Woke Academia's Assault on Fantasy Classics: University of Nottingham's Absurd "Decolonising Tolkien" Course, By Richard Miller (Londonistan)

The latest episode of academic overreach has the University of Nottinghamlaunching a course that brands timeless fantasy epics like J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (LOTR) and C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia as bastions of racism and ethnic chauvinism. Titled "Imagining 'Britain': Decolonising Tolkien et al," this history module peddles the notion that these beloved stories demonise people of colour and perpetuate harmful stereotypes, claims that smack of presentism and ideological tunnel vision rather than scholarly rigour. As someone who's delved into these worlds since childhood, I can't help but critique this as yet another example of "woke" academia twisting literature to fit a narrative of perpetual victimhood, all while ignoring the authors' intentions and the stories' deeper themes of heroism, friendship, and moral complexity. I unpack this farce, backed by the facts, and expose why it's not just misguided, it's detrimental to genuine education.

The controversy erupted with a Daily Mail exposé highlighting the course's use of texts by Dr. Onyeka Nubia, a historian who argues that Tolkien's portrayal of orcs, Easterlings, Southrons, and men from Harad as dark-skinned antagonists reflects "ethnic chauvinism" and "anti-African antipathy." According to Nubia, these characters position people of color as the "natural enemy of the white man," with fairer-skinned Western heroes embodying virtue. The module extends this lens to Lewis's Narnia, critiquing the Calormen, a fictional empire of "cruel" people with "long beards" and "orange-coloured turbans," as orientalist caricatures that reinforce ethnic stereotypes. The goal? To "repopulate" the British literary canon by decolonising it, moving away from a supposedly white, Western-centric worldview.

But hold on, is this really about uncovering hidden biases, or is it a forced retrofit of modern identity politics onto works from a different era? Tolkien, a World War I veteran and philologist, drew from Norse mythology, Anglo-Saxon lore, and his Catholic faith, to craft Middle-earth as a mythic battle between good and evil, not a racial allegory. He explicitly rejected racism, once lambasting Nazi publishers for their Aryan purity nonsense by affirming his admiration for Jews. Orcs aren't stand-ins for any real-world ethnicity; they're corrupted elves symbolising industrial dehumanisation and moral decay, Tolkien's critique of modernity, not melanin. Similarly, Lewis's Calormen in The Horse and His Boy draws from Arabian Nights-inspired tales, but the story ultimately subverts stereotypes: Heroes like Shasta and Aravis bridge cultures, and the narrative condemns tyranny regardless of skin tone. Accusations of racism here often stem from cherry-picked elements, like the Dwarfs' use of "Darkie" in The Last Battle, ignoring Lewis's broader anti-prejudice messages.

Critics like Philip Pullman have long railed against Narnia as "racist" and "misogynistic" religious propaganda, but this Nottingham course takes it further by lumping it with LOTR in a decolonisation framework that also targets Shakespeare and Milton for "failing to reference Africans in England." This isn't scholarship; it's ideological activism. As one commentary puts it, these attacks arise from discomfort with the stories' Christian underpinnings, Aslan as Christ, redemption arcs, and unapologetic patriotism, like Tolkien's idyllic Shire or Lewis's love for traditional British folklore. In a twist of irony, the UK's Prevent program has even flagged these books as potential far-Right radicalisation risks, alongside classics like Beowulf and The Canterbury Tales, a move that's been widely mocked as absurd.

The real harm? This course risks turning students away from great literature by framing it through a lens of grievance. Instead of appreciating how Tolkien and Lewis used fantasy to explore universal themes, courage against despair, the corrupting influence of power, Nottingham's approach reduces them to "problematic" relics. Scholars like Helen Young have noted colonialist attitudes in Tolkien's work, but even they acknowledge it's more nuanced than outright racism. And let's not forget: Diverse fans worldwide, including people of colour, celebrate these stories without offense; witness the global appeal of Peter Jackson's films or Amazon's Rings of Power series, which faced its own backlash for "woke" casting.

Universities should foster critical thinking, not echo chambers. By "decolonising" these classics, Nottingham isn't empowering students, it's impoverishing their imaginations. If everything from hobbits to talking lions is racist, what's left? A sterile canon of approved narratives that prioritise ideology over artistry. Tolkien and Lewis offered "good art with good morals," not extremism. It's time academia remembered that.