ABSTRACT
This study explores African American students’ experiences of off-campus housing in American higher education after the Second World War as part of a larger discussion about the meaning of educational desegregation. African American students’ exclusion from the most basic of services to allow for education – a place to rest their head at night – was one that Black students consistently identified as the most pressing problem that they faced after registration, and that Black and White anti-racist community efforts often galvanized around. Through the 1950s and 60s, African American college student activists focused on accessible housing both on and off campus, in addition to the more legendary civil rights struggles to integrate local restaurants, movie theaters, and public services, and, eventually campus issues of curriculum, staffing and resources.
