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The goal of this essay contest is for students to engage with EJI's ongoing conversation about our nation's history and legacy of racial injustice. Students are invited to participate by writing about a chosen theme or topic involving racial injustice in America.
Using your own voice, the hope is that your essay will explore a theme or topic's context and the details of a related, specific historical event to help discuss the historical injustice that occurred and its connections to present-day injustice.
identifying essay themes and topics
identifying essay themes and topics
Throughout the history of the United States, racial injustice has significantly impacted the lives of Black people and people of color. Each of the themes and topics below are examples of the historical experiences and legacies of racial injustice that have created, and continue to create, challenges for Black people and people of color in our nation.
Click on the themes and topics listed above for definitions and source recommendations. After reviewing the ones of interest to you, select one of the themes and topics to write about for your essay. You can also choose a theme or topic not listed on this page, but you will need to clearly define it in your essay. Next, you will need to choose a historical event.
Choosing a historical event
Choosing a historical event
Students are encouraged to explore areas of our nation's history of racial injustice that they may be less familiar with for their essay topics. The themes and topics in the previous section have impacted the lives of Black people and people of color through specific historical events. A historical event is a specific moment or experience that occurred in the past and happened in a particular place. Some of these events, like the Montgomery Bus Boycott from December 5, 1955 until December 21, 1956, are well known. Others are less known but are no less consequential for those involved.
Students should choose a historical event related to the essay's theme and topic that has been selected. Students are encouraged to review EJI's History of Racial Injustice Calendar and Timeline, consider the local history of your community, or review other sources to choose a relevant historical event of interest. We encourage you to write about a historical event that is new to you.
USING THE RACIAL INJUSTICE CALENDAR TIMELINE
USING THE RACIAL INJUSTICE CALENDAR TIMELINE
When using the EJI History of Racial Injustice Calendar website, use the search bar in the top right corner or spend time reading through the entries to explore historical events relevant to your chosen topic.
Try using various search terms to identify events of interest for your essay. For example, if you are exploring "environmental injustice and racism," consider searching for "environmental racism," "disaster relief," and "pollution" to find events of interest.
Students are also welcome to visit our website at www.eji.org to learn more about historical events and to search for information connected to the Racial Injustice Calendar.
LOCAL HISTORICAL EVENT TOPICS
LOCAL HISTORICAL EVENT TOPICS
Local Essay Topics:
Apply one of the EJI Themes using one of these historical events as an example.
Alexandria was Home to the Largest U.S. Dealer of Enslaved People. Franklin and Armfield took the business of human trafficking to new levels at 1315 Duke Street. Read more about their business in this article in The Atlantic. Read The Ledger and the Chain by Joshua Rothman.
Alexandria’s First Civil Rights Protest. The petition of 1864 was signed by US Colored Troops who had fought for the Union in the Civil War and asked to be buried in a soldiers’ cemetery. The troops who signed the petition believed they deserved equal treatment in death. To learn more: start here, but a google search will provide even more information.
The Christmas Day Massacre of 1865. ACRP believes the murder of John Anderson by a group of former Confederate soldiers during what was called “The Christmas Riot” to possibly be the first documented public lynching in this city. To learn more about the terror inflicted on Mr. Anderson and the other members of the Black community that day, read the December 2021 ACRP newsletter.
The lynchings of Joseph McCoy and Benjamin Thomas. In 1897 and 1899, white Alexandrians lynched Black teens Joseph McCoy and Benjamin Thomas. To read the narratives and learn more about these acts of racial terror,
visit the ACRP website.
The 1939 Library Sit-In. Alexandria Attorney Samuel Tucker organized a group of Black men to go to the library on Queen Street and apply for library cards. He knew they would likely be arrested, and he planned to represent them in court to force Alexandria to integrate the library. The city let the men go instead of risking legal action, and built the Robinson Reading Room as a library for Black citizens. Read more about it at the Alexandria Library site, in an article in the Alexandria Times, or read Public in Name Only, by Brenda Mitchell-Powell.
Alexandria's role in Massive Resistance to the integration of public schools. Alexandria’s city and school leadership joined Senator Byrd in an attempt to stop the desegregation of ACPS. Read more about this history here.
Reprisal against Blois Hundley. Blois Hundley was a Black cafeteria worker and mother of eight who was fired by then-Alexandria Public Schools Superintendent Thomas Chambliss Williams when she joined an NAACP lawsuit to desegregate Alexandria’s schools in 1958.
Remember the Titans: Fact From Fiction. The Disney movie from the year 2000 does not tell the full story of what was happening in Alexandria in 1970. Use this opportunity to engage in truth telling about the reality of white opposition to desegregation and share what really happened the year the Titans won the state championship. There are a lot of resources at ACPS identity project site, , as well as Douglas Reed’s book, Building the Federal Schoolhouse.
The killing of Robin Gibson. 19-year-old Robin Gibson was murdered by a white shop attendant at a 7-11 in Del Ray on, May 29, 1970, and protests followed. Read the article: Flashes of Violence from the Alexandria Gazette.
connecting the past to present-day injustice
connecting the past to present-day injustice
Consider how your essay theme and topic and historical event connect to specific examples of present-day injustice. It will be important to describe in your essay how you see these connections.
For example, you might choose voter suppression as your theme. One historical event you could write about is the 1866 massacre in New Orleans during the Louisiana state constitutional convention. In your essay, you could use the topic of voter suppression in the past to connect to present-day injustice, such as the changes that were made to the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
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