Land Acknowledgment plaque unveiling Friday
October 30, 2023
Dear Campus Community,
I hope you will join me as we unveil a Land Acknowledgment plaque on Friday, Nov. 3, at 12:30 p.m. between the Dining Hall and Furman Lake. Shelby Parker ’15 will represent the Cherokee.
A CLP with Kathi Littlejohn, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokees and a storyteller since 1986, will take place on Thursday, Nov. 2, 5-6 p.m. in Burgiss Theater. Watch for information about other events and activities on campus during November as we celebrate Native American Heritage Month.
The university has taken several steps toward fulfilling our promise since we made a formal acknowledgment to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians in late 2019. Since 2020, we have read our statement at significant public events, such as Convocation and Commencement, and we presented the written acknowledgment to the tribal council in early 2022. Last week, we launched a new website to house all Land Acknowledgment information.
The plaque includes Furman’s official statement, acknowledging that our campus was once the land of the Cherokee people and that other indigenous groups also traveled the forests and fields where we now study, work, and live. It will be a permanent public display of our ongoing commitment to truth and, as our Values state, to cultivating “a community of learners engaged in an effort to understand themselves, the world, and their place in it.”
Please join us on Friday.
Warmly,
Elizabeth Davis
President