Race & Racism at the University of Richmond

Ring Dance: Gaining a New Perspective

Irina Rogova Uncategorized June 25, 2018June 21, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2018, Catherine Franceski

[For the first blog post of the Summer 2018 A&S Research Fellowship, students were tasked with exploring the existing collection of the Race & Racism at UR Project at memory.richmond.edu and reflecting on the materials they encountered there.]

by Catherine Franceski

Catherine Franceski is rising junior from Washington, D.C. majoring in Philosophy, Politics, Economics & Law (PPEL) with concentration in politics and minoring in Rhetoric & Communication Studies. She is the president of Phi Alpha Delta pre-law fraternity, and a member of the Westhampton College Honor Council. This is her second year working on the Race & Racism Project. Last summer, she focused on studying the lives and legacies of “hidden” black figures in Richmond, Virginia’s history.

When I came to the University of Richmond in the fall of 2016, I thought I knew the school very well. My mother had attended UR, my brother was a current student, and other family members had different connections to the school. I had grown up outside of D.C., coming to campus for reunions, family weekends, and other events. Although I knew a bit about the history of the school and the social culture of campus, I did not know anything about the history of the school’s interaction with the city of Richmond, the rocky road to integration, or the black student experience.

I worked on the Race & Racism Project last summer compiling hidden narratives about inspirational figures in the city of Richmond’s history and learning about the history of black students on campus. This included gaining a whole new insight into the isolation and exclusion black students have felt, and continue to feel, on campus. When I returned to school in the fall, I realized my work on the project last summer allowed be to become a more culturally competent and aware student, as well as a better ally for students of color on this campus.

The Distinction Between Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Richmond

Irina Rogova Uncategorized June 20, 2018June 19, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2018, Kristi Mukk

by Kristi Mukk

Kristi Mukk is a rising senior from Mililani, Hawaii. She is majoring in Rhetoric and Communications and minoring in English. She is a dancer and communications director for Ngoma African Dance Company. This is her first time working for the Race & Racism Project as a Summer Fellow, and she is excited to continue her work in the course Digital Memory & the Archive in Fall 2018.

When I first toured the campus before applying, I observed that the University of Richmond struggled with issues of diversity and inclusivity, and I found myself questioning how I would fit in. In being awed by the beautiful campus, it can be easy to overlook how predominantly white and affluent the student body is. I planned on declaring a business major, so when I came to visit campus, I explored the Robins School of Business and sat in on an economics class. I was immediately struck by the lack of students of color and faculty of color in comparison to other departments. During my two semesters as a Pre-Business freshman, I felt that the business school had an alienating atmosphere for students of color—the majority of students in my classes were a part of Greek life, had an affluent socioeconomic background, and already had connections in the business world. This is part of the reason that I decided to switch to liberal arts disciplines like English and Rhetoric and Communications where there are more diverse students and faculty. Not only is there more numerical diversity in these departments, but students and faculty make an effort to have conversations about race, equity, inclusivity, and justice. Furthermore, the diversity of the curriculum reflects an interest in a more inclusive history and beliefs and cultures outside of the Western world.

Multicultural Recruitment as a Gesture of Goodwill

Irina Rogova Uncategorized June 18, 2018June 12, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2018, Ayele d’Almeida

by Ayele d’Almeida

Ayele d’Almeida is a Political Science and Leadership double-major from Bloomington, Minnesota. Her work at Common Ground, the University of Richmond’s social justice initiative informed her decision to pursue the Race & Racism Project as a summer fellow. She hopes that through her fellowship and continued connection with the project, she will learn more about the University of Richmond. Ayele believes that the Race & Racism Project will also help later in life – as the project forces her to question institutions she may benefits from. She hoped to focus her research on black faculty and the presence of black students in white-dominated clubs and spaces.

My first introduction to the University of Richmond was in December of my Senior year – much later than the average applicant or attendee to the University. When I was accepted into the Richmond, I was flown out from Minnesota to visit campus through a multicultural accepted students program, entitled A Night To See and Experience Richmond (ANSWER). I would be on campus with a group of other multicultural-identified students and we would eventually transition into the larger accepted students’ day. It was during this first visit to campus that I learned that the University of Richmond is involved in an ongoing battle to recruit multicultural students. After one day of activities with other multicultural students, I was thrown into the larger admitted students day. I realized quickly that the number of multicultural students interested in and attending the University of Richmond was low. Although I was told multiple times about the rich, white, Southern reputation of the University, my expectations did not prepare me for the extent to which stereotypes were reinforced.

We Like What You Do, But Don’t Care Who UR

Irina Rogova Uncategorized June 13, 2018June 12, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2018, Jacob Roberson

by Jacob Roberson

Jacob Roberson is a rising senior on the varsity football team from Richmond, VA double majoring in psychology and sociology. He is a co-vice president of UR Mentoring Network, he is a part of the Dean’s Student Advisory Board, and during the 2017-2018 academic year he was an appointed student representative of the Presidential Advisory Committee for Sexual Violence Prevention and Response. Additionally, he has been inducted into numerous honor societies including Omicron Delta Kappa, Mortar Board, Alpha Kappa Delta, and Psi Chi. He joined the Race & Racism Project in the summer of 2018 as a part of Team Oral History and hopes to remain an active contributor and collaborator into and through the 2018-2019 school year.

I have been able to call Richmond, Virginia home for all 21 years of my life and fortunately have had little to no trouble navigating about it; be it directionally, socially, athletically, racially, etc. Growing up as a multi-sport athlete, division one sports were something I always had on my mind for when I graduated high school and it was time for me to go to college. During my senior year, the University of Richmond, despite its high cost of attending, emerged as a viable option for me to choose to play division one football and be a student athlete. Though the campus is only a mere 15 minutes away from my home, I had only ever been to the campus for a few basketball games in the Robins Center when I was young, and to the intramural fields for a few recreation lacrosse games during high school. I never realized that there were only 3000 undergraduates, I did not know how the coordinate college system of Richmond College and Westhampton College functioned to make the “University of Richmond,” and I certainly did not know that the first black students were not admitted to the main campus until 1968.

Lemon Project Symposium Presentation: George Modlin’s Segregated University of Richmond by Madeleine Jordan-Lord

Irina Rogova Uncategorized June 6, 2018June 4, 2018Digital Memory & the Archive, Lemon Project Symposium 2018, Madeleine Jordan-Lord

On March 16, 2018, five undergraduate students who have worked with the Race & Racism at the University of Richmond Project had the opportunity to present at the Lemon Project Symposium at the College of William and Mary. The panel, entitled “Seeing the Unseen and Telling the Untold: Institutions, Individuals, and Desegregating the University of Richmond,” was moderated by Dr. Nicole Maurantonio and featured Dominique Harrington, Madeleine Jordan-Lord, Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart, Jennifer Munnings, & Destiny Riley. Below you will find the text and slide images of Madeleine Jordan-Lord’s presentation, focusing on the research she conducted while taking “Digital Memory & the Archive in the fall of 2016.” Click here to explore the exhibit she and her teammates created, “George Modlin’s Segregated University of Richmond.”

Madeleine Jordan-Lord is a 2018 gradaute who majored in American Studies and History at the University of Richmond. She has worked on digital history projects, including the Race & Racism at the University of Richmond Project, as well as the Abbitt Papers special collection at Boatwright Memorial Library. Over the course of her time at UR, Madeleine has held internships at several non-profits–Art180, Virginia Historical Society, and Tricycle Gardens–creating public curriculum and education-based workshops.

Lemon Project Symposium Presentation: The Black Student Experience at UR (1970-1992) by Jennifer Munnings

Irina Rogova Uncategorized May 30, 2018May 29, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2017, Jennifer Munnings, Lemon Project Symposium 2018

On March 16, 2018, five undergraduate students who have worked with the Race & Racism at the University of Richmond Project had the opportunity to present at the Lemon Project Symposium at the College of William and Mary. The panel, entitled “Seeing the Unseen and Telling the Untold: Institutions, Individuals, and Desegregating the University of Richmond,” was moderated by Dr. Nicole Maurantonio and featured Dominique Harrington, Madeleine Jordan-Lord, Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart, Jennifer Munnings, & Destiny Riley. Below you will find the text and slide images of Jennifer Munnings’s presentation, focusing on the research she conducted as a 2017 A&S Summer Research Fellow with the project. Click here to read more of her writing from last summer, and here to explore the exhibit she and her teammates created, “The Black Student Experience at UR (1970-1992).”

Jennifer Munnings is a rising junior at the University of Richmond double majoring in Sociology and Political Science with a minor in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She is from Nassau, Bahamas, and attended high school in New York. She was a research fellow during the Summer of 2017 for the University of Richmond Race & Racism Project where she created metadata for archival materials, wrote blog posts for the project, and collected oral histories and stories at the unveiling of the Maggie Lena Walker statue.

Lemon Project Symposium Presentation: Faculty Response to Institutional Change by Dominique Harrington

Irina Rogova Uncategorized May 23, 2018May 22, 2018A&S Summer Fellows 2017, Dominique Harrington, Lemon Project Symposium 2018

Photograph courtesy of The Lemon Project at the College of William & Mary.

On March 16, 2018, five undergraduate students who have worked with the Race & Racism at the University of Richmond Project had the opportunity to present at the Lemon Project Symposium at the College of William and Mary. The panel, entitled “Seeing the Unseen and Telling the Untold: Institutions, Individuals, and Desegregating the University of Richmond,” was moderated by Dr. Nicole Maurantonio and featured Dominique Harrington, Madeleine Jordan-Lord, Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart, Jennifer Munnings, & Destiny Riley. Below you will find the text and slide images of Dominique Harrington’s presentation, focusing on the research she conducted as a 2017 A&S Summer Research Fellow with the project. Click here to read more of her writing from last summer, and here to explore her exhibit “Faculty Response to Institutional and National Change (1968-1973).”

Dominique “Dom” Harrington is a rising senior from Indianapolis, IN majoring in American Studies and minoring in Psychology and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She is a part of the Dean’s Student Advisory Board, Students Creating Opportunities, Pride, and Equality (SCOPE), and she is both an Oldham and Oliver Hill Scholar. She has worked on the Race & Racism Project for two years and looks forward to continuing to work for the project during her final year at the University. Last summer, she completed a digital exhibit on faculty response to institutional and national changes from 1968-1973.
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This Week in the Archive: Black Students’ Recruitment Beyond Athletics

Irina Rogova Uncategorized April 11, 2018March 21, 2018Digital Memory & the Archive, Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart, This Week in the Archive

by Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart

Elizabeth Mejía-Ricart is from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. She is a sophomore at the University of Richmond who is double-majoring in Economics and Mathematics. Elizabeth is a Boatwright and Oliver Hill Scholar, who tutors at the Academic Skill Center. She has been involved with the Race and Racism Project since the summer of 2017, as an A&S Summer Fellow. She is excited to discover more about the University of Richmond’s past as she believes it is linked to the city of Richmond’s interesting history. This post was written as a part of Digital Memory & the Archive, a course offered in Fall 2017.

In Alley’s University of Richmond, the author emphasizes the institution’s first integration of black students to the main campus by mentioning the admission of Barry Greene in 1968. (p. 98) However, I want to dig deeper into the effect and success of the integration of black people at the university, especially black women. In an article of the Collegian from September, 1971, Thomas N. Pollard Jr., Director of Admissions of Richmond College at the time reported that “definite but slow” progress was being made in the recruitment of blacks to the University of Richmond. (Tatum, 1971, p. 4) Linda Tatum, the author of the article reported the opinion of multiple black students at the time, and two main concerns arise: the lack of social life for black students and the disproportional amount of black women living on campus. Immediately after reading this article I start wondering: Why does it take longer to integrate black females than black males?

On December 7, 1978, multiple articles in the Collegian guided me to the answer to this question. The first one, titled “Recruiting Troubles Cited by Students” reported that “recruitment of blacks at the University of Richmond is concentrated in the athletic department”. The article emphasizes that a majority of black males were attracted to the university by the athletic scholarship programs; otherwise, they would not be able to afford it. Indeed, this lack of effort in recruiting black students outside of athletics was one of the main reasons why out of 45 black undergraduates at the time, only six were women. The financial burden as a cause for this imbalance is further emphasized by Valerie Collins, a black junior enrolled at the time. She states that “most of the black females are from middle-class families, who have grown up around predominately white neighborhoods”. She admitted growing up in an all-white neighborhood, as her father was a Baptist minister.

This Week in the Archive: The Necessity of the “Dixie Resolution” at UR

Irina Rogova Uncategorized April 4, 2018March 21, 2018Anna Lowenthal, Digital Memory & the Archive, This Week in the Archive

by Anna Lowenthal

Anna Lowenthal is a junior from Larchmont, New York, double majoring in Political Science and Rhetoric and Communication Studies. The most interesting part of the project to her has been the process of making connections between past and present and learning more about the history of the University. This post was written as a part of Digital Memory & the Archive, a course offered in Fall 2017.

“Collegian Forum: The Dixie Resolution” written for The Collegian at the University of Richmond on November 5th, 1971 gives a direct insight into campus culture as the University of Richmond slowly became a more tolerant and inclusive place. While it may be hard to grasp what the campus rhetoric was by reading most articles or looking at pictures, this direct letter from a member of the Student Government Association (SGA)–Gaston Williams–provides a unique perspective. The fact that this is a letter stuck out to me because it is someone’s thoughts unedited; I can get an honest idea of how some people on campus felt.

This Week in the Archive: UR’s Slow Implementation of Title IX

Irina Rogova Uncategorized March 28, 2018March 21, 2018Digital Memory & the Archive, Kirsten Avila, This Week in the Archive

by Kirsten Avila

Kirsten Avila is a senior from Malibu, California, majoring in Interdisciplinary Studies: Business of Media, Culture, and Communication, with a minor in History. The most interesting part of the project for her has been learning about the University’s reluctance to comply with Title IX and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This post was written as a part of Digital Memory & the Archive, a course offered in Fall 2017.

The Collegian article titled “Title IX is Slow Moving,” published on February 16, 1978, discusses the implementation of the Title IX law passed by Congress in 1972. Title IX states that no one should be excluded on the basis of sex in the participation, benefits, or subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving financial assistance. The passing of Title IX was extremely vital to the progress of gender equality because it granted women equal opportunity for scholarship and sports as men. The Collegian article goes through and assess the University of Richmond’s slow progress in fully implementing Title IX across all women’s sports. The Collegian interviews Assistant Athletic Director, Carol Reese, who claimed that there had been progress since the University now provided women practice uniforms and shoes. Additionally, Reese argued that the reason why the University of Richmond was behind other school is due to the lack of funding: “It takes money to build a competitive program.” Carol Reese and the article concludes that the reasoning behind the University’s slow progress in executing Title IX was the lack of funding.