The Destruction of the "Ghetto"

"SAAC offers black students self identity," September 17, 1973

"SAAC offers black students self identity," September, 17, 1973

     In fall 1973, North Carolina State University’s student led organization, the Society of Afro-American Culture (SAAC), continued to thrive on campus, gaining membership slowly as the African American campus population grew, that is to say as university administrators began admitting more African American students in compliance with federal regulations. The “Ghetto,” SAAC’s central meeting place, offered students a space to present “lectures, poetry, skits, and plays that appeal[ed] to the black student.” In an interview with Touché, a campus magazine sponsored by Student Media, Don Bell, 1973-1974 president of SAAC, stated, “The name ‘Ghetto’ is symbolic. It serves to remind the black student of the real ghetto outside of college.” The Ghetto provided African American students a place to honor African American history and culture or to discuss personal and social challenges on campus. The Ghetto also provided counseling and support in an effort to increase the graduation rate of African American students. As demonstrated below, the campus counseling program became a source of conflict between African American students and university administrators later that year. Located in the King Religious Center on NC State’s north campus, the Ghetto quickly became threatened following the announcement that the building would soon be demolished to make room for a new Design School addition.

     The demolition of NC State’s Ghetto mirrored the changes many southern African American neighborhoods encountered during the 1950s and 1960s. According to historian W. Fitzhugh Brundage’s The Southern Past: A Clash of Race and Memory, “between 1957 and 1968, federally funded renewal projects destroyed more than 300,000 housing units as highway builders and downtown redevelopers joined in a national frenzy of urban clearance, in the name of eliminating ‘blighted’ areas…Urban renewal demonstrated white resolve to extend white control over urban spaces that whites previously had ceded to black control.” In the case of the Ghetto at NC State, white administrators exerted control over campus spaces and could decide whether to allocate a new space for African American students to gather on campus. Aware of the power of university administrators, African American students developed written proposals for a new center and approached administrators with a plan.

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The Destruction of the "Ghetto"