Browse Exhibits (28 total)
The Illusion of Inclusion: Is The Technician Racist? Debates About Multiculturalism and Post-Racialism 1991-1992
Introduction: Post-Racial Debates and the Establishment of the Nubian Message
On September 25, 1992, over 250 African-American students gathered in the Brickyard on Campus to burn copies of the student newspaper, the Technician, and call for more sensitive coverage of African-American issues on campus.[1] These students’ activism eventually led to the establishment of The Nubian Message, an independent African-American paper to address issues of racism and multiculturalism on campus. Yet what articles in the Technician aroused these students’ anger? What debates about race made so many African American students on campus feel they needed a separate media space to represent their voice?
This exhibit explores various opinion columns and articles that ran in the Technician in the two years leading up to the demonstration on campus. These articles shed light on a lively and contentious debate on campus about the meanings of race in a period considered by many to be “post-racial.” For many columnists writing in the early 1990s, the racial struggles of the Civil Rights Movement had already been consigned to distant memory. Racial equality was a foregone conclusion and any continued feelings of inequality reflected personal beliefs and not continued realities of indirect racism that kept African Americans in a subordinate economic, social, and political position.[2] Faced with increased hostility to special programming aimed specifically to advance African American civil rights on campus, African-American students responded in a myriad of ways that reflected deep divisions within the African-American student body about how to achieve true racial equality. Some students accepted the myth of “post-racialism,” while others tried to engage their detractors in a conversation about continued structures of racism that perpetuated a largely-invisible white privilege. These conversations in the student newspaper became more incendiary over time and led to active protests on campus in the fall of 1992. The protests finally led to Tony Williamson creating the Nubian Message as a safe media space.
The ultimate establishment of the Nubian Message reflected many of the difficulties of advancing civil rights in a supposedly post-racial context and highlights the vicious debates that characterized the “culture wars” of the 1990s. While the Nubian Message created a separate and safe space for African-American students to explore issues of their own identity, the establishment of the paper also curtailed the development of a real, if problematic, dialogue about race within the larger campus community in the pages of The Technician.
[1] Kevin G. Alexander, "Technician Burning Makes Wrong Point," The Technician vol. LXXIV no. 20 (September 28, 1992), 7.
[2] Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, “The Long Civil Rights Movement and the Political Uses of the Past,” The Journal of American History vol. 91 no. 4 (March 2005): 1237.
The Illusion of Inclusion: Lesson Plan
After the election of African American President Barack Obama in 2008, many commentators rejoiced that America had finally overcome its long history of racial discrimination. These commentators declared that America was now "post-racial" and that race was no longer a barrier to success.
But does race really no longer matter in American society? Has America actually become a "post-racial" society? These questions are important for understanding the state of race relations in the United States today and the outcome of historical developments in decades past. This lesson will use North Carolina State University's African American student newspaper, The Nubian Message, as a window into these important issues. Students will read articles from The Nubian Message, as well as secondary source literature, to determine for themselves if America has entered an era of "post-racial" relations.
The Illusion of Inclusion: The Nubian Message in the 1990s
Introduction:
“The Nubian Message has been created to represent the African American community at NCSU totally, truthfully, and faithfully.” So wrote Tony Williamson, the founding editor of NC State’s African American student newspaper, The Nubian Message, in the inaugural issue. Outraged at ongoing and controversial misrepresentations of African Americans in NC State’s main student newspaper, the Technician, Williamson and others organized The Nubian Message to provide African American students with a media voice. “We are not seeking superiority, nor segregation,” Williamson wrote. “[A]ll we want is an equal voice on this campus and with The Nubian Message, the door is open for us to have that voice.”[1]
Williamson and other students distributed the first issue of the paper on November 30, 1992. Because University administration refused to recognize the paper or allow student editors to use NC State media equipment, The Nubian Message staff partnered with North Carolina Central University, a historically African American college, to print the first issue. While NC State administrators permitted students to publish later issues using University equipment, The Nubian Message was not made an official member of the NC State Student Media Authority, through which it could gain funding and advisory support, until March 7, 1994.[2]
[2] “We’re Here to Stay,” The Nubian Message (Raleigh, NC), March 10, 1994; Special Collection Research Center, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC.
The Illusion of Inclusion: The Nubian Message in the New Millennium
This exhibit examines the changes in the content and activism of The Nubian Message between 1998 and 2002. Within this chronology, this study notes points of both convergence and divergence after the student government elections of April 2000, which produced monumental victories for the African American community at NC State. The inaguration of three black students, including a former "Opinions Editor" for The Nubian Message, as Student Body President, Treasurer, and President of the Student Senate marked an unpredented moment in the life of the African Americna community at NC State.
As a result,these events forced changes in the structure and content of The Nubian Message. Whereas previous editorials and coverage of campus events and student government emphasized the need for activism and involvement to ensure African Americans secured a powerful voice in student affairs at NC State. The gains of the 2000 election, however, forced The Nubian Message staff and many black students to reconsider both what constituted activism and what role the paper would take toward the new student government leadership. Moreover, in other areas the paper’s editorials increasingly moved away from advice and encouragement for African Americans in confronting persistent racial discrimination. As a result, the Message continued to take a critical view of perceptions of “post-racialism” in both the university and the United States. More broadly, the internal and external debates evident from the content of this paper raise a number of fundamental questions about race at the beginning of the twenty-first century. In what forms did racial discrimination persist during this period? To what extent did these manifestations of prejduce, along with the respective reponse of African Americans, indicate continuity with the civil rights era?
Under Review: Football and Collective Identity
This exhibit explores the relationship between college football and different notions of collective identity at North Carolina State College in the 1930s.
Under Review: Football and the Well-Rounded Citizen
This exhibit will focus on how the 1936 Anderson-Sermon football controversy shed light on the educational and character-building role that collegiate football and athletics were thought to play on college campuses.
Under Review: The Business of Football
This exhibit examines the 1936-1937 Anderson-Sermon controversy at North Carolina State College as representative of the growing commercialization of college football. Many of the issues associated with this controversy like recruiting, scholarships, and sponsorships for student players remain debated issues in today's college football programs.
Featured Exhibit
The Good Wife Diploma: Civic Contributions of State's Mates
Like many other women's organizations in 1960s America, State's Mates maintained a strong civic commitment, despite their characterization as a...