Student activism has a rich history and legacy. From the protests against American involvement in the Vietnam War across U.S. college campuses to the more recent Chilean protests against the country’s education system, student mobilization has proven critical to the ever-changing landscape of social justice. Scholars and activists from around the country touched on this very subject at the “Campus Activism” panel at BCRW’s Activism and the Academy: Celebrating 40 Years of Feminist Scholarship and Action conference. Addressing issues of queer and trans* organizing, Arizona’s ban on ethnic studies, and workers’ rights, the panelists underscored the indispensability of student and campus collaboration on local struggles to achieve broader visions of social change. Given the invaluable role of campus activism, I want to spotlight some of the student activism happening in the Barnard/Columbia community.
Abigail Boggs, Debanuj Dasgupta, Stephanie Luce, Sandra K. Soto, Jesse Kadjo, and moderator Catherine Sameh discuss campus activism.
The present activism of Barnard and Columbia students should come as no surprise. The Columbia University protests of 1968, in which students demonstrated against university affiliation with the Vietnam War and Columbia’s construction of a segregative gymnasium in Morningside Park, are remembered for their large-scale acts of student subversion. Hundreds were arrested and injured by the police called in by then Columbia President Grayson Kirk, and the university shut down in the face of utter chaos. Protestors ultimately claimed victory when Columbia scrapped its gym construction plans and its ties with the U.S. Department of Defense. Students thwarted the university’s racist and militarist acts, but not without incurring police brutality and racial tensions between protestors.