by Drew Smith
Faculty members from the University of Arkansas’ School of Journalism and Strategic Media found pictures of students wearing blackface in old Razorback yearbooks.
On page 305 of the 1967 Razorback yearbook, one blackface image shows four students from the engineering fraternity, Theta Tau, putting on a skit while apparently wearing blackface.
Other photos and captions throughout the 1967 book could also be seen as racist, sexist or fat-shaming.
A photo caption on page 467 reads, “Fatty, Fatty, two by four, couldn’t get through the bathroom door.” Page 145 features an image of two black students performing onstage with the caption, “The majority sat back to enjoy the concert as the minority moved to the front of the bus.”
Other Razorback yearbooks document more racial incidents on campus. In the 1982 edition, some costume party choices raise further questions.
These pictures add to the increasingly common discovery of controversial images in yearbooks across the country.
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s page in his 1984 medical school yearbook includes a photo of one man in blackface and another dressed in a Ku Klux Klan robe. Northam, 59, previously acknowledged that he appeared in the picture, but he later said he does not believe he was involved like he initially thought.
After the Northam controversy, a new phenomenon emerged–yearbook digging. Images surfaced at colleges like George Washington University, the University of Maryland and North Carolina University.
Just like many yearbooks document controversies of past generations, posts on social media can haunt members of younger generations.
Last year, a UA student wearing blackface sent out a Snapchat with text that read, “I hope this offends someone.” That student no longer attends the university.
Two students at the University of Oklahoma withdrew last month after a video showed one of the students wearing blackface and using a racial slur.
The “Journal of Blacks in Higher Education” keeps an updated list of campus racial incidents on its website.