Oral history interview with Joanne Peerman, February 24, 2001
Subtitle: interview K-0557, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)
Contributors: Gilgor, Bob, interviewer; Southern Oral History Program; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project); University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library
Edition: Electronic ed.
Publisher: University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill
Published: 2006
Place of publication: [Chapel Hill, N.C.]
Language: eng
Subjects: Interviews; Race relations; School integration; African Americans; African American students; Education; Civil rights; Segregation in education; Civil rights demonstrations; Lincoln High School (Chapel Hill, N.C.); Chapel Hill High School (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Other titles: Interview K-0557. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007); Interview with Joanne Peerman, February 24, 2001; Oral histories of the American South.
Description: Joanne Peerman, a member of one of the first integrated classes at Chapel Hill High School and daughter of "bigger than life" Coach Peerman, grew up in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and attended both segregated and integrated schools. This interview reveals some of the complex dynamics involved in civil rights protest: conflicts within families and concerns about retaliation, the influence of the media, and young people's passionate but not always focused efforts at protest. To Peerman and her fellow junior high and high school students, civil rights protest was not just about achieving certain goals, like diversifying the cheerleading team. It was also an opportunity to test their relationship with teachers and administrators, to assert themselves physically and intellectually, and to simply have fun. This interview also offers a portrait of one of Lincoln High School's iconic figures, Coach Peerman.
Notes: Title from menu page (viewed on March 7, 2007).

Interview participants: Joanne Peerman, interviewee; Bob Gilgor, interviewer.

Duration: 01:33:45.

This electronic edition is part of the UNC-CH digital library, Documenting the American South.  It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.

Text encoded by Mike Millner.  Sound recordings digitized by Steve Weiss and Aaron Smithers.

Text (HTML and XML/TEI source file) and audio (MP3); 2 files : 100 kilobytes, 171.7 megabytes.

Original version: Southern Oral History Program Collection, (#4007), Series K, Southern communities, interview K-0557, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Original transcript: 30 p.

Funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this interview.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

System requirements:  Web browser with Javascript enabled and multimedia player.