Memories of Activism (2024)

Undergraduate: Julia Straight

Faculty Advisor: Sara Smith
Department: Geography and Environment

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This research investigates how student activism shapes the campus landscape of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Oral history interviews were used to catalog ten recent activist events, ranging from accessibility advocacy to voter registration to environmentalism. A publicly available interactive map was then created to spatially display these events. Each event is connected with an activist event profile which explains the inspiration, goals, and impacts of the event to determine how it shaped UNC’s campus landscape. Activist events on UNC’s campus have a variety of impacts on the campus landscape: protection of student safety, increased voter turnout, expanded awareness of injustices. Common themes throughout the ten events include the establishment and strengthening of community bonds. Strong community bonds based on student activism allow students to feel better supported on campus, enabling a greater capacity for activism and bolstering quality of life for students and student activists. These findings underscore the importance of activism in driving change and strengthening communities.

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