Reading and Conversation: “Under the Campus, the Land”
Join us for a conversation on Anishinaabe Futuring, Colonial Non-Memory and the Origin of the University of Michigan.
In the 1817 Treaty of Fort Meigs, Anishinaabe leaders granted land to a college where their children could be educated. At the time, the colonial settlement of Anishinaabe homeland hardly extended beyond Detroit in what settlers called the “Michigan Territory.” Four days after the Treaty of Fort Meigs was signed, the First College of Michigania was founded to claim the Anishinaabe land grant. Four years later, the newly-chartered University of Michigan would claim this land. By the time the University of Michigan moved to Ann Arbor in 1837, Anishinaabe people had been forced to cede almost all their land in what had become the state of Michigan, now inhabited by almost 200,000 settlers.
Andrew Herscher’s recent book, Under the Campus, the Land (University of Michigan Press, March, 2025), narrates the University of Michigan’s place in both Anishinaabe and colonial history, tracing the University’s participation in the colonization of Anishinaabe homeland, Anishinaabe efforts to claim their right to an education, and the university’s history of disavowing its responsibilities to Anishinaabe people.
Andrew Herscher and Bethany Hughes will discuss the book and the questions it raises about the University of Michigan’s history and future.
Free and open to the public, no registration required.
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Andrew Herscher
Andrew Herscher’s work endeavors to bring the study of architecture and cities to bear on struggles for justice, democracy, and self-determination across a range of global sites. He is the co-founder of a series of activist research collectives, including Detroit Resists, the Settler Colonial City Project, and the We the People of Detroit Community Research Collective. His most recent book is Under the Campus, the Land: Anishinaabe Futuring, Colonial Non-Memory, and the Origin of the University of Michigan (University of Michigan Press, 2025). He is Professor of Architecture and Faculty Associate of the Native American Studies Program at the University of Michigan.
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Bethany Hughes
Bethany Hughes (Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma) is an Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan. A performance scholar and cultural historian, her work focuses on the representation of Native Americans in theatrical performance and contemporary Indigenous performance. Hughes teaches on Native American Studies, Indigenous performance, race and musical theatre, and American performance. Her writing can be found in Theatre Journal, American Periodicals, Theatre Survey, Mobilities, and Theatre Topics. Her book Redface: Race, Performance, and Indigeneity (NYU Press) articulates the aesthetic, racial, and political implications of the “Indian” in live theatre.