By: Elienishka Ramos Torres
On Wednesday, July 15, 2020, “Re-imagining Public Safety,” a zoom meeting hosted by several UMass Amherst student organizations, provided participants with an insight on their current goals of police abolition within the UMass community.
Continue reading “UMass Amherst Student Organizations Come Together in Starting Conversations on Police Reform and Abolition on Campus”
By Ethan Bakuli
Outside of the Greater Boston area or gateways cities, such as Springfield or Pittsfield, few may expect to find large numbers of black people in Massachusetts. It’s surprising, then, to hear that Florence, Mass., a village tucked in the northwest corner of the city of Northampton, had 10 percent black residents in 1850, higher than major hubs like New Bedford and Boston.
On Wednesday, Feb. 20, in light of Black History Month and in partnership with the David Ruggles Center for History and Education, the Malcolm X Cultural Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst hosted a two-part event on the impact of slavery in the Pioneer Valley.
Ruggles Center director Steve Scrimer was invited to speak at the MXCC, presenting the history of African Americans that arrived to Florence in the middle 19th century via the Underground Railroad, and quickly made the mill town their home and site of radical organizing.
Continue reading “Abolition in the Valley: The legacy of African Americans in Florence, MA”
By Lucia, Ariya, Sandra
Sociology major
“Silence is violence, and it’s important to break the silence. Because there’s` so much institutional silence around issues of race and racism and the intersectionality of race and racism. And when we engage in discussion we’re like starting the work of deconstructing the institutional silence and violence that’s imposed on people of color but also that affects other people as well at predominantly white institutions.”
Accounting major
“Coming to this class and having an open discussion about people’s experiences with racism at umass was so eye opening. Because I know a lot of my friends think that racism doesn’t really occur on this campus, and it was astounding to see so many first perspectives about racism on campus and their own actual experiences.”
Computer Science major
“Something I learned over the weekend is that everyone feels the same as I did about racial issues — they had their own issues with race too. And so I’m not the only one who feels this kind of pressure about race.”
Psychology major
“I had the intention to learn more about different people’s perspectives because I am a leader on this campus fighting very hard for diversity and I felt that this course would, in a way teach me more about others people’s perspectives so that i can incorporate it in my work and improve.
“It’s important to have these kinds of group discussions because we can all just in a way share our pain so that we can learn to better empathize with each one another and have a greater understanding as to what’s happening in not only our lives but other people’s lives.”
