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President Barack Obama speaks about the nuclear agreement that was reached with Iran at American University in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 5, 2015. The president is attempting to sell the benefits of the deal despite strong criticism from many members in Congress. Photo by Samuel Corum/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
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What is #TheRealAU

Black students at American University set to protest racist treatment on campus

Clinton Yates @clintonyates
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All Day Black Lives Matter Social Activism Washington, D.C.

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    2:55 PMWhile Howard and Hampton universities were across town battling over who could call themselves “The Real HU” on the gridiron, farther uptown in the leafier climes of Northwest Washington D.C., black students at American University were using the hashtag #TheRealAU to shed light on incidents across campus that they say are racially motivated. One student told The Washington Post that a banana was thrown at her late at night inside a dorm.

    The school held a town hall on the matter, but at the same time claimed the scenarios were not racially biased. “Regarding the known facts, on Sept. 8, an incident that was not characterized as bias-related occurred in a residence hall,” a university statement said. It’s not the first time something has happened like this in recent weeks, and the AU Black Student Alliance issued a statement of its own regarding the matter.

    It’s also important to understand the climate of American University. Known for turning out many politically minded graduates, many people on campus would consider themselves progressive. But it’s also the kind of place where most of the black people you see there are those working in facilities or food service on campus.

    In 2015, Sydney Gore wrote a story titled “What It’s Really Like To Be Black On Campus: As Told By a Black College Grad” for Nylon magazine. In the essay, she describes how in her final year on campus at AU, the moods of racial tension across the country exploded into a barrage of insults on social media in the university environment.

    “Instead of being met with support by our peers, we were criticized. Students posted statuses about how our chanting was disrupting them from studying because this happened to occur during finals,” Gore wrote. “The backlash was so bad that it got to a point where people were calling our demonstrations a ‘minstrel show’ on Yik Yak. (I want to point out that my student body constantly rallies in support for anything that has to do with the environment, but as soon as the discussion turns to the human lives that occupy that space, allies are silent and nowhere to be found.)”

    There’s a protest scheduled on campus for 4 p.m. on Monday, and we’ll update as needed.

    Clinton Yates is a tastemaker at Andscape. He likes rap, rock, reggae, R&B and remixes — in that order.