Vanderbilt University Wants Our Bodies But Not Our Baggage

This article was written by Guy Russo and Erin Logan. They both attend Vanderbilt University.

In solidarity with the protests occurring at the University of Missouri and Yale University, a growing number of college students have taken action to address the systemic injustices plaguing their campus. Aside from two brief moments of solidarity, students at Vanderbilt University have remained silent. This silence ends today.

The list of demands delivered to Chancellor Zeppos and his administration has been at their disposal for over two years. Hidden Dores, a grassroots movement committed "to induce structural change" at Vanderbilt, has worked tirelessly with the administration to create an environment wherein students of color can feel safe. Thanks to the student-led campus activism, Chancellor Zeppos declared diversity and inclusion to be a paramount concern in August of this year. Since then, the university has spearheaded lackluster initiatives including instituting the Office of Inclusion Initiatives and Cultural Competence and the Diversity and the Inclusion and Community Committee (a 15-person faculty team). These committees, which have yet to better the personal and academic lives of marginalized students, were started at the expense of dissolving the Office of Multicultural Affairs; the only entity on the campus that dealt explicitly with race. The disconnect between rhetoric and reality makes clear that as Zeppos and his team endeavor to resolve the racial disparities on this campus, they install new hurdles for their students to overcome.

The failure to address these racial inequities calls into question the university's complacency in light of the incidents at Mizzou and Yale. Students and administration alike seem to be functioning within a false sense of insularity, unable to recognize that the vices of one Ivory Tower are as salient as ever here in Nashville. Echoing Vanderbilt's inaction, administrators across the country are quick to absolve themselves from any and all responsibilities when it comes to these same issues on their own campus.

Made evident by the deplorable Yik Yaks posted by anonymous Vanderbilt students, the racial climate here mirrors the conditions of campuses nationwide. Students of color are subject to racial epithets spouted by sober and drunk people in dorm rooms and fraternity houses. As recently as 2014, Hidden Dores launched an online photo campaign so that white students, faculty, staff, and administration cannot claim ignorance to the events occurring under their noses. In the Vanderbilt Hustler, students publish narratives to counter the lived experiences of their classmates. The tenuous dialogue surrounding the removal of 'Confederate' from Confederate Memorial Hall amplifies the "diversity balderdash" released from Kirkland Hall. Vanderbilt refuses to pay $1 million to the Daughters of the Confederacy to divorce the university from its racist past but raised $10 million to renovate campus baseball facilities.

Largely left unchecked, the racism on this campus points to a more insidious habit of Vanderbilt's disregard for the welfare and personhood of its students of color.

Their neglect of the issues present during these turbulent time derives from the homogeneity of their gentility: a board of trust and administration that is lily white, cis, and largely male. A university that boasts diversity and inclusion throughout their admissions pamphlets seem to loosely apply this logic in their hiring and promotion practices: using white women as the fulfillment of their manifest destiny. These people, tasked with cleansing the university of its racism, do not have the lived experiences to empathize with what 38.8 percent of the undergraduate student body experience on a daily basis. Students are expected to live with the scars and not have a place to de-traumatize themselves. The Psychological & Counseling Center, which claims to "offers a range of services," does not even have a staff diverse enough to care for students of color.

Many assert that the administration has the best of intentions; that we "angry coloreds," unable to know their hearts, should remain quiet and hope for the best. But a university that outlaws campus demonstrations in an effort to censor their student body cannot create a truly inclusive and diverse environment.

On August 3rd of this year, Vandy's administration added a clause to the
Student Accountability outlawing activity that creates "obstruction or disruption of teaching, administration, and University procedures and activities, or other authorized activities on University premises." When enforced, students are subject to disciplinary action. This is a step backward for Vanderbilt. A university that expelled James Lawson for his activity in the Civil Rights movement should be making every effort to ensure that the voices of all students are heard. But instead, we are left with a university that not only neglects the health of students of color but also censors, utilizing our bodies to advertise diversity without properly addressing our baggage.