ScholarWorks at UMass Boston

Title

'Very Quiet Day, Vague Tension': Digitizing and Sharing the Stories of School Desegregation and Busing in Boston

Authors

Andrew Elder, University of Massachusetts BostonFollow

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

4-2016

Abstract

In the summer of 2015, University Archives & Special Collections at UMass Boston began to work with a number of area archival institutions to create “a digital library of material that can be widely disseminated for both curricular and scholarly use” related to the history of school desegregation and busing in Boston. Too often, the history of Boston school desegregation seems weighted down by some of the most visible characters involved – politicians, policy-makers, court officials – so we decided early on to focus largely on identifying materials that tell a more complex, personal history of school desegregation and busing in Boston. After reviewing the range of materials in our care and the myriad rights issues involved, we decided to focus on two collections: the records of Mosaic, a program out of South Boston High School from 1980 to 1989, and the chambers papers of Judge Arthur Garrity, the federal district court judge who oversaw the Boston Schools case.

Comments

Adapted and revised, from a presentation at the 2016 Spring Meeting of New England Archivists in a session titled "Boston Public Schools Desegregation: From Digital Library to Classroom.” Co-presenters included Julia Collins Howington, Giordana Mecagni, Marilyn Morgan, Patricia Reeve, and Josue Sakata.

Images and slides from the presentation at New England Archivists are available below, under Additional Files.

Community Engaged/Serving

Part of the UMass Boston Community-Engaged Teaching, Research, and Service Series. http://scholarworks.umb.edu/engage

Recommended Citation

Elder, Andrew, "'Very Quiet Day, Vague Tension': Digitizing and Sharing the Stories of School Desegregation and Busing in Boston" (2016). Joseph P. Healey Library Publications. 30.
https://scholarworks.umb.edu/hlpubs/30

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.