Whiteness as Collective Memory in Student Publications at Midwestern Liberal Arts Colleges, 1945–1965

Abstract

In this study, I investigated how student publications portrayed whiteness as the dominant feature of the campus environment between 1945 and 1965 among the member institutions of a consortium of elite U.S. Midwestern liberal arts colleges located in rural and industrial towns across Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and western Pennsylvania. These colleges’ yearbooks and student newspapers informed this analysis of whiteness as property. Through these findings, I demonstrate the ways in which White student publications recorded whiteness as property, entitling White students to the use and enjoyment of their college years. The invisibility of Black students’ structural exclusion rendered whiteness unmarked and offers a new model for understanding and analyzing desegregation and integration in historically White institutions.

Out of Site, Out of Mind: The Evolving Significance of Race in the Story of an Early Quaker-Freedmen School

“…There are four attributes of Whiteness as property identified by Harris (1993): (a) disposition, (b) use and enjoyment, (c) reputation and status, and (d) right to exclusion. These attributes are supported by recent applications of Whiteness as property in education research (Hughes et al, 2016; Stewart, 2019; Thompson Dorsey & Venzant Chambers, 2014). For the purposes of this study, we rely on Whiteness as property to understand the trajectory of the Quaker-Freedmen School, including how the school has been remembered and disremembered within and across communities and time.…”

“…In keeping with Stewart’s (2019) AERJ application of CRT to historical theory and analysis, we applied Whiteness as property (Harris, 1993) to interpret data from our historical project. There are four attributes of Whiteness as property identified by Harris (1993): (a) disposition, (b) use and enjoyment, (c) reputation and status, and (d) right to exclusion.…”

Race and historiography: Advancing a critical-realist approach.

“…Black students, faculty, and staff were systemically denied access because Blackness had been defined as inferior and they were then categorized as Black. However, that production of Blackness does not wholly explain the social isolation and segregation that has been documented by scholars over time (Clotfelter, 2004;Evans, 2007;Stewart, 2015;Stewart, in press;Waite, 2001;Zimbardo, 1966). To narrate the experiences of Black collegians historically requires an analysis of how Black students understood the role of their racial identityits epistemic saliencein these predominantly White GLCA colleges, as well as how categories of class also moderated their experiences and the meaning they made of them (Stewart, in press).…”

Engaging with the other

“…The increasing presence of Black students on historically White campuses is an indirect result of segregation. Southern state governments developed scholarships to send Black students to pursue degrees in Northern cities (Stewart, 2018;Thelin, 2011). Although these campuses admitted Black students, they were not fully included, especially in the social aspects of college life.…”

“…Black students who opted to be pioneers in the desegregation of higher education often endured isolation, shunning, and sabotage. Black students experienced exclusion from participating in sports teams, performing in dramatic productions, living in the residence halls, and eating in the dining facilities (Stewart, 2018;Thelin, 2011).…”