Yale's new Committee to Establish Principles for Renaming released its first report on Friday, containing guidelines on how and when to rename buildings on Yale's campus. The committee formed in light of students' dissatisfaction towards Yale preserving the name of their Calhoun College building last spring.
Calhoun College is named after 1804 Yale grad John Calhoun, an influential historical figure known for his pro-slavery beliefs. With this in mind, three Yale professors are slated to compare the committee's report to Calhoun's biography and reconsider renaming the building. They will announce their decision early in 2017.
The committee outlined a general procedure for renaming buildings in the future. Individuals must submit to them historical background that aligns with the committee's specific principles for renaming.
The new principles “allow us to considering [sic] renaming a building in a way that preserves history, to remember but not to honor,” Yale President Peter Salovey said in a New York times article.
Yale's committee seeks to answer whether or not Calhoun's "principal legacy" correlates with Yale's mission statement. Still, the university's action raises the issue of balancing revisionist history with tradition. Calhoun College has had its name since 1933.
The New York Times quoted Stanford University historian David M. Kennedy on the subject: “Memory is contested because history is contested. Controversy is built into the whole exercise of doing history."
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