I Heard What You Said
‘Are you really a teacher?’ ‘Can I call you Mr B?’ ‘Can you rap?’ ‘Have you ever been to prison?’ ‘Stephen who?’
Jeffrey Boakye was often the only black boy in his class. And then, after training to become a teacher, a few years later, he was often teaching the handful of black students, as the only black teacher in the school.
This book recounts how that felt and how it feels. Boakye reports what he has found out along the way about the underlying habits, presumptions, silences and distortions that underpin the whole British educational system that black students, and teachers, experience. He offers sharp analysis, sharp patter and even sharper hopes for what might come.
Smart and witty, eye-opening and thought-provoking, I Heard What You Said provides an unforgettable insight into racism in modern education and sets out what we can do to change things for the better.
Published by Picador in hardback in June 2022 and in paperback in May 2023.
We offer Continued Professional Development (CPD) ad inset sessions for schools on this book and the themes it raises. More information.
Jeffrey Boakye On I Heard What You Said, 5x15, June 2023
Praise for I Heard What You Said
Shortlisted for the Bread & Roses Award for Radical Publishing
TV rights acquired by Stigma Films
The Bookseller Editor’s Choice for June 2022
Amazon Best Books of the Year – Non-Fiction, 2022
‘I Heard What You Said makes a powerful case: until we have rid our educational system of its dominant whiteness (and, dare I say it, maleness) we cannot hope to give all our children (whatever their ethnicity or gender) the educational experience they need and deserve.’ Rt Hon Lady Hale
‘This is the book I’ve been waiting for and the book every teacher should read. Brave, brutally honest, funny and necessary. Jeffery captures the Black teaching experience in such a powerful and potent way. The book of the year.’ Ben Lindsay, CEO/Founder of Power The Fight and author of We Need To Talk About Race
‘This book is written with passion, fury, knowledge and, in spite of the painful subject, wit. Do you want to break down entrenched structural racism in schools? Then read this.’ Patrice Lawrence MBE, prize-winning author of Orangeboy
'Deeply compelling, intellectually rigorous and essential' Nels Abbey
'Personal and political, profound and playful' Darren Chetty
'Hugely important' Baroness Lawrence
'Sharp and witty with moments of startling candour' The i
‘Revealing and beautifully written’ David Harewood
‘Essential reading for teachers, those who run educational institutions, parents – but perhaps most of all for those Black children who may be currently going through school not realising why they are made to feel small, out of step and unworthy. For them in particular, it could be a ray of hope.” The Guardian