In addition to sponsoring a range of programming and events, the Fields Center offers space for courses, including this writing seminar on "Human Rights and the Rule of Law" led by Patricia Kennedy, a lecturer in the Princeton Writing Program.
Below left: The Fields Center -- named in honor of Carl
Fields, Princeton's first high-level black administrator -- was
established to provide a social, cultural and political environment
that reflects the needs and concerns of students of color at the
University.
Photos: John Jameson
In his recently published memoir, Carl Fields describes the
difficulty of trying to decide whether or not to accept a job at
Princeton. It was 1964 and Fields, an African American, had to weigh
carefully the prospect of working at a university that had just 12
black undergraduates and four black graduate students.
While it
was no easy decision to come to Princeton, once here, Fields quickly
made an impact and became the first high-level black administrator at
an Ivy League school. Reflecting his many contributions to the
University, the Carl A. Fields Center for Equality and Cultural Understanding was named in his honor.
Titled
"Black in Two Worlds," the first half of Fields' memoir recounts his
seven years at Princeton, and the second half describes his work at the
fledgling University of Zambia in Africa.
The book was published
posthumously -- Fields died in 1998 -- by Princeton-based Red
Hummingbird Press. Excerpts from the manuscript previously have
appeared in the Princeton Alumni Weekly.
Fields started his
Princeton career as assistant director of student aid and, in 1968, was
promoted to assistant dean of the college. In his memoir, he relays how
determined he was upon his arrival to not be pigeonholed as an adviser
only to black students. Once he became known as an adviser to all
students, he worked tirelessly to introduce policies and practices
aimed at increasing the enrollment and retention of African-American
and other minority students.
Among his many accomplishments, Fields pioneered a Family Sponsor Plan
with the local African-American community to provide support for
incoming black students; he helped students form the first black
student group on campus, which soon was followed by other ethnic
organizations; and he was a driving force behind the founding of the
Third World Center, which in 2002 was renamed the Fields Center.
In a foreword to the book, President Emeritus Robert Goheen, who was at the helm of the University during Fields' tenure, writes that by the time Fields left Princeton in 1971 for Zambia, the University had "come a long way toward being an institution in which young men and women of whatever race or persuasion could move about freely and with confidence, intermingling or not as they chose, being regarded and regarding each other as equals."
Book launch, Black History Month events set
In honor of
its namesake and to celebrate Black History Month, the Fields Center is
hosting a book launch of "Black in Two Worlds" at 2 p.m. on Saturday,
Feb. 18.
Participating will be members of the University
community and the Fields family. The Association of Black Princeton
Alumni, the Princeton Human Services Commission, Red Hummingbird Press
and the Fields Center are presenting the event.
The Fields Center also will be hosting a variety of events in honor of Black History Month. A schedule of events is available online.
