Restrictions to Access

This collection contains materials that are not available for immediate or same day use. Due to Twitter Terms of Service, the full data collected cannot be made publicly available. The collection is made available as files containing tweet identifiers (tweet ids) for all collected tweets. The identifiers can be used to query the Twitter API and gain access to the full tweet data. Any tweets that have been deleted or made private since the collection date will not be retrieved. Twarc can be used to "hydrate" the tweet identifiers. https://github.com/DocNow/twarc. For questions, please contact wilsonlibrary@unc.edu.

Restrictions to Use

No usage restrictions.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Confederate Monument Protests Collected Tweets #40486, University Archives, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Collected in Fall 2017 (UA.20180110.1), May 2018 (20180511.1), September 2018 (20181008.1), August 2019 (20190808.3), and April 2020 (20200401.1).

Tweets were collected using the twarc (https://github.com/edsu/twarc) python package that makes use of Twitter's search API. The search function of the Twitter API retrieves tweets from the previous seven days. In the first few days of the protest tweets using #silencesam and #silentsam were captured more frequently using the filter feature. Beginning on 15 September 2017, weekly searches for the hashtags were conducted.

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

This finding aid compiles archival collecting, description, and preservation work performed by: Jessica Venlet, February 2018

Encoded by: Jodi Berkowitz, February 2018

Revisions by Jessica Venlet and Laura Smith, June 2018, January 2019, and September 2019; Jessica Venlet and Nancy Kaiser, April 2020.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Chapel Hill (N.C.)
• North Carolina--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Monuments.
• Protest movements--North Carolina.
• Soldiers' monuments--North Carolina.
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
• War memorials--North Carolina--Chapel Hill.
• Wilson, John A. (John Albert), 1878-1954. Silent Sam.

• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Ephemera Collection #40446
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Harvested Websites #40417
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Web Archives Confederate Monument Protests seed group

During the 2017 fall semester, students and other activists organized protests calling for the removal of the Confederate Monument (known as Silent Sam) on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill campus. The protests began with a rally on 22 August 2017 and a continuous sit-in until 31 August 2017. Following the sit-in, organizers continued to protest through demonstrations at South Building and Board of Trustees meetings, daily protests at the monument, a boycott of UNC student stores in September and October 2017, and more. On 30 April 2018, Maya Little, a graduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, poured red ink and her blood on the monument in protest of the statue's existence on the University's campus. On 20 August 2018, a rally protesting the monument was held on McCorkle Place and on Franklin Street. Protesters toppled the monument at approximately 9:20 pm on 20 August 2018.

On 3 December 2018, The UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees announced a proposal to build a $5.3 million facility to house the monument. In response to the proposal, teaching assistants organized a grade strike beginning on 7 December 2018. The strike ended on 17 December 2018 after the Board of Governors rejected the Trustees' proposal on 14 December 2018. On 14 January 2019, Chancellor Carol Folt announced her resignation and ordered the removal of the monument pedestal. The pedestal was removed on the evening of 14 January 2019. Protests and counter-protests by neo-confederate groups and anti-racist activists occurred on 3 December 2018, 23 February 2019, 16 March 2019, and 4 May 2019. During the protests on 16 March 2019, members of a neo-confederate group brought firearms onto campus, but no arrests were made. The UNC-Chapel Hill Unsung Founders memorial and an art installation outside the Hanes Art Center were vandalized on 31 March 2019. On 24 April 2019, anti-racist activists organized a rally, #StrikeBackUNC, to demonstrate against the behavior of police during protests and the treatment of student activists.

On 27 November 2019, the University of North Carolina Board of Governors announced a settlement regarding the disposition of the UNC-Chapel Hill Confederate monument known as "Silent Sam." Among other terms, the settlement granted the North Carolina Division Sons of Confederate Veterans, Inc. ownership of the monument and a $2.5 million charitable trust for expenses related to care of the monument. On 12 February 2020, Orange County Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour overturned the settlement ruling that the NC SVC lacked standing to bring the lawsuit against UNC.

The #SilenceSam Twitter Collection contains tweets harvested from the Twitter (https://twitter.com) social media platform. Included in the collection are tweets containing the hashtags #silencesam and #silentsam. Also included in this collection are captures of a few related hashtags (#boycottunc, #boycottunctownhall, #iaarchat, #silentsham) and two Twitter accounts (@Move_Silent_Sam and @dailytarheel).

The protests were ongoing as of December 2019 and the data in this collection represents only a snapshot of tweets from August 2017 through December 2017, May 2018, August 2018 through September 2018, December 2018 through May 2019, August 2019, December 2019, and February 2020.

• Digital folders (DF-40486/1-4)