Isolation during Integration
This item depicts how African American students felt isolated even after
integration began. The item depicts the feelings of those individuals and the grief they felt when they looked around and all they saw were white students. In this item an African American football player describes how he felt when he looked around and only saw white cheerleaders and white teammates, this made him feel as though he had to prove he belonged. It also made him feel like his teammates who were supposed to be like family to him would never feel that way because they were all white and he was not.
This item is applicable to my other items because I wanted to capture the feeling
of being the odd one out and how traditions at MSU were what fixed this feeling. Also, this helps to show how just simply letting black students attend the school was not the real step of integration, but it was when the black students started to feel like they truly had a place at MSU that the change started to happen. This item depicts the original feelings of black students.
This item shows that within the first ten years the first couple of years the black students were only a statistic and were only seen in some areas of the
school. They did not truly belong yet and it took hard fought battles to integrate into all areas of student life. These students had to deal with uncomfortable feelings to see true change.
This item depicts an important moment in which a black male was voted as
Mr. MSU, but also is seen as significant because he was elected alongside a white female. This shows the bridge of equality forming and shows that black individuals were becoming a large part of campus life. This shows that integration was beginning to happen not only in the classroom and on athletic fields, but also in social life, which was a huge step. Homecoming is also a very sacred tradition at MSU which is still celebrated today and so it was a crucial step for black individuals to begin to be seen in these traditions that are still held near to students and alumni today.
Homecoming is a tradition important to MSU students and seen as a sense of
pride among alumni and students. That is what made this moment so important and
valuable. The students and peers choose who wins Mr. MSU and queen and so by Frank Dowsing winning that shows that MSU students were beginning to include black individuals in their traditions and truly seeing them as their fellow students. This had to be a moment that struck immense pride in the black community.
The importance of this can be seen in the date because there are about 3 years between these two items and in those three years immense strides were made. Rather than feeling like they were only seen for their academic or athletic value these black students began to be seen for who they were as people and how they could be included in social life at MSU. This was an important turning point for progress to continue because it showed students that integration was possible and that the battles they were fighting were important and should be continued.