News

Beyond Its Limits: A Case Study in University Expansion and Gentrification in Newark, DE

Posted on July 13, 2021 at: 1:59 pm

by Collin Willard
Ray Callahan Experiential Learning Fund Fellow, Spring 2021

Anyone who has ever set foot in Newark, Delaware could tell you that it is a college town. Positioned in the center of town, the University of Delaware’s vast campus dominates Newark’s built environment. Businesses along Newark’s Main Street cater to student tastes, and students make up a sizable portion of Newark’s population. Large real estate management companies offer a variety of off-campus housing options in just about every part of Newark, from apartment complexes to single family homes, and nearly everything in between.

However, Newark was not always like this. Prior to the 1970’s, University of Delaware students primarily either lived on campus or commuted to class. Newark had several distinctive neighborhoods within its core that housed working-class families. One such neighborhood was home to the New London Road community, where Newark’s Black population lived throughout the 20th century. This neighborhood, shown in the figure below, encompassed most of the northwest portion of Newark’s core, including New London Road and Avenue, West Cleveland Avenue, Ray Street, Church Street, Corbit Street, Rose Street, and Terry Manor. Today, however, this area of Newark is largely student housing and university property.

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Vigil for Victims of Atlanta Shootings and Anti-Asian Violence.

Posted on March 26, 2021 at: 4:32 pm

Vigil for this Sunday, 7pm at Grace Church in Wilmington, DE. Please help us to spread to the word at UD. Thank you.

Please join us to remember the victims of the Atlanta shootings and unite against acts of racial/sexual/gender violence towards Asians/Asian American Women and AAPI communities. We are a few in DE, but I believe our experiences matter, not only in our injury, but also in our commitment to the coalitional work of justice and liberation.

#StopAsianHate Vigil

March 26th is StopAsianHate Day

Posted on at: 3:07 pm

Racism and the Invisible Asian Americans

Eight people, six of them Asian women, were killed in Atlanta on March 16. In the aftermath of the slaughter, many competing explanations have focused on the shooter’s motivation.  A Cherokee County sheriff department spokesman’s careless words seemed to express sympathy with the shooter and manifested anti-Asian racism. Increasingly, discussions have turned toward the shooter’s sexual temptation and the association of spa businesses with sex work, serving to transfer the blame unfairly to the women and their hypersexualized Asian bodies.

The growing awareness of violent assaults on Asian Americans over the last year has shaped our understanding of the killings in Atlanta in a certain direction.  Americans are still struggling to comprehend and foster meaningful dialogue about racism, sexism, xenophobia, and classism.  Now, living in 2021, Americans of all colors and races still lack the vocabulary to talk seriously about violence against Asian American women who continue to be framed in hypersexualized terms. The historical legacy of the U.S. wars in Asia coexists alongside records of sexist and racist restrictions on Asian immigration. Racism, sexism, xenophobia, and classism cannot be separated.

The Asian American Anti-Racism Initiative is a group of faculty, students, and administrators at the University of Delaware working to offer a forum to understand the contributions of Asian Americans to the public discourse around race.  We denounce the killings in Georgia and we are dismayed by the coverage of the mainstream American media.

We will act. We will counter all forms of stereotype and typecasting.  We will reframe the pre-established views.  And we will combat systemic racism, sexism, classism, and xenophobia.

As the first step to create a more inclusive community, on Wednesday April 28 and Wednesday May 5, we invite members of the UD community to join us for #FightingforAllofUS: film streaming and conversations about Yuri Kochiyama and Grace Lee Boggs, two Asian American women who challenged all of us to create a more just and equitable society. Kochiyama and Boggs fought for women, men, children, Asian, Black, Latinx, and Native Americans. They worked across class and social groups, combatted systematic racism, and fought for equality and equity.  Their passion and revolutionary activism cut across all racial thresholds and barriers.  They stood tall in history, side by side with others in the Civil Rights Movement.  And we invite all of you to join and discuss how acts of antiracism must first begin with unity that span across racial boundaries and socioeconomic backgrounds.  

UDARI Undergraduate Research Assistants announced for Spring 2021

Posted on March 8, 2021 at: 4:17 pm

Gelina Dames and Elisa Davila have been selected as the UD Antiracism Undergraduate Research Assistants for Spring 2021.

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