The University of Pennsylvania & Slavery Project

In recent years, a group of driven undergraduate students at the University of Pennsylvania partnered with the Department of History to found the Penn&Slavery Project dedicated to discovering, analyzing, and publishing the university’s historical ties to slavery. Following a series of articles in the Daily Pennsylvanian detailing their discoveries regarding the university’s financial and intellectual ties to slavery, Penn GHHS has partnered with the Penn&Slavery Project, the Penn Program on Race, Science, and Society, and Penn Medicine’s Office of Inclusion and Diversity to assist in these efforts.

Importantly, many of the university’s ties to slavery occurred through several high-level faculty at our medical school. According to published work by undergraduate student Archana Upadhyay, in the University's early years, Penn lecturers such as Samuel Morton and Josiah Nott supported popular pseudoscience that "pushed ideas of racism and the justifications of racism.” Additionally, Upadhyay’s research suggested that the non-consented use of black bodies for anatomical dissections and teaching purposes was a pervasive practice in our medical school’s history.

In response, the Penn Program on Race, Science, and Society and the Office of Inclusion and Diversity have developed a History in Medicine Summer Fellowship for medical students interested in collaborating with the Penn&Slavery Project to further institutional understanding of our medical school’s financial involvement and intellectual legacy with slavery and racist scientific practices. Medical students interested in applying for this fellowship should contact Kya Hertz at khertz@upenn.edu for additional information.

Moving forward, the Penn Gold Humanism Honor Society stands in solidarity with the work and mission of the Penn Slavery Project and the Penn Program on Race, Science, and Society. Given our medical school’s significant ties to slavery, we hope to collaborate with other student groups to provide a medical student work force to assist in their efforts. In this way, we hope that our efforts contribute to our institution’s understanding and rectification of how our current financial and intellectual legacy may be contributing to present day racist structures and practices.