Alienation Reinforces Segregation

Hannah Tucker never thought twice about diversity at the University of Georgia.

“I thought it was 50 percent black and 50 percent white because that’s what’s fair,” Tucker, a sophomore at UGA, said.

Her freshman year, Tucker roomed with Danielle Cannady, 20, a black sophomore at UGA.

“There is a strong black presence, so people assume we’re even, but it’s only 8% black,” Cannady said.

Cannaday, now a Resident Assistant at Mell Hall, has 48 residents—none of which are black.

Out of all the residents in Mell Hall, there are only 9 black residents.

Because there are so few black students on campus, all black people speak to each other.

“Black people definitely seek each other out on campus,” Cannady said. “It’s a courtesy to acknowledge each other.”

Cannady and Tucker grew close during their freshman year, and Tucker frequently ate in the dining halls with Cannady and her black friends.

“The dining halls are very segregated,” Tucker said. “I got stares in the dining hall and on my floor in Brumby for being with my black friends.”

Tucker said that all the dining halls are segregated and not just into black and white.

“The Asians stick together,” she said.

But it's a different story for black athletes, who are frequently seen dining with their teams, both black and white members.

“If a black athlete was with a group of black people, it's because those were his friends,” Tucker said. “Black athletes have a bond with their whole team because it's not about color, it's about the team and their schedule.”

For the black non-athletes, it's harder to make the adjustment to being around white people.

Cannady immediately felt a sense of isolation during her orientation at UGA.

She came to UGA with the mindset that she would make a lot of friends, but by the end of her first day of orientation, the only friend she made was another black girl.

“You don't know them from Adam and Eve, but they're black, you're black, you've got to be going through the same thing,” Cannady said.

Cannady, now best friends with Tucker, doesn't worry about diversity in her life.

“I hang out with diverse people, but I hang out with black people and do black things, too.”

Story 2

For two hours in the Hatton Lovejoy Courtroom, it was once again January 6, 1961 and Charlayne Hunter and Hamilton Holmes were once again fighting for admission into the University of Georgia.

On February 25, the Davenport-Benham Black Law Students Association and the UGA school of aw performed a reenactment of the fateful trial that eventually lead to the admission of UGA’s first black students; Hunter and Holmes.

After the fictitious Judge Bootle, played by Ronald L. Carlson (Fuller E. Callaway Chair of Law Emeritus), welcomed the audience to the year 1961 with some historical background, the “trial” began.

The actors were accurately dressed in 60s garb and performed their roles quite well, considering all of the participants were law students.

There was a general shudder amongst the spectators when the word “negro” made its first appearance in the dialogue, but after that, the rest of the “trial” carried on smoothly.

All of the members involved in the reenactment have been working on this project for quite a while. “We came up with the idea for the event last semester and it’s kind of been rolling from fall until now,” said Sherida Jones, who portrayed Hunter in the “trial.”

They somehow managed to cram the original trial, which was four and a half days long, into just under an hour.

“To do it with the punch and conciseness that we did, we had to take a lot of the testimony out,” said Carlson. “This is the first time that anyone has gone to the original trial records in the case and extracted testimony.”

When the trial reenactment concluded, there was panel discussion featuring some distinguished UGA graduates, a reporter from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Horace T. Ward. Ward was denied from UGA’s law school in 1950 and played a crucial role in the university’s desegregation.

Ward reflected on his memories from the trial and said that the whole process was “very tense.”

In 1961, after the actual trial was over, the judge ordered that both students be admitted right at that instant. Ward said that “I was a little afraid for Charlayne Hunter and Hamilton Holmes to come down here so quickly.”

Other various members of the panel also offered recollections of their past involving desegregation and discussed about the racial issues that are still going on today.

The general consensus of the discussions as well as the event itself can best be summed up with a quite from Ward. “Things are looking up, but there is still a lot to be done.”

Perspective affects progression

Legal desegregation took place on campus at the University of Georgia fifty years ago but that doesn’t mean all the race issues are resolved and everyone is treated equally.

The world is “still very prejudiced, [some] don’t want to be associated with black people and its not uncommon,” Dr. Elwood Beck said. “It’s the public display of racism which was widely accepted is now not widely accepted. Now what you have is much more private.”

Beck is a sociology professor at the University of Georgia and has studied race relations for many years for his Sociology of the South class.

“The University of Georgia at that period was, not only was it segregated, but it had a different philosophy of how to relate to students,” Beck said. “It was a time of parentis, the idea and notion was that when your parents dropped you off here the university became your parent so they told you where you could go, when you had to be in your dorm, what you could do and a variety of things that if applied to you today you would just find totally and completely unacceptable. “

Beck describes how society has transformed from legal segregation to self-segregation.

“Now you are choosing to be with people that you are comfortable with,” Beck said. “That is not the same as being told you cannot go into a place.”

He said that the first is empowering because people have the choice to sit with people they know they like. This in itself shows a big shift in society.

Since Beck lived through the time of segregation, he sees the difference in society now.

“I’m still amazed. The other day I was walking across on campus and a black guy and a white girl were walking. They were just talking, they weren’t holding hands, they were just talking and God knows what they were talking about,” Beck said. “But what struck me was, my God, fifty years ago he would have been killed. I mean literally he would have been killed.”

Sara Lorusso, 63, was a student at UGA from 1966-1970. She describes her experiences growing up as positive in regards to race relations because she was sheltered from most of the harassment and racism.

Lorusso remembers ‘colored folks’ moving out of her way when she walked down the sidewalk in her hometown.

She also recalls seeing separate water fountains and bathrooms but it never phased her because its what she thought that’s the way it was supposed to be.

However, as Lorusso got older, she realized that wasn’t true.

“I heard a lot of terrible things about Martin Luther King, Jr. and people who worked with him as they slowly began to work through the south and create the momentum for the Civil Rights Movement,” Lorusso said. “But I can tell you that I personally never had a bad experience through all that. I heard people say bad things; I still hear people say bad things.”

“We were on the progressive side of the [Civil Rights Movement] and I saw it from that angle more than from the negative angle,” Lorusso said. “So it was a very interesting experience, very eye-opening and I feel very grateful to have lived through it. And I think I have a greater appreciation for race relations than those who did not live through it.”

She said she saw the people who were in the movement as ‘patriots’ and thinks they made a real difference in this country and what its like now.

However, Lorusso also said that there are still a lot of problems in this country and that it’s still segregated in many ways.

“Maybe more economically than racially but it kind of works out to be the same thing,” Lorusso said. “So I still think we have a long way to go to being a color-blind society.”

Both Beck and Lorusso agree that the face of the University is changing because the students did not experience a truly segregated society.

“My generation remembers what segregation was like, both if you’re black or if you’re white, if you grew up in the south, you knew what segregation was like and can see the change,” Beck said. “For [the new] generation, its part of what they’ve always accepted so there are very little changes that they’ve observed in their lifetime. But yet there’s a monumental change that’s happening in southern society.”

Come Together.

Segregation kept blacks and whites apart.

Desegregation drove Doc Eldridge and Michael Thurmond together.

Following a screening of the Peabody award-winning film “The Search for Quality Education: Busing,” the pair shared their story:

Both Eldridge and Thurmond had been student council presidents until the dawn of desegregation re-drew the map and brought whites and blacks together.

The pair weren’t thrown together by their differences, however, but their similarities — and in time became good friends.

Now the former mayor of Athens and former state Labor Commissioner, respectively, Eldridge and Thurmond have gone on to influence far larger stages than that of the Classic City, but their story remains vital.

“We originally thought we would try and find some people that were featured in the documentary, but that proved to be a little more of a challenge,” said Diane H. Murray, Director of Public Service and Alumni Outreach at the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication which is coordinating the event in celebration of the 50^th anniversary of the desegregation of the university.

“We thought it was a natural fit,” Murray said, referring to the film’s place both in the list of commemorative events and in the university’s extensive archive of Peabody-winning work, overseen by professor and awards director Horace Newcomb.

So Grady reached out to Eldridge and Thurmond.

“They’re both very interesting on their own,” Murray said, “and the two of them together talking about their experiences, we [thought], [would] be very interesting.”

The answer was immediate.

“It was an easy ask,” Murray said. 

They were happy to appear and connect with an audience — an important part of the screening and discussion.

“We’ve been really pleased with how the audience has engaged,” Murray said.

Some of the positive reaction may be due, in part, to the documentary’s regional feel: one segment features Athens specifically, with comments from William Tate and Charles McDaniel, among others.

Of course, that was always the hope.

“We chose this documentary, in part, because it features Athens,” Murray said. 

However there is more than one part to the issue and side to the struggle.

Although “Busing” was made in 1972, almost 40 years ago, its problems remain a very real part of the landscape of today, Murray said.

“What we’re hoping I people will see how far we’ve come,” she said, “and that we still have a ways to go.”

Story 2 very rough draft

Each undergraduate class at the University of Georgia is over 70 percent White with only less than 10 percent Black/African American. The data from the UGA Factbook presents alarming numbers surrounding the issue of diversity at UGA.

Under the chapter Characteristics of Enrolled Students by Class Fall 2010, anyone can access the data regarding ethnic origin in the UGA Factbook. For Fall 2010, there were 25,947 undergraduate students enrolled, 20,041 of which identified themselves as White.

The freshman, sophomore, junior and senior classes all have a similar statistical break down for each ethnic origin, and no once class shows numbers not comparable to the others. All of them have the least amount of American Indians and Pacific Islanders and are made up of mostly White students.

Each class also has more Asians than Black students. While the numbers are low for both categories, for the total undergraduate students, there are 249 more Asian students than Black students.

“It is important to just take the numbers for what they are,” said Charles Mathies, a research analyst for the Office of Institutional Research.

With all the percentages presented so similarly, it makes one question exactly what role does ethnicity play in the admissions process for the university?

When students identify their ethnic origin upon arriving at UGA, they have seven options to choose from: American Indian, Asian, Black/African American, Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic, Multiracial, and White. If a student does not wish to choose one of the seven options provided, they can choose to be “Not Reported.” The Not Reported students throw a slight wrench in the analysis of the data.

All the data is reported by the University of Georgia Office of Institutional Research. According to their mission statement, the OIR office is responsible for collecting, organizing, and analyzing data to support institutional management, operations and decision-making. The Factbook is a compilation of much of this data.

Story Two

History of Black Professors

Historically the University of Georgia has been known as a predominantly white school in both their faculty and students.

Seven years after the desegregation of UGA, Richard Graham became the first full-time African-American faculty member. He began his career at UGA as a visiting professor at the School of Music and after a year became part of the faculty. He later became director of the school in 1994.

In 1980, the Black Faculty and Staff Organization was formed to create a positive environment for minority students. The idea of the organization was to help students appreciate African-American History while giving them an environment to grow in their culture.

“Considering history and the civil rights movement during that time period it’s amazing that he was hired in the 1960’s at all, especially in such a conservative state like Georgia,” states Danielle Davison a black UGA sophomore.

Black faculty have an important role in recruiting and encouraging minority students. According to the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education (JBHE) Research Department, only five flagship state universities out of the nations 50 have more than 100 black faculty members. UGA can be found with 167 black faculty in 2006.

Although UGA is in the top five for black faculty the ratio of percent of black state population to percentage of black faculty is .20 and the percentage of black faculty was 5.6%.

“Nope, I have never had a black professor,” Davison states about her time here at UGA.

UGA has made significant accomplishments with in segregation, but diversity among professors can still be improved. Not only would it benefit minority students but it would give other students a positive opportunity to experience diversity.

Black Student Organizations Helping with Desegregation Events

This year's desegregation events came together in an amazing display of history and culture, but not without help from local outreach groups. In the celebration of desegregation at the University of Georgia, many student organizations came together to sponsor events and programs on campus.

The Black Affairs Council
Formally known as the Black Student Union, the Black Affairs Council aims to encourage black students to create programs and to reach out on the UGA campus. With 140 members, the Black Affairs council calls themselves the “socio-cultural educational arm of the African American community” at UGA.
The Black Affairs Council has many objectives as a large student organization. First, the council aims to supplement widespread understanding of the black culture and to support the ideas of the Multicultural Services and Programs at UGA. The council also promotes the leadership of black students and encourages their attendance at national workshops and conventions. Also, the BAC aims to expand the perspective of black students and highlight their skills and talents while they are UGA students.
The BAC is comprised of different committees, including the Freshman Advisory Board and the Political Action Committee.
Throughout the year, the BAC holds several events for current and prospective members. This year the Unity Ball, as part of the 50th Anniversary of Desegregation at UGA events, was sponsored by the BAC. The Unity Ball was held on Jan. 22, 2011 for people of all races to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream of unity.
The BAC meets every other Wednesday at the Miller Learning Center room 248 at 5:15 p.m.


Abeneefoo Kuo Honor Society
The Abeneefoo Kuo Honor Society is a multicultural group devoted to “scholarship, leadership, and service” on the UGA campus and surrounding areas. Founded in 1977, the ABK is devoted to the pursuit of greatness in all areas and they provide “educational, career, and personal assistance to members of ABK and others.”
In Swahili, Abeneefoo Kuo means “circle of honor.” The ABK upholds their values by working with the Athens Area Homeless Shelter, W. R. Coile Middle School and the Northeast Georgia Food Bank.
On Feb. 5th, ABK held their 2011 member induction as part of the events of desegregation. Members participated in rituals and ceremonies as part of their induction into the honor society.
ABK also holds an annual spelling bee called “Play on Words” in which other multicultural organizations participate.

UGA Black Theatrical Ensemble
The UGA Black Theatrical Ensemble is a campus organization for students who are interested in drama. The BTE gives students an outlet for their talents and aims to introduce members of the audience to aspects of African American theater.
The BTE is open to all students regardless of theatrical background or previous experience. They also provide members with opportunities to work in production, costumes, design, managing and community service.
The desegregation event, “Supernatural Courage: Love, Passion, Sacrifice” was held on the night of Feb. 17th, 2011. At the event, members of the BTE celebrated courage through the art of performance.

Thanks to many multicultural student groups, the 50th anniversary of desegregation celebration events have been educational and influential experiences for many UGA students.

Story 2

The Queen of Campus

   When Charlayne Hunter-Gault was in the sixth grade, she won a school contest. Her prize was a diamond tiara, which she insisted on wearing at all times.

   By age eighteen, the physical tiara was gone, but the mindset of a queen remained. When she and Hamilton Holmes walked onto the University of Georgia’s campus on January 9, 1961, they were met by a sea of students hurling racial epithets as they passed. But for Hunter-Gault, the insults fell on deaf ears. As far as she was concerned, she was a queen, and they couldn’t possibly be talking about her.

   On March 22, Hunter-Gault spoke with a panel of students about the experiences highlighted in her autobiography, “In My Place.” With the help of moderator Dean Cully Clark, Hunter-Gault illustrated how her first seventeen years poised her to desegregate a staunchly segregated university.

   The adults that influenced Hunter-Gault and her classmates had lived under segregation their entire lives. At the first rumblings of desegregation, black families prepared their children for the trials they would face in the future. “Most black families I knew imbued their children with a sense of self that wouldn’t be denied by society,” said Hunter-Gault. “Society might deny it with artificial means, but it was critical to all of them that they teach us to be somebody.”

   Students of segregated elementary, middle and high schools never had access to the newest school supplies. In fact, by the time their “hand me down” textbooks reached their desks, many of the pages were missing. But they knew better than to complain. “Nobody ever cried about that, or made a big deal about it,” said Hunter-Gault. “They knew the pages were missing and they kept on.”

   Outside of school, families also used the church to prepare their children for the future, giving them leadership positions as missionaries or in Sunday school. They were determined to teach their children that they deserved the same respect that white children enjoyed. “Maybe it was primal memory, but they instinctively gave us first class citizenship,” said Hunter-Gault. “Even when I don’t win, I have enough of a suit of armor to pick myself up again.”

   Armed with her tiara and the ability to pick herself up again, Hunter-Gault used her goal of becoming a journalist to distract herself from the constant reminders- like slashed tires and egregious messages etched into her car- that she was not welcome on campus. But for Hunter-Gault, learning how to protect herself against racial advances in college proved just as useful as learning how to write a story.

      While covering apartheid in South Africa, she hosted a dinner for South African political leaders who told her that they were open to black South Africans obtaining the right to vote, as long as they were “brought to the standard” of white people. Hunter-Gault chose not to react, choosing instead to listen to their opinions in the interest of her story. “You may be sitting beside somebody whose absolute guts you’re beginning to hate because of the hate that’s coming out of their mouths,” she said. “And you ask them to tell you more.”

   As the audience of journalism students listened, Hunter-Gault discussed the interview technique that fueled her abundantly successful career. “I have always tried to approach people as if they were people and not news stories,” she said. “And that’s taken me a long way.”

   When she interviewed Nelson Mandela, she insisted that he have time for a cup of tea to ensure that he was relaxed before the interview. Once they started talking, she formed a connection with him by sharing her involvement in the American civil rights movement. When he asked if she knew Maya Angelou, she knew she was “home free.”
   She even found a connection with Muammar el-Qaddafi when she discovered that they had the same birthday.

   As she shared her experiences, she also connected with students in the audience.

   “I’ve been through a lot in my life, and I expected to pick up the book and personally identify with it,” said senior Marah Lidey. “But it was so inspiring to see the positive attitude with which she described things. She rarely focused on the negatives.”

   For senior Price McKeon, the connection came from Hunter-Gault’s discussion of her passion for journalism. “I have that passion I’ve had for journalism since before even middle school, and it was so great to hear about someone focusing so much on journalism rather than the differences and the troubles of what she faced,” she said. “It was really inspiring. It made me want to get up and do something.”

   Hunter-Gault’s dedication to journalism guided her through her undergraduate years, and it might have even saved her sense of bulldog pride.

   “I think that developed over time,” she said. “The way the university worked to try to reconcile the past I thought was an important thing that they did. And also to see the kids who are here being so enthusiastic and having such a positive time helped me to become a good dawg.”

   Like any good “dawg,” when she saw a young black couple sporting “Go Dawgs” T-shirts in the Johannesburg airport, she yelled “Go Dawgs” for the entire airport to hear. The couple smiled in return, bulldog to bulldog. No tiara necessary.

Glory Bound

         Dark figures dart across an open field under the brightly lit night sky. The melody of  “cricket, cricket,” combined with the croaking of bullfrogs sets the pace for these runaway slaves. Tonight they run to the next safe house - a white farmers family housing any and all slaves that are glory bound.

            A cloud of young voices suddenly rushes into your ears and brings you back to reality- it’s the 22^nd of February in the year 2011, at the University of Georgia, in Athens, Ga. and you’re in the Reed Hall. You aren’t in the bayou of Louisiana watching runaway slaves head towards “safety.” You are participating in a Desegregation event on UGA’s campus that aims to educate students about the difficulties and achievements of minorities in the past, especially linked with the Underground Railroad.

            The vivid imagery you just experienced was a re-creation of the Underground Railroad made possible by the UGA Reed Community and Reed Community Council. They welcomed students into Reed Hall, and led them on a journey through rooms, each encompassing a certain aspect of the Underground Railroad.

            The first stop, a dark and dreary study room, served as the basement of a farmer’s safe house. The runaway slaves (Glory Bound participants) where given a bag of food by the farmer and his wife, expected to last for days. The bag consisted of one roll, a handful of trail mix and a piece of beef jerky.

            Just as participants were getting into the notion of sneaking around for their livelihood, they were led through the halls into another multi-purpose room - this time a story and quilt reading session to point slaves toward the drinking gourd.  The gourd (a constallation in the sky) meant glory and freedom, so the older women taught the participants how to follow its signs. Slaves use to create quilts with certain patterns, encoded with directions to safe houses, and ultimately to freedom.

            Participants continued their journey onward to the next safe house, but had to walk outside to do so. They were startled and then chased by two frustrated farmers. Luckily, everyone was able to get away and arrived at the next stop, where participants where encouraged by Harriet Tubman’s remarkable speech.

            Next they moved to the final stop where they were sung to as congratulations for making it to freedom. The entire time, students where exposed to thoughts and experiences similar to what run-away slaves might have experienced.

            Glory Bound was created as a way for students to interact with the history of the Underground Railroad. The journey through Reed Hall was a small way to create an environment in which students could really sense what it was like to be a part of the Underground Railroad.

            Reed Community Residence Assistant and Glory Bound actor Nathan Nerswick said, “It helped me realize the tremendous achievement people overcame to be free.” Nerswick believes Glory Bound is an innovative and interactive way to help educate individuals about why the Underground Railroad and its participants were important.

            The University of Georgia is celebrating the 50^th Anniversary of Desegregation in many ways. Glory Bound certainly contributed to the celebration of freedom and change in numerous ways.