A SPACE FOR DIALOGUE

The year is 2018 and the Shabazz Center at Dartmouth is known by most students as simply “Shabazz.” However, as recently as 2016, students on campus referred to the building by another name: Cutter. These names and the shift between them were not arbitrary or random; in fact, the building’s name is seamlessly woven into the history of black students at Dartmouth, and the shift reflects students’ priority to have a space wholly dedicated to the empowerment of students of African descent.

The Shabazz Center for Intellectual Inquiry, as it is off­icially named by the College, is currently classified as a Living Learning Community whose mission is to “enhance the intellectual and cultural milieu of the Dartmouth College campus with particular regard to those issues which pertain to the historical and contemporary experiences of people of African descent.”[i] However, in its early years with the College, the building was used as just another dormitory, named for a trustee of the College, Victor M. Cutter. In 1970 the African American Society adopted the building as its headquarters and wanted to claim the space as its own. To do so, the society changed the name of the building to El Hajj Malik Shabazz Temple, named for Malcolm X, and commissioned murals to imbue its walls with meaning.[ii]

Florian Jenkins (b. 1940) was hired to paint the murals, and he arrived on campus in 1972. During his time in Hanover, Jenkins had many conversations with students about their experiences at Dartmouth and their hopes for the future. Together, through these conversations, they came up with the concept for the murals: to depict the life and legacy of Malcolm X, an important historical figure in the civil rights movement who had visited the Dartmouth campus during his political career. By mid-October, Jenkins lined the walls with a set of seven inspirational panels that spoke to the struggle of black students at Dartmouth. The goal was to inspire the students to continue to thrive in an environment where they were marginalized, and to inspire future black students to do the same.[iii]

Primarily located in the public gathering space of the building—now known to many as “The Mural Room”—these murals help to create a permanent space for dialogue where students can convene to discuss the state of black students at Dartmouth, host social events that cater to students of color, and create fellowship within the community.