Two halls at UC Berkeley will have their names removed Wednesday in response to growing awareness of their namesakes’ controversial legacies, campus officials said.
For now, Barrows Hall will be referred to simply as the Social Sciences Building, while the two buildings that make up LeConte Hall will be known as Physics North and Physics South, according to a news release from the university. Their original namesakes were early, prominent members of the university faculty who also promoted racist rhetoric and colonialist ideas.
A process for selecting new, permanent names is in the works, officials said. They will continue to go by their “default” names until they receive new ones.
“The decisions reflect a new urgency being felt by U.S. civic and higher education leaders to remove building names and monuments that memorialize individuals who expressed racist and dehumanizing views,” the university said.
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