A Tour Led by Professor Louis P. Nelson
An illustration of UVA’s landscape
of slavery and early stages of racism
Take the walking tour by yourself or in a group. Listen along to the live Tour and make your way to the next stop when the music plays. Listen to the complete tour and pause as you go, or listen to the individual stops.
Louis P. Nelson’s UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Complete Guide
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 1
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 2
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 3
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 4
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 5
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 6
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 7
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 8
UVA Landscape of Slavery Tour – Stop 9
HIDDEN LANDSCAPES
The lawn side of the Academical Village only shows two floors while the parking side shows three, masking the lower floor to mask the landscape of slavery. The enslaved population of the Academical Village lived and worked on the lowest floor.
EUGENICS AT UVA
A concrete block marks the only building of Jefferson design that was removed – the Anatomical Theatre. In order to practice anatomical dissection, professors of anatomy created an illegal process of grave robbing in which mainly black bodies were pulled out of graves.
MEMORIAL TO ENSLAVED LABORERS
In 2009, students at uva started saying UVA was not telling the truth of its own past and not many faculty were looking at the history of slavery at UVA. So those students started a design studio to design a memorial to get admin attention.