Project Description:

In the US, African American communities have had inequitable participation in urban life through racist and discriminatory practices and policies that historically targeted predominantly Black communities: from redlining to exclusionary zoning. For decades, we have also seen Black neighborhoods and communities lost to demolition in service of urban renewal, redevelopment, or transportation projects. Decades of these actions have therefore erased the physical spaces and places representing the history, memory, and heritage of Black communities across the US. Erasure of the history and heritage of any group of people leads to irreparable loss of their cultural memory, and thus their cultural identity. Concomitantly, when creating place-based historical narratives, extant neighborhoods, sites, buildings, and structures important to Black heritage have been ignored as well. Especially across Indiana, there is hardly any documentation or recognition of sites (existing or extant) that are important to Black history. In Tippecanoe County where Purdue University is located, the Farmers Institute is the only site listed on the US National Register of Historic Places with any significance to Black history. With the lack of these kinds of information systems in place, residents here are unaware of the history of the spaces and places they inhabit. Especially in and around Purdue University, spaces and places important to Black history are only now being focused on. Thus, there is today an urgent need to document Black heritage sites in the Greater Lafayette Area to reclaim the heritage, reclaim a sense of place, a sense of belonging and identity for Black Hoosiers. By participating in this one-year US-based project, students will learn skills in archival research, historical writing, leadership, and responsibility, which they can apply to different contexts upon their return to Mexico.

Tec de Monterrey students who apply for this project will join current Purdue students who are already working in my Urban Matters Lab on this research project. They will be mentored by current students and learn how to do archival research with them and with the PI Dr. Ashima Krishna. Students will work in Purdue Archives, Tippecanoe County Historical Association archives, and local libraries to find information on sites Dr. Krishna has already identified, and will write essays on their findings. Dr. Krishna will publish them on the lab website with the student credited as the author. This project will be one-year long, and during that time, students will get extensive experience to undertake similar historical studies when they return to Mexico.

Requirements:

An ideal student will have the following:
1. Interest in doing historical and archival research
2. Willingness to learn how to do historical and archival research
3. Willingness to go on a hunt for information by digging up clues and piecing them together to create a historical narrative about a building
4. Curiosity to find historical information
5. Hard working
6. No other prior experience needed
7. Student needs to be comfortable with writing essays in English