From Black Wall Street to Reparations

• In Event: Historical Inequality and Current Day Political Engagement

Abstract

In the past decade, there has been a proliferation of racial justice museums across the United States. These museums seek to recount the racial history of Black and white Americans. Through a multi-method approach, we examine the influence of racial justice museums on attitudes towards racial justice policies. First, we hold focus group sessions with museum visitors to understand their experience. Next, we implement a field experiment at the Greenwood Rising Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to understand how exposure to the racial atrocities of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre shape support for racial justice policies like reparations. Finally, we conduct an online experiment that allows us to examine how exposure to museum content shapes behavior outside of the context of self-selected visitors. Findings demonstrate that the museum has a limited shift in attitudes among self-selecting visitors, but exposure to museum content significantly influences the attitudes of people who otherwise may have not gone to the museum. Online survey respondents are significantly more supportive of reparations after viewing museum content. Though changes amongst museum visitors are limited, people are more likely to donate to the museum after visiting.

Authors

• Chaya Crowder, Loyola Marymount University

• Elsa Voytas, Dartmouth College