BERKELEY, Calif., Dec. 14 (UPI) — Three effigies, life-size depictions of African American lynching victims, were found hanging from a tree early Saturday morning on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley. Police officers took down two of the three cut-outs, while students took the third.
The effigies’ time and placement seemed to correspond to a on-campus protest planned for Saturday — organized in response to police brutality directed at minorities, specifically the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Gardner at the hands of law enforcement.
While it’s not known who was responsible or why they were placed, the effigies depicted real-life lynching victims from the past, and appeared to be hung as a form of protest against state-sponsored violence against African Americans.
“To me this suggested a really powerful public art installation that was trying to provoke people to make historical connection between the history of lynching, state violence against black folks and the contemporary situation that we’re faced with around police brutality and these non-indictments,” Leigh Raiford, an African American studies professor at Berkeley, told the San Francisco Chronicle.
On Twitter, Raiford pointed out that the effigies continue a tradition of repurposing lynching imagery as form of protest.
Without a doubt it is hard for black folks to see these images. But white folks need to see them too. This is not our shame. It is yours.— Leigh Raiford (@professoroddjob) December 13, 2014
The effigies were inscribed with the names of the victims and the dates of their deaths, along with popular protest slogan #ICantBreathe — a nod to Eric Gardner’s last words. One of the effigies depicted Laura Nelson, an African American woman who was raped and then hung from a bridge in Oklahoma alongside her son, after he was accused of shooting the town sheriff.
“This is definitely something of concern,” Cal spokeswoman Claire Holmes said. “We’re not sure what the motivation was.”
Holmes confirmed that police are investigating the incident.
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