Woke privilege: University College London tells academics to stop courses about 'dead white men'

University College London (UCL) academics have received criticism about the number of their courses which are focused around "dead white men".

The researchers are being told to "check their privilege" in order to secure a promotion.

This comes after a UCL initiative with the goal of “challenging traditional Eurocentric, male-dominated curricula and ensuring the work of marginalised scholars on race, sexuality, gender, and disability are fairly represented in curricula”.

The policy is stated in a document, obtained by The Daily Telegraph, and urges people sending applications for lecturer roles to “demonstrate the impact” of their commitment to UCL's Liberating the Curriculum initiative.

The UCL Academics Careers Framework document calls upon academics to “check their privilege” and “acknowledge the prejudices baked into a field”.

The paper criticises the current academic courses, calling the disciplines "deeply exclusive and unfair."

The policy argues that academics should move away from the courses because they are overly focused on “dead white (able-bodied European) men."

One academic responded: “I think this whole woke avalanche is really concerning because it is like a religious fervour.”

The general secretary of the Free Speech Union, Toby Young, responded to say the document infringed academics “right to free speech and almost certainly unlawful”.

UCL said: “We have a long tradition of safeguarding freedom of speech and are strongly committed to upholding academic freedom of inquiry in our teaching and research.”