Transforming North Carolina: Black Women’s Activism at North Carolina HBCUs, 1950–80

This paper explores the experiences of Black women student activists who attended North Carolina Historically Black Colleges and Universities from 1950 to 1980. The eleven HBCUs located in North Carolina during this period created a significant cadre of student activists that would launch the Student Sit-In Movement and largely influence the Civil Rights and Black Power movements. Dominant narratives about African American social movements are largely masculinist and urban focused. By focusing solely on a few great men who primarily operated out of urban locales, our collective understanding of these integral historical events is incomplete and vastly distorted. By centering the lived experiences and activism of dozens of Black women, I seek to expand our notions of activism and who can be deemed an activist. I analyze student activists as holistic beings and therefore consider their full lived experiences. Although scholarship about Black activism largely focuses on national organizations and motivations, it is important to examine the influences of the local. For example, for some student activists their mothers or other community members inspired them to participate in activism prior to them attending college. Additionally, this paper notes the importance of space and recognizes the college campus and rural south as integral sites of inquiry. It surveys how various elements of the college campus such as population size, religious affiliation, faculty/administration, gender demographics etc. influenced student activism and simultaneously how did the local and often rural environments shape the demands, support, ideology and tactics of student activists.