Acknowledgments
Carolina Kickoff’s Statements
As a social justice nonprofit within the Campus Y, Carolina Kickoff is committed to creating a safe and equitable experience for individuals from all backgrounds and with all identities at UNC. Below, we have included statements that align our mission with important issues going on in the world today as well as historical acknowledgements relating to UNC’s campus.
Statement on the Israeli-Palestine Conflict:
As a partner of the Campus Y and an organization devoted to social justice, CK is committed to speaking against injustice everywhere. As such, we stand with the Campus Y Executive Board and in solidarity with Palestinians in their struggle for land and freedom. Please read the Exec. Board’s full statement here.
CK echoes the Campus Y’s position and stand resolutely with UNC SJP in their calls for a permanent fire in Gaza as well as UNC divestment from companies and organizations supporting Israel’s genocide of Palestinian people. Hatred in any form has no place in our organization, on our campus, or in our world; and as such, we call for justice and an end to American complacency.
Acknowledgement of the Exploitation of Black Labor and Racial Injustice on UNC’s Campus:
We would like to acknowledge the history and present of White Supremacy on UNC Chapel Hill’s campus. UNC was built to further the education of white men and expand White Supremacy on the backs of enslaved African American people. The University was founded through the dispossession of indigenous folks in an act of settler colonialism, relying on enslaved labor whose exploitation was crucial to the building of University buildings and facilities. The profits gained by the sale and escheatment of human beings were critical to the success of UNC as we know it today. Furthermore, Black undergraduate students were not admitted to the University until 1955 with the first being Leroy Frasier, John Lewis Brandon and Ralph Frasier. Karen Parker became the first Black woman undergraduate student in 1963. Hortense McClinton became the first Black faculty member hired in 1966. We honor Carolina’s Black Pioneers as well as the students and staff who further their legacy today.
Today, named after Dr. Sonja Haynes Stone, the Sonja Haynes Stone Center is a hub for Black Culture and History. Dr. Haynes Stone was an outspoken advocate for a free-standing cultural center for African American students, and the center honors her legacy today by promoting appreciation for African American culture as well as furthering academic understanding of African American diaspora culture. Other campus buildings previously named after Confederates, enslavers, and other White Supremacists are in the process of having their names changed. The Student Stores and Student Affairs buildings names were changed in 2020. The process to name Hamilton Hall after scholar, activist, attorney, and historian Pauli Murray is still underway. On campus today, there are a variety of fraternities/sororities, activist clubs, and social groups. The Black Student Movement has been an important part of student life since its founding in 1967. Black Ink is a student newspaper created as part of BSM in 1969 as an alternative to the Daily Tar Heel. Community Justice, Abolition, and Antiracism is a student-led coalition centered around anti-racism and abolition both on campus and the local community.
Resources
CK Land Acknowledgment
Carolina Kickoff acknowledges how UNC has benefited and continues to benefit from settler colonialism. The land we stand on was stolen, and its legacy is rooted in the dispossession of the people who originally inhabited it. Much of the wealth accumulated by UNC systems is a direct result of the forced removal of indigenous peoples and the commodification of land for private gain. UNC must address these harms and theft by providing funding to research the history of the people from whom this land was taken, contributing reparations to the Native peoples of NC, and working to reckon with its history and present as a colonial and racist institution.
We recognize that the land we stand on today was traditionally part of the territories under the stewardship of the Occaneechi, Shakori, Eno, and Sissipahaw peoples. Native Americans are not relics of the past, and as such, we honor their living legacies. We ask that you do the same by listening and learning from them, standing in solidarity with them, and living in a way that honors their past and present stewardship, love, and respect for the land.
Carolina Kickoff’s main event, CKamp, takes place at Camp New Hope, Chapel Hill. We would like to acknowledge that Camp New Home is on the lands of the Saponi, Occaneechi, Cheraw, Eno, Shakori, Catawba, and Lumbee peoples. The descendents of these peoples are the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation Indian Tribe and the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina – though, these are only the specific groups recognized by the state of North Carolina. We recognize the importance of acknowledging the history and ongoing impact of colonization and strive to engage in meaningful relationships with Indigenous communities. We would like you to do the same by honoring their stewardship of the lands we exist on, standing in solidarity with Indigenous rights movements, and reckoning with your position within a colonial system.