After grabbing some dinner, my friend and I went over to the ground floor of the Langson Library to see the Anteater Spirit exhibit in person. Before walking in, I had no idea where the exhibit would be and had the expectation that this exhibit would be taking up a decent amount of space. I was surprised how it was pretty much the first thing that greets you when you walk in.

The exhibit is curated in a way where it showcases important time periods in the UCI community from its initial opening up to present time, and how these different movements have formed the UCI student identity today. The part that stood out to me personally was in the "A University in Flux" section, where in it contains different periods that shaped what it means to be a student at UCI. It was interesting to see how Peter the Anteater evolved from being just the school mascot into being used for one of the most unique traditions on campus. However, learning how ingrained activism is in the shaping of UCI since its opening really puts into perspective how the campus only managed to get where it got to today because of regular students who were passionate for change. I also tried to see if anything about the TA strikes was mentioned, but either I missed it or it wasn't archived in time for the exhibit. It was kind of a shame, since it fit really well into the exhibit.

Despite this, it was pretty cool seeing how everything was put together. There was a lot of media that showcased UCI activism throughout the years, enough to where you learn more about how the youth in general was affected during times of struggle. I don't think full on articles were posted, but there was enough information for someone to research deeper into each topic if they really wanted to. This is a contrast to Professor Robertson's discussion of how difficult it is for historians to gather the bigger picture because of conflicting accounts/lack of accounts. There was a lot of care into archiving different items that were used in each movement. In that way, I felt a deeper connection with students of the past because of I was seeing something that they themselves used to promote their cause.