Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) Oral Histories
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Abstract
The Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) was a citywide radical student activist group, based at Hunter College (City University of New York) and formed in 1996 out of the dissolution of the CUNY Coalition in 1995. SLAM!'s main organizing concern was to stop the budget cuts and tuition increases at CUNY. The group also organized around welfare, Ethnic Studies, police on campus, incarceration, war, and other social justice movements. This collection consists of oral history interviews in electronic format with SLAM! activists conducted between 2012-2014 by Dr. Amaka Okechukwu, an interdisciplinary scholar, author, oral historian, and Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at George Mason University, as a part of Dr. Okechukwu's dissertation research which she completed in the Department of Sociology at NYU. The collection comprises 15 interviews with SLAM! members and collaborators, consisting of audio recordings in mp3 format and transcripts. As a part of her research process, Dr. Okechukwu's oral history work on this project was additionally reviewed and approved by NYU's Institutional Review Board (IRB). At least one interview, that of Suzy Subways, has been corrected. Topically, the interviews cover subjects such as the fight to save open admissions at CUNY; the origins, life-course, and decline of SLAM; young people of color organizations in New York City in the 1990s and 2000s; radical organizing on the Left in New York City in the 1990s and 2000s; and the individual biographies of each activist. Narrators in this collection include Kazembe Balagun, Jesse Ehrensaft-Hawley, Kamau Franklin, Camillo Gaston-Greenberg, Orlando Green, Neha Guatam, Chris Gunderson, Sabrine Hammad, Rachel LaForest, Mariano Munoz, Lenina Nadal, Irene Neofotistos, Brad Sigal, suzy subways, and Hank Williams.
Biographical Note
SLAM! was a citywide radical student activist group, based at Hunter College (City University of New York) and formed in 1996 out of the dissolution of the CUNY Coalition in 1995. SLAM!'s main organizing concern was to stop the budget cuts and tuition increases at CUNY. The group also organized around welfare, Ethnic Studies, police on campus, incarceration, war, and other social justice movements.
Between 2012-2014, Dr. Amaka Okechukwu, interdisciplinary scholar, author, oral historian, and Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at George Mason University, conducted interviews with activists who were members of SLAM! These oral histories were recorded as a part of Dr. Okechukwu's dissertation research which she completed in the Department of Sociology at NYU.
Arrangement
This collection is arranged alphabetically by interviewee's first name, in the order in which it was received from the donor.
Scope and Contents
This collection consists of oral history interviews in electronic format focused on the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) conducted between 2012-2014 by Dr. Amaka Okechukwu, an interdisciplinary scholar, author, oral historian, and Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at George Mason University, as a part of Dr. Okechukwu's dissertation research which she completed in the Department of Sociology at NYU. The collection comprises 15 interviews with SLAM members and collaborators, consisting of audio recordings in mp3 format and transcripts. As a part of her research process, Dr. Okechukwu's oral history work on this project was additionally reviewed and approved by NYU's Institutional Review Board (IRB). At least one interview, that of suzy subways, has been corrected. Topically, the interviews cover subjects such as the fight to save open admissions at CUNY; the origins, life-course, and decline of SLAM; young people of color organizations in New York City in the 1990s and 2000s; radical organizing on the Left in New York City in the 1990s and 2000s; and the individual biographies of each activist. Narrators in this collection include Kazembe Balagun, Jesse Ehrensaft-Hawley, Kamau Franklin, Camillo Gaston-Greenberg, Orlando Green, Neha Guatam, Chris Gunderson, Sabrine Hammad, Rachel LaForest, Mariano Munoz, Lenina Nadal, Irene Neofotistos, Brad Sigal, suzy subways, and Hank Williams.
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Donors
Conditions Governing Access
Materials are open without restrictions.
Conditions Governing Use
This collection is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use materials in the collection in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).
Preferred Citation
Identification of item, date; Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) Oral Histories; TAM 799; box number; folder number or item identifier; Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, New York University.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Donated by Dr. Amaka Okechukwu in October 2021; the accession number associated with this gift is 2021.055.
Born-Digital Access Policies and Procedures
Advance notice is required for the use of computer records. Original physical digital media is restricted. An access terminal for born-digital materials in the collection is available by appointment for reading room viewing and listening only. Researchers may view an item's original container and/or carrier, but the physical carriers themselves are not available for use because of preservation concerns.
About this Guide
Processing Information
Electronic files from one external drive were transferred off of physical carriers, analyzed, and described at the collection-level with an interviewee-level inventory. Filesystem metadata, including the original dates of file creation, were altered prior to acquisition. New York University Libraries follow professional standards and best practices when imaging, ingesting, and processing born-digital material in order to maintain the integrity and authenticity of the content.
