Race on Campus: Beyond Obama, The Unity Stops

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal


Race on Campus: Beyond Obama, The Unity Stops
After Campaign Rallies, Black, White Students Go Their Separate Ways
By JONATHAN KAUFMAN
May 3, 2008; Page A1

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Across the country, college campuses have become hotbeds of support for Sen. Obama. Nationally, 70% of Democrats ages 18 to 24 favor Sen. Obama compared with 30% for Hillary Clinton, according to a recent poll by Harvard's Institute of Politics. Many black and many white students wear their Obama buttons and "Got Hope?" T-shirts proudly as a sign that they are part of a post-Civil-Rights generation more welcoming of change and diversity than their parents. But after classes -- and after the occasional Obama rally -- most black and white students on college campuses go their separate ways, living in separate dormitories, joining separate fraternities and sororities and attending separate parties.

(snip)

The racial divisions among college students are striking both because of the fervor for Obama and the increasing diversity on campus. Colleges offer a unique opportunity for students to get to know each other in a relaxed atmosphere where many of the issues that often divide blacks and whites, like income and educational levels, are minimized amid the common goals of going to class, playing sports and going to parties. About 10% of Duke students are African-American, compared to 4.5% two decades ago; they include many popular athletes as well as student leaders. The newly elected head of the graduate and professional student association is an African-American woman. Black and white students live together in the same group of dorms during freshman year, though they can join fraternities and sororities and select their roommates starting in sophomore year. Like many colleges, Duke sponsors initiatives to address race relations on campus, an effort that gained added impetus following the widely publicized incident two years ago when white lacrosse players hired a black stripper to perform at a party and the woman then falsely accused several of the students of raping her.

(snip)

But working or voting for an African-American running for president doesn't necessarily bridge differences -- on campus or, later, in the workplace. Following a recent discussion in one of his classes about the campaign, in which most students expressed support for Sen. Obama, Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, a Duke sociologist, asked his white students how many had a black friend on campus. All the white students raised their hands. He then asked the black students how many of them had a white friend on campus. None of them raised their hands. The more he probed, Mr. Bonilla-Silva says, the more he realized that the definition of friendship was different. The white students considered a black a "friend" if they played basketball with him or shared a class. "It was more of an acquaintance," recalls Mr. Bonilla-Silva.

Black students, by contrast, defined a friend as someone they would invite to their home for dinner. By that measure, none of the students had friends from the opposite race. Mr. Bonilla-Silva says when white college students were asked in series of 1998 surveys about the five people with whom they interacted most on a daily basis, about 68% said none of them were black. When asked if they had invited a black person to lunch or dinner recently, about 68% said "no." He says his own research and more recent studies show similar results.

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Some white students at Duke and other schools blame racial division on the fraternity and sorority system, which breaks down along racial lines, and the presence of "themed" housing which allows black students to live together. Some blacks respond that black students -- like all students -- room with people they are comfortable with. What's more, they say living among backs eases some of the pressure and isolation of being a minority at a predominantly white institution.

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URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120977670689464343.html (subscription)

[FrenchieCat]

1. Well, isn't that what's being encouraged by the grown ups and the news media?

But I think that the WSJ is stretching it a bit. My Black Daughter Married her White Husband November of last year. They met on the Harvard campus while she was a Freshman and he was a Junior. Lovely couple, if I have to say so myself!

[Diane R]

2. I don't buy this. I have three kids that age, and they've had numerous black roommates.