The University of Notre Dame announced its intentions to cover murals of Christopher Columbus over the weekend.
University President John Jenkins wrote in a campus-wide email that the murals once reflected “the attitudes of the time” but that they are now “demeaning” to “the indigenous peoples.”
Painted in 1882-84, the artwork has great historical value and resides in the university’s iconic Main Building, aka the “Golden Dome.”
The Native American Student Association of Notre Dame issued a statement via Facebook, applauding the “thoughtful and wise decision,” calling it “a good step towards acknowledging the full humanity of those Native people who have come before us.”
Students have been calling for the artwork’s removal since 2017 when the campus paper called it Notre Dame’s “own version of a Confederate monument.”
The Young Americans for Freedom chapter at the University of Notre Dame is calling on the university to reverse its decision.
“Sadly the University of Notre Dame decided to coddle its students by shielding them from a painting of an important figure in world history,” Grant Strobl, YAF spokesperson and Notre Dame law student, said in a statement. “If we adopt the standard of judging previous generations by current standards, we may reach a point where there are no longer accomplishments to celebrate.”
YAF chapter leader Luke Jones wants his school to “proudly display the remarkable artwork depicting Christopher Columbus.”
The university’s current course of action is to create wall coverings that will hide the 12 renderings but not destroy them. Jenkins’ letter mentions that “it will be possible to display the murals on occasion” but that it will need to be displayed in context.
This raises the question, how would one view an image of Christopher Columbus out of context? Even when briefly passing by the artwork on one’s way to class or the library, it should be abundantly clear the images depict the life of an explorer, not the celebration of the mistreatment of Native Americans.
What the university president truly means when he says the art can be displayed from time to time is that it will only be presented to those who make the choice to go out of their way to encounter the artwork. In other words, Notre Dame will make the campus a safe space, free of artwork or other things that might be controversial, and provide context and trigger warnings on the rare occasion someone may want to view the historical works.
This choice, to strip the university of its rich history, is a part of a bigger and more worrisome trend: the acknowledgment from academia that we must view the past through the lens of today’s culture. This shift in thinking creates a haughty superiority complex for scholars and degrades our history. Of course, in some cases like at Notre Dame, it quite literally covers it up altogether.
Lauren Cooley (@laurenacooley) is a free speech advocate and higher education contributor to Red Alert Politics.
