This week we are revisiting our Cotton Capital series that originally ran in April 2023. Today in Focus will be back with new episodes on Tuesday 29 August.
Maya Wolfe-Robinson, a Guardian journalist and the editor of the Cotton Capital series, explores the revelation that the Guardian’s founding editor, John Edward Taylor, and at least nine of his 11 backers had links to slavery, principally through the cotton and the textile industry.
Maya talks to Dr Cassandra Gooptar who has spent the past two years researching the Guardian’s links to slavery. The Manchester Guardian was founded in 1821 and in that period there was one industry that was dominating Manchester: cotton. Maya talks to Dr Matthew Stallard about why Manchester was known as “Cottonopolis” and where that cotton was coming from. She also talks to Prof David Olusoga about the illusion at the centre of British history that conceals the role of slavery in building the nation, and to the teacher and researcher Washington Alcott about the difficulties he faced when trying to document Manchester’s links to the transatlantic slave trade. Prof Gurminder K Bhambra believes that to understand the full implications of transatlantic slavery we need to see its place in a wider picture of the British empire.
Cotton Capital is the first episode of a six-part podcast series that is looking at the Guardian’s links to transatlantic slavery and the legacies of that history. This project will take listeners from Manchester to Jamaica, the US, Nigeria, Brazil and back to the UK.
Host: Maya Wolfe-Robinson
Guests: Prof David Olusoga, Dr Cassandra Gooptar, Dr Matt Stallard, Washington Alcott, Prof Gurminder K Bhambra
Series producer: Courtney Yusuf
Producer: Silas Gray
Consultant executive producer: Colin Stone
Historical consultant: Dr Misha Ewen
Original music: Melo-Zed
Sound design: Max Sanderson
Development series producer: Tej Adeleye
Development producers: Weyland McKenzie-Witter and Fatuma Khaireh
Commissioning editors: Nicole Jackson and Maya Wolfe-Robinson
With thanks to: Safi Bugel, Dr Sami Pinarbasi and Dr Jonathan Silver
Illustration: Mark Harris/The Guardian
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