Polk Place is the central quad of the University’s campus, surrounded by major academic buildings and enclosed by Wilson Library and South Building. On the last day of classes in 2015, the Real Silent Sam Coalition organized The People of Color Takeover of the Quad, in recognition of the last year’s work around issues affecting people of color on campus, including the campaign to rename Saunders Hall after Zora Neale Hurston. Holding an end of year party in this traditionally white social space on the campus, Black students reclaimed Polk Place a space for themselves.
Polk Place is the central quad of the University’s campus, surrounded by major academic buildings and enclosed by Wilson Library and South Building. On the last day of classes in 2015, the Real Silent Sam Coalition organized The People of Color Takeover of the Quad, in recognition of the last year’s work around issues affecting people of color on campus, including the campaign to rename Saunders Hall after Zora Neale Hurston. Holding an end of year party in this traditionally white social space on the campus, Black students reclaimed Polk Place a space for themselves.
Organization: Real Silent Sam Coalition
Space Use: Open Space
Spatial Organizing Approach: Creation
Date Created: 1941
Campus Space: Saunders Hall
Citation: Interview with Mars Earle by Charlotte Fryar, 3 March 2018, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007), Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.