"Beginning at 8:30 am this morning Providence College students who have been organizing against anti-blackness and racism on their campus began to occupy the Office of the President. Student organizers issued a list of comprehensive Demands for Redress (click here to read Demands for Redress) based on evidence-based practices and systemic solutions for an inclusive campus in December of 2015 that the President will not agree to, said Mary-Murphy Walsh '16 speaking with The Board of Representatives from Women Empowered, Society Organized Against Racism, Brotherhood, PC NAACP, and the Faculty Coalition Against Racism.
"[This is] following three semesters of unproductive dialogue filled with political rhetoric and with complacency from the President and his administration. Additionally, Shanley has not responded to any e-mails requesting to meet one-on-one with student activists. On-campus protests have led to increasing racial tensions, including hostile agitators harassing student protestors this weekend, " said Murphy. "Student protesters say they will occupy the Office of the President and remain there until Shanley signs An Agreement of Commitment to the Demands for Redress. Three of the students are participating in a hunger strike."
Murphy added, "The students were told when they entered the office that President Shanley was not on campus. At 9:30 a.m. the President was seen in the hallway outside his office in Harkins Hall 218 but he refused to make eye contact with the student."
See PC's reponse below the video.
PC Associate Vice President of Public Affairs Steve Maurano issued the following statement Tuesday afternoon.
Race relations and racism are daily topics of discussion throughout much of America, and certainly on the nation’s college and university campuses. PC is no exception as colleges and universities are microcosms of society. We expect those discussions to take place here and we welcome the opportunity for dialogue.
This morning, about 40-50 students occupied the reception area of the President’s Office, insisting that they will not leave until the President agreed to their list of demands and the specific steps of how they are to be achieved.
A number of the student demands address issues of curriculum, training, hiring practices, facilities and resources. While some of these demands can be addressed more readily, others – such as changing the curriculum – require significant discussion and dialogue among and between a number of constituencies and cannot be achieved today.
Last week, Fr. Shanley held an open forum on diversity and inclusion for the entire campus community. Approximately 250 faculty, staff and students attended. The discussion was respectful and constructive. Our plan is to take some of the things we learned from that discussion and try to incorporate them into an action plan going forward.
Related Slideshow: Legacy of Racism in New England
Institutions around the country are currently addressing whether to acknowledge -- or not -- individuals whose past racist views are now being subject to present political pressure, whether it's Woodrow Wilson Hall at Princeton University, renaming Byrd Stadium at the University of Maryland, to renaming Jefferson-Davis Highway in Virginia.
In New England, a number of once prominent figures in the region's history are causing members of the community to revisit how a racist history plays a part in having a role in today's society.
The legacy of the former owner of the Boston Red Sox, who passed away in 1976, is currently in the media glare for his views and actions while head of the club.
Wrote Walker, “All this history raises an uncomfortable, current-day question. Why on earth does Boston have a street called Yawkey Way? Or a Yawkey MBTA station? At a time when activists, especially on college campuses, are clamoring for renaming monuments to racist history, it’s long past time for Boston to think long and hard about the official Yawkey legacy. That the Red Sox are so central to the city’s psyche makes it even more urgent for Boston to act now to banish this legacy of racism.”
Last year, the Globe’s Robert Burgess posed,"Was Tom Yawkey Boston's Donald Sterling," making a comparison to the now former LA Clippers owner who was banned by the NBA for making racist remarks.
“Unfortunately, Boston knows a thing or two about racism in sports," wrote Burgess. "While Sterling’s alleged words are offensive to many, let’s not sit too proud on our high horse.”
“In 2003, Brown University president Ruth Simmons opened an investigation into the school’s role in the slave trade. The findings exhumed unsettling accounts of the many ways in which important founders of the institution participated in and benefited from slavery, including the use of slave labor to construct the oldest and most iconic building on campus, University Hall,” wrote Northwestern Professor Jennifer Richeson in a piece entitled "What Ivy League Ties to Slavery Teach About Redemption."
As part of its recognition of its past ties to the slave trade, Brown unveiled its slavery memorial last year, which reads, “Rhode Islanders dominated the North American share of the African slave trade, launching over a thousand slaving voyages in the century before the abolition of the trade in 1808, and scores of illegal voyages thereafter. Brown University was a beneficiary of this trade.”
"If you're going to get rid of the day honoring Columbus because he was involved in slavery, I don't see how you can bypass the Brown problem," said John Leo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. "They have to be consistent with their message on slavery. And if they’re not willing to do that, then there's no reason to take them seriously."
Now, Brown just announced it is investing $100 million to "promote diversity and inclusion" on the campus, in light of pressures from the students and community to address ongoing racial issues on campus.
H.P. Lovecraft, one of Providence’s most famous authors, known for “The Call of Cthulhu” and other works of horror fiction, is also known for a fair degree of controversy about racially-charged aspects of his writing.
“John Winthrop, the first governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, kept American Indians as slaves and helped to write the first law in the US officially sanctioning the practice of keeping African slaves,” wrote C.S. Manegold for the Boston Globe in “New England’s scarlet ‘S’ for slavery” in 2010.
In terms of legacy, Winthrop is one of a number of historic figures that is subject to the “latest call by students at Harvard University for the school to purge terms or symbols deemed offensive by a vocal minority raises [in] what could be a confounding issue: How far will the 379-year-old school go to distance itself from historic figures whose actions and social values we would not approve today?” wrote Evan Lips for the NewBostonPost on December 4, as Harvard's Winthrop House” is one of a number at the school named for for a prominent Massachusetts leader who profited from slavery.
In 2007, the then 80-year-old Ralph Papitto — “a big time donor to [Roger Williams University] and a longtime chairman of its board — expressed deep regret for uttering a racist slur about black people at a board meeting,” the Wall Street Journal reported.
“I take full responsibility for this matter and ask for understanding from the community,” Papitto said in the statement. “I do not want this controversy, which at present is running out of control, to further the damage already caused to the university.”
The law school had opened at the Bristol, Rhode Island institution in 1993 and was named for Papitto in 1996, but just over 10 years later saw his name removed -- at his request -- in light of the scrutiny for the racist remarks.
“A group of Harvard Law students called Royall Must Fall, is taking issue with the law school’s seal, parts of which come from the Royall family crest. Isaac Royall, Jr. was a slave owner and son of a slavetrader who played a key role in creating Harvard Law School,” wrote WBUR on December 2.
Following an outcry from students, officials from the school are "examining the continued use of the seal, in what is the latest controversy over race and historic injustices on US college campuses in recent weeks."
“Symbols are important,” Martha Minow, dean of the law school, said this week to the Boston Globe. “They become even more important when people care about them and focus on them.”
"James DeWolf of Bristol, Rhode Island (1764-1837) was a United States senator and a wealthy merchant who, at the time of his death, was reported to be the second richest person in the country. He was also the leading slave trader in the history of the United States,” wrote the Tracing Center.
“Over fifty years and three generations, from 1769 to 1820, James DeWolf and his extended family brought approximately 12,000 enslaved Africans across the Middle Passage, making the DeWolf family our nation’s most successful slave-trading family.”
And the mission of the Tracing Centre?
“To create greater awareness of the full extent of the nation’s complicity in slavery and the transatlantic slave trade and to inspire acknowledgement, dialogue and active response to this history and its many legacies.”
DeWolf is featured prominently in a 2008 documentary" Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North" co-produced and directed by Katrina Browne, a DeWolf descendant.