Racism and College: The Links

Race is one of the most important issues in America today (as it has been since the United States' beginnings), and its significance is reflected in the breadth of material you can find about it on the Web.

If you want an understanding of the number of racial incidents that have taken place on college campuses nationwide as of late, check out the blog Vox Ex Machina's extensive detailing of such events. Dr. Thornton-Dill from the University of Maryland speaks about the noose hanging incident at the college with NPR here. Pictures of the nooses found at Columbia and Maryland can be found here and here, respectively.

Those interested in learning more about the background of "Discrimination of another color" should check out the Muslim Students Association's national Web site, which contains tons of information about the organization's background and about Islam in general. This clip from Fox News features a discussion of an offensive, "racist" party at Tartleton State University on Martin Luther King Day.

The Jena Six incident has been covered extensively on the Web. The New York Times put together a very powerful slideshow on the Jena Six affair, and has a page dedicated to information about the Jena Six, as does the Washington Post, which you can find here. For those looking to take action, there's freethejenasix.org, as well as a Color of Change petition.

One incident that was not covered in In Depth, but which holds great significance to the topic at hand, is the Genarlow Wilson case. Wilson was a 17-year-old African-American sentenced to a 10-year prison term in Georgia for aggravated child molestation because he received oral sex from a 15-year-old girl at a party. His case made national headlines because the act was considered to be consensual, and many considered his punishment to be extraordinarily harsh because he was an African-American. Due largely to public outcry, Wilson was released in May 2007, but ESPN.com wrote a great story on Genarlow and his case as it was happening, and NPR featured a very interesting roundtable discussion with four teenagers about the larger issues surrounding Wilson's case.