“Diversity” has been a buzzword for today’s higher education system. Most colleges & universities like to boast on the diversity of their student body. Also, with this comes lots of education and initiatives to create inclusive environments and reduce marginalization of any particular culture. These intiatives have included changes to songs, mascots, and have gone as far as changing names of buildings who are named after salient members of the schools’ history due to affiliations of that member. Recent examples include North Dakota State Fight Sioux mascot change and the University of Mississippi Rebels mascot change. Most recently, there has been discussion about changing the name of a residence hall at the University of Texas, Austin.
The University of North Dakota debated whether the mascot, Fighting Sioux, was racially insensitive to Native Americans in our country. Some believe that this mascot insinuates a sense of disrespect to the Native American culture. On the other hand, some believe that they are taking inclusivity too far because there is no controversy over mascots such as the Fighting Irish, Vikings, etc.
A similar controversy occurred in the South with the mascot, Colonel Reb, at the University of Mississippi who simulates a plantation owner/confederate soldier. Colonel Reb was forced into retirement in 2003, students were no longer allowed to chant the phrase “the South will rise again” after the school song. The crowd favorite, Dixie, was prohibited from play by the band.
In recent news, the University of Texas at Austin is dealing with a controversy over the name of a residence hall on campus. One of their residence halls is currently named after William Stewart Simkins, who taught at The University of Texas at Austin School of Law from 1899 until his death in 1929 but, who also was known for his ties to the Klu Klux Klan after the Civil War. This part of Simkins’ history was recently published in an article in Social Science Research Network by former UT Austin faculty member, Thomas Russell. In this article, Thomas Russell suggests that in 1954, the Faculty Council and the Board of Regents of Texas decided to name the residence hall after Simkins to snub Brown vs. Board of Education, thereby intimidating Blacks from attending and residing on campus. Since this publication, and to the credit of UT Austin, the university has been deliberant in making attempts to ensure inclusivity on campus.
Nevertheless, this country has to deal with the harsh sin of slavery. However, in the spirit of “inclusivity”, lots of debate is taking place around changes in our history, naming of buildings, mascots, and other things. One has to be able to realize how far colleges, universities, and scholars should go to right wrongs of this country’s history.
So, with that being said, “How Far Should Universities Go To Rewrite History In An Effort Of Being Inclusive?
Good post- A couple of thoughts Travis:
ReplyDelete1. History belongs to the victor or those in power, and for years it was written in a certain way- Just because it was written that way does not mean we need to honor that.
2. We should not make up history, but there is history worth noting now that has not been before. Rather than rename a building to something meaningless at UTexas, they could have taken the opportunity to provide some balance and name it after an African american, Latino, or native American who accomplished much, or even a white person who fought against racism and bigotry when it was dangerous. I think about this all the time now that I am living in the South and there are civil war memorials everywhere. I don't think we need to rip them all down because that would not serve us well, but we need to balance them out. Wars are not just about generals and military campaigns and the monuments should not be limited to them either.
-LCH