The Slavery, Colonialism, and their Legacies at Tufts University (SCL) initiative will illuminate the history of slavery and colonialism within and beyond Tufts, shaping the future of how universities study their institutional pasts. Through original, interdisciplinary research, public programming, and community partnerships, SCL will examine:

The historic Black and Afro-Native communities of Charlestown, Medford, Somerville, Boston, and Grafton.

The university’s historical ties to racial slavery, the slave trade, and colonialism in Massachusetts and across the Atlantic world.

The Universalist religious tradition upon which Tufts was founded, and the tradition’s relationship to slavery, anti-slavery, and social movements.

The long presence of African-descended and indigenous students on Tufts’ campus

SCL is sponsored by the Center for the Humanities at Tufts, the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy, the Tufts Archival Research Center, and the Office of the Provost. Launched in 2023, the seeds of the project were first planted by Gerald Gill, beloved Professor of African American history at Tufts from 1980-2007, whose efforts to collect and document the experiences of early students and faculty of color at Tufts led to the first Another Light on the Hill exhibit, staged in 1988. 

Over the last seven years, in conjunction with the Tufts Archival Research Center and the Tufts DataLab, Professors Kendra Field and Kerri Greenidge built the African American Trail Project at Tufts (AATP), mapping African American and Afro-Native public history sites within the Tufts campus and across greater Boston and Massachusetts. The AATP aims to develop African American historical memory and intergenerational community, placing present-day struggles for racial justice in the context of greater Boston’s historic African American, Black Native, and diasporic communities.

Over the next several years, the SCL project will expand these initiatives through scholarly research involving collaborators from across the university, with renewed focus on Tufts’ institutional history. The project will also further connections with community partners such as the Royall House & Slave Quarters, the Medford Historical Society & Museum, the Robbins House, and others.

Project Team

Heather Curtis: Warren S. Woodbridge Professor of Comparative Religion and Affiliate Faculty in the Departments of History and Race, Colonialism, and Diaspora. Director, Center for the Humanities at Tufts. Area of Research Specialization: American Religious History (19th century).

Kendra Field: Associate Professor in the Department of History and the Department of Studies in Race, Colonialism, and Diaspora. Director, Center for the Study of Race and Democracy. Co-founder and co-director of the African American Trail Project and project historian for the W.E.B. Du Bois Center for Freedom and Democracy. Area of Research Specialization: African American and Afro-Indigenous History (19th and 20th century), Public History.

Kerri Greenidge: Andrew W. Mellon Assistant Professor in the Department of Studies in Race, Colonialism, and Diaspora. Co-founder and co-director of the African American Trail Project. Area of Research Specialization: African American and African Diaspora History (19th & 20th century), Public History.

John Hannigan: Archivist and Project Manager 

Dan Santamaria: University Archivist and Director of the Tufts Archival Research Center

Zoe Schoen: Project Manager and Researcher

Kyera Singleton: Center for the Humanities Dissertation Fellow. Executive Director, Royall House and Slave Quarters.