A 2020 exhibition curated by Anna Robinson-Sweet

The archival objects featured in this exhibition document over sixty years of protest on The New School campus, from student campaigns against the Vietnam War to those urging greater diversity in the university.

Global Politics and Local Protest

A mural, a temporary art exhibit, and the professional background of a member of the Board of Trustees sparked the protests documented in this case. 

This petition and card-sized flier were created in response to The New School’s decision to place a curtain over the section of the José Clemente Orozco murals at 66 West 12th Street that includes portraits of Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Lenin. This controversial curtaining happened as McCarthyism swept the nation and The New School found itself fending off accusations of communist ties

Announcement and card informing New School students 
about a petition and protest committee advocating the 
uncovering of murals by José Clemente Orozco,” circa 1953.

In the 1960s and ‘70s, students at The New School were active in demonstrating against the Vietnam War. The largest of these protests came in the spring of 1970 in reaction to the expansion of American military operations into Cambodia. Ellsworth Bunker, an honorary member of The New School’s Board of Trustees, became a flashpoint for these student demonstrators. Bunker was serving as the U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam and was a strong supporter of the Vietnam War. Students occupying the registrar’s office and other areas of the campus demanded the administration remove Bunker’s honorary trusteeship and offer its support for anti-war organizing.

Listen to oral histories with participants in the 1970 Vietnam Moratorium on The New School’s Digital Collections website: https://bit.ly/2xa2G8J 

At the same time, Arab students at The New School were voicing their opposition to an exhibition held at the university, “The Gallows of Baghdad.” This show featured a series of paintings by Abraham Rattner depicting gleeful Arab crowds rejoicing in the hanging of fourteen Jews in Baghdad in January 1969. The Arab students who took offense to this exhibition argued that The New School should provide exhibition space to art depicting the Palestinian struggle, as well.

Demonstrating for Diversity

Since at least the 1960s, students at The New School have engaged in protest for a more diverse and equitable university. In 1969, students in the sociology department circulated a petition asking the administration to hire Black faculty. The following year, staff participated in the first Black Solidarity Day, skipping work to show their support for ongoing civil rights struggles. Records in The New School Archives suggest that the administration retaliated against some of these striking staff members. Black students and staff responded by issuing their own set of demands, calling for greater diversity in the curriculum, faculty, and student body. 

The same calls for diversity came 25 years later from members of the Mobilization for Real Diversity, Democracy, and Economic Justice, a student-led group at The New School that was formed in response to the administration’s decision not to extend the contract of a popular professor, M. Jacqui Alexander, a Black feminist scholar. The Mobilization lasted the entire 1996-1997 academic year, and culminated in a two week hunger strike.

Watch footage from the Mobilization on The New School’s Digital Collections website: https://bit.ly/3csm4Oo 

All material is from The New School Archives & Special Collections. Contact archivist@newschool.edu for more information.

Installation photo by Prajwal Godse