OPINION
STUDENT REVOLUTIONARIES BY SARAH JONES (SLA ’20)
D
uring the spring semester of my first year at Tulane University, I took a comparative politics course that focused on revolutions in the context of Western societies. This course offered insight into the characteristics and mechanisms that constructed a revolution, and it opened my eyes to how my studies could impact my world view. From the start of this course, I began to imagine what would coming revolutions look like? Who would lead them?
Years later, I took a leap in my academic career. After taking courses with Elisabeth McMahon and Z’etoile Imma, professors in the Departments of History and English, respectively, I decided to study abroad at the University of Cape Town (UCT) due to the rich anti-apartheid resistance present in the country before and after 1994. When I arrived on UCT’s campus in January 2019, I could feel a similar atmosphere as when I arrived at Tulane in Fall 2016. In the spring of 2015, students from UCT started nationwide movements to decolonize education with #RhodesMustFall, which organized a collective of students to demand the removal of a statue memorializing British imperialist Cecil Rhodes on their campus. The movement soon spread to the University of Witwatersrand (UWC), which led to the emergence of #FeesMustFall. This movement demanded an end to increasing student fees and pushed for more financial assistance for students. Together, these movements sparked the mobilization of university students across institutions, the streets of the Western and Eastern Cape, and on social media. Students collectively organized to spread awareness of the oppression they faced from colonial and apartheid legacies and assert that education was not a commodity. #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall contributed to defining an era of digital activism, which made organizing and advocating accessible to a larger audience and created an international awareness of these issues.
Across the ocean, students at Tulane had ignited their own movement. At the Call for Unity action in 2015, students from organizations such as Tulane’s Black Student Union (tBSU), Generating Excellence Now and Tomorrow in Education (GENTE), Students Organizing Against Racism (SOAR), and the Muslim Student Association (MSA) stood in solidarity with students at the University of Missouri to demand a list of changes to make Tulane a safe and equitable place for marginalized students. Echoing the 1968 requests from African American Congress of Tulane, the tBSU’s list of demands included changes to academic and financial departments and admissions in an effort to increase accessibility and representation. These demands reflected the concerns and realities for marginalized students that faced barriers of not only being admitted to Tulane, but navigating the campus and feeling supported while completing their academic careers. Knowing that they may not experience the benefits that could result from the list of demands, the student organizations were intentional in creating a legacy to alleviate stress for future students. The mission of Tulane and UCT student organizers resembled the reality of organizing, which is obtaining the liberation of all impacted by legacies of oppression. When I studied abroad at UCT, this became even more clear to me. At UCT, I befriended students who reminded me of my friends and mentors at Tulane. Students who wanted to learn in an environment free of
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economic and social oppression and marginalization. Students who attended school to break barriers for their families. Students who knew that they could not treat 2015 as a single event, and who knew that change started with them. While at UCT I took an African Political Economy course, which awakened me and my classmates to protest scholarship and challenged us to “ask the right kinds of questions.” The lecturers, tutor, and guest speakers encouraged us to not accept any text or theory as just a body of work; rather, we were empowered to see ourselves as
