postdoctoral fellow in the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) in Ghana. Prior to this she completed her PhD at the University of Glasgow in 2019 and a Postgraduate Diploma from ICTP, Trieste in 2015. Her research interests are in noncommutative algebra, Hopf algebra, quantum groups and quantum homogenous spaces. She teaches postgraduate courses in Mathematics for Machine Learning and Linear Algebra at AIMS, and is the lead for the Girls in Mathematical Sciences Program (GMSP), which nurtures girls from senior secondary schools in Ghana to unlock their potential in the mathematical sciences. She is also leading a unique initiative called Femafricmaths, which promotes STEM education among African females.

Please click here to watch a recording of Dr Tabiri's talk.