Overview:
In the late 1940s, a few short years after the end of World War II, the Cold War began. During this time period, the second red scare emerged, ramping up especially in the 1960s and 70s as hysteria grew over the perceived threat of communism spreading across the globe as the US intervened in war at Vietnam. Not surprisingly, xenophobia in the US was painstakingly high then, so life for international students in the United States was plagued by an urgency to be forced to assimilate, which often meant accepting American culture as the “sophisticated” and “correct” way of life. TCU, behaving as a more conservative academic institution, was certainly not exempt from this propagandizing of American superiority. Though the university established an International Students Association (ISA) in 1971, its purpose was not progressive. Instead, this student organization originally functioned as a weapon that forced international students into the cultural melting pot at the expense of their own cultural identities. However, in 1982, the ISA began to transform into a more accepting and less problematic organization on campus when Rosena Clarke, a black woman from the Bahamas, transferred to TCU.
All about Rosena:
Rosena Clarke was a student at TCU from 1982 to 1985. Before her arrival at TCU, she attended College of the Bahamas, where she was from. She was one of a select few seniors chosen to be “Featured seniors” in the 1985 yearbook because of her contributions to the university through outstanding leadership. Rosena was involved on campus as a member of the service fraternity Alpha Phi Omega, the 1984-85 Mortar Board Treasurer, the Alumnae Relations Chair for Black Student Caucus, a member of the Social Work Club, and a resident assistant for Colby Hall. Most notably though, she is so integral to the history of TCU as an institution because of the role she took on as an advocate for international students on campus as a leader in the International Students Association (ISA), for which she was the president during the 1984-1985 term. While at TCU, Rosena dedicated much of her time assisting other international students, like herself, who were often students of color, adjust to life in the United States. This was the general goal of the ISA since it was brought to TCU’s campus in 1971; however, Rosena took the organization a step further, by making it not only about integrating international students into the “American lifestyle,” but also about preserving their own cultural identities while at TCU. This is reflected in an article from the TCU Daily Skiff in February of 1984 titled “Week brings cultural awareness” in which Rosena discussed what she believed was the purpose of the International Students Week that the ISA organized events for. In the article she said, “In addition to giving TCU students insight into the culture and lifestyles of other countries, International Students Week allows the foreign students some time to rediscover their own heritage.”
Significance:
Though this shift in the view of what the ISA should be about may at first appear minor, it truly was not. Prior to Rosena’s involvement in the organization, much of its efforts were primarily centered around a one-way cultural change that focused only on the adjustment of the international students’ lifestyles to the “American way.” This problematic goal not only explicitly undermined the slogan of the organization, “In our diversity lies our unity,” but it also promoted a type of “colonization of the mind,” mentioned by indigenous scholar Haunani-Kay Trask, by imposing American ideals on international students while forcing them to reject their own because of a Western framing of any dissimilar culture as "primitive." In addition to this, the one-way cultural change of international students prompted by the ISA also suggested a cultural belief in American white supremacy, discussed by one of the founders of the Black Lives Matter movement, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, because of how American ethnocentrism is heavily white-washed due to a country-wide history based in racist colonialism. Moreover, only emphasizing the need of international students to change, promotes these aforementioned problematic ideals because it suggests a devaluation of any cultural practices not viewed as “American,” which was then and still is today, defined widely through an upper-middle class white narrative. An example of these racist and ethnocentric attitudes in action is presented through the rhetoric used in the TCU Daily Skiff article from September 1984 titled “International students get acquainted at annual picnic.” In this article, Rosena talks about the “responsibility” she feels as a part of the ISA to quell misconceptions about her home country, as she once had a student ask her about “African people adjusting to wearing shoes.” Along with that comment in the article exposing racist attitudes by reflecting a perception of white American superiority by students on campus, another issue present within the article is the “responsibility” that Rosena describes. The fact that she felt such a responsibility to educate the ignorantly privileged and thus, justify her own being, reflects a common sentiment that Cherrie Moraga, Mitsuye Yamada, Merle Woo, and many other women of color scholars express in their writing, which is that it is not the duty of the oppressed to explain their oppression, but rather, it is the responsibility of the privileged to educate themselves and use their privilege for the liberation of all those who are oppressed, especially those who face the most interlocking oppressions.
What Now?
Overall, I was able to learn more about Women of Color History in the 1980s at TCU through following the history of Rosena Clarke because of her incredible involvement on campus, as not only a woman of color, but also as an international student. Her intersectional experience as an international woman of color helped provide further insight into the grander scheme of race relations at the university in the early 1980s, which only marked about 20 years since the institution started admitting black students, because she occupied a space telling of how race and nationality interact. As mentioned above, Rosena revealed rather insidious goals of the ISA and worked to remedy them through taking on the immense responsibility of shifting the cultural narrative around international students, who were often students of color and were originally perceived as threatening the white American culture that predominates TCU. However, this unfair responsibility that Rosena felt can be problematic because of the way making people of color responsible for their own visibility and inclusion only perpetuates their oppression and serves to validate the existing racial hierarchy that allows privileged women to ignore the responsibility they have to recognize their own racial privilege and amplify the voices of women without it. This weight of responsibility that Rosena faced in the 1980s at TCU is unfortunately relevant today as cultural education and awareness is still the main focus and responsibility of students belonging to the ISA. This is what needs to be changed next on this campus, and hopefully, through implementing the new Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion component to the core curriculum, the TCU community can see that change, making cultural education and understanding everyone's responsibility.
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