Revere or Remove? The battle over statues, heritage and history panel discussion, Emmanuel Centre

Last year, Oxford university found itself in the midst of a bitter conflict concerning the statue of Cecil Rhodes outside Oriel College. Student activists of the Rhodes Must Fall campaign fought vociferously to have his statue removed, on the grounds that it symbolised oppression and colonialism: Rhodes was an active British imperialist and zealous advocate of white supremacy.

The issue of how to address controversial statues has sparked debate not only on our shores, but also particularly in America, where violent protests erupted in Charlottesville following a decision to take down a statue of a Confederate general of the Civil War. Countless institutions across the world have similarly been prompted to re-evaluate their buildings, statues, even endowments and scholarships, due to their association with problematic historical figures, complicit in atrocities such as the slave trade.

Activists argue that offensive statues serve to commemorate and glorify people who should be condemned. Those who defend these links to the past claim that to remove them would be to rewrite history, and also to isolate the actions of individuals from their historical context.

This May, Guardian columnist and author Jonathan Freedland is chairing a discussion on this topical issue – should we revere or remove those statues and monuments of individuals who by contemporary standards are morally indefensible?

He is to be joined by a panel including renowned historian Peter Frankopan, the writer Afua Hirsch, author and consultant on cultural policy Tiffany Jenkins, and award-winning historian David Olusoga. The event is hosted by Intelligence Squared, an organisation that hosts debates on current affairs, which is teaming up with Historic England especially for the panel discussion.

It will no doubt be a thought-provoking way to sift through some of the complex ideas associated with this delicate issue - and to hear first hand the opinions of distinguished historians and social commentators.