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Oral History

Karen L. Parker - On her childhood, family, college experience, and race

Interviewed by Nicete N. Moodie on February 18, 2007

Karen Lynn Parker was the first African American woman undergraduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She discusses her childhood; family history; moving to Los Angels; three marriages; division of race in her neighborhood; parents encouraging her to attend a predominantly while male institution; academics at Women's College; hardships for African Americans in the South; affirmative action process of getting into UNC Chapel Hill; social issues with students on campus; interracial students; foreign students; editor of the Journalism school for Mass communications; courting and dating on campus; the campus uniform; dorm life; gender relations.

Karen L. Parker - On her childhood, family, college experience, and race

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Oral history interview of Parker, Karen Lynn conducted by Moodie, Nicete N. on February 18, 2007 at Greensboro, NC.

Citation: Southern Oral History Program, “Karen L. Parker - On her childhood, family, college experience, and race,” From the Rock Wall, accessed November 23, 2024, https://fromtherockwall.org/oral-histories/karen-l-parker-on-her-childhood-family-college-experience-and-race-relations.

Rights: Open for research. The Southern Oral History Program (SOHP) welcomes non-commercial use and access that qualifies as fair use to all unrestricted interview materials in the collection. The researcher must cite and give proper credit to the SOHP. The SOHP requests that the researcher informs the SOHP as to how and where they are using the material.

View this interview on the Southern Oral History Program website

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In this Oral History

Karen L. Parker

"Most Black students wanted to go to historically Black colleges or universities because there was a sense of belonging. Because one thing about being one of the handful of Blacks on a predominantly white campus socially you can be very isolated." - Karen L. Parker
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