The Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History

Michelle Thomas on the connected struggle for equity for Black students and Black workers

Excerpt Description: Michelle Thomas describes the connection between the Black Cultural Center movement and the housekeepers’ movement as one determined by the goal of equity and resistance to oppression.


Interviewee Name: Michelle Thomas

Interviewer: Charlotte Fryar

Excerpt Transcript: “We were–all of it, both the housekeepers movement and the Black Cultural Center movement was about elevating—it was about equity. It was about acknowledging the dignity and contributions of people who had been marginalized at UNC for two hundred years. That really was the root of it. And so because it was that common purpose the Black Cultural Center movement could not ignore the Housekeepers’ movement because it signified what it was we were trying to accomplish. And there were many who worked tirelessly for both.”

Organization: BCC MovementBlack Student Movement

Excerpt Length: 0:53

Interview Date: 12/26/2017

Interview Location: Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

Campus Space: The Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History

Citation: Interview with Michelle Thomas by Charlotte Fryar, 26 December 2017, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007), Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.