UC Berkeley’s Kroeber Hall is fourth building in 1 year to be stripped of its name
Alfred Louis Kroeber, the founder of the study of anthropology in the American West, is a powerful symbol that continues to evoke exclusion and erasure for Native Americans.
Native Americans on campus, in California and beyond supported the proposal to unname Kroeber Hall. Among them, from left, are Berkeley senior Cheyenne Two Feathers Tex and Ph.D. students Ataya Cesspooch and Alexii Sigona, and Berkeley staff member Phenocia Bauerle. Photo: UC Berkeley/Irene Yi
UC Berkeley’s Kroeber Hall today became the fourth building on campus to be stripped of its name in a year’s time. The decision by Berkeley officials capped a formal review process and was made, in large part, because the building’s namesake Alfred Louis Kroeber, born in 1876 and the founder of the study of anthropology in the American West is a powerful symbol that continues to evoke exclusion and erasure for Native Americans.
University Denames Another Hall, Fourth In 12 Months
Bay City News Service
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This Wednesday, June 1, 2011 photo shows Sproul Plaza on the University of California, Berkeley campus with the Campanile in the background in Berkeley, Calif. For a one-time hotbed of protest, this liberal college town is pretty chill these days. You re more likely to hear rumblings about the latest in the food revolution than people power. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg)Eric Risberg/AP
By Keith Burbank
BERKELEY (BCN)
University of California at Berkeley officials on Tuesday stripped another hall of its name, the fourth in a year s time.
Kroeber Hall, which honored anthropologist Alfred Kroeber, was unnamed because he continues to be associated with the ideas of exclusion and erasure of Native Americans. Kroeber is remembered as the founder of the study of anthropology in the American West.
‘Not so one-sided’: Campus community reacts to unnaming of Kroeber Hall
Karen Chow/File
The Proposal to Un-name Kroeber Hall has elicited more praise than criticism from the UC Berkeley community. Out of 595 comments on the proposal made to the Building Name Review Committee, 85% were in favor of denaming the hall.
Last Updated January 28, 2021
The complicated legacy of Alfred Kroeber will no longer be honored on a campus building after UC Berkeley unnamed Kroeber Hall, a decision that has drawn more praise than criticism.
According to the Proposal to Un-name Kroeber Hall, Kroeber was a founding member of UC Berkeley’s anthropology department and began teaching in 1902. Though he was a pioneer in the field, Kroeber took custody of a Native American man known as Ishi and had him perform as a living exhibit on campus, something the proposal cites as one of the main reasons to dename the hall. The hall will temporarily be referred to as the Anthropology and Art Practice build
San Francisco to rename 44 schools with racist namesakes, including Washington, Lincoln, Feinstein
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A sign is posted outside of Abraham Lincoln High School on December 17, 2020 in San Francisco, California.Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
San Francisco will rename 44 schools, including campuses named after former presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln and Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
The near-unanimous Monday vote by the San Francisco Board of Education, with only one dissenter, comes after years of debate and much scorn, including from Mayor London Breed over the reckoning of historical figures and their contentious, flawed legacies.
“It’s a message to our families, our students and our community,” board member Mark Sanchez said in the meeting, per the San Francisco Chronicle. “It’s not just symbolic.”
UC Berkeley removes the name on a school building over an anthropologist’s controversial past
The University of California, Berkeley has removed the name on its anthropology building, Kroeber Hall named for prominent American anthropologist Alfred Kroeber because of his controversial history with Native Americans.
A proposal to rename the building was submitted last July to the Building Name Review Committee headed up by the school’s chancellor, Carol Christ, according to the university.
Alfred Louis Kroeber, who was born in 1876, was the founder of the study of anthropology in the American West.
The proposal lists several key factors in wanting his name removed including “research practices that were always objectionable to many Native Americans and that society now recognizes as reprehensible and has made illegal.” The proposal then describes the practices, which include collection of remains and sacred funerary objects of Native American ancestors and other indigen