The video was produced in response to “The Black Bruins,” a similar project created by a group of disaffected UCLA students. It went viral after being posted online in November, creating a stir in the national media and spawning imitations on other campuses, such as a Twitter campaign at public universities in Michigan.
“The Black Beavers” features five OSU students, dressed in Beaver logo gear, standing at parade rest on the steps of the Memorial Union. One of the five, OSU Black Cultural Center President Anderson DuBoise III, looks directly into the camera and recites a four-minute critique of the university’s black student recruitment and retention efforts in the rapid-fire cadence of spoken word poetry while atmospheric music plays in the background.
