Team profile by members of the Agents of Change project team

“Agents of Change: Portraits of Activism in the History of Duke Health” is an oral history project documenting the work of activists and “change agents” throughout Duke Health’s history. As Duke celebrates its centennial anniversary and engages in a university-wide project to illuminate its past and set goals for the future, what voices are being silenced and what stories are being left out?

“Institutional histories all too often limit their task to summarizing the accomplishments of past leaders and department chairs. Medicine, in particular, has a long history of celebrating “giants who roamed the halls” – larger-than-life physicians and scientists exemplifying nearly superhuman skills as clinicians, teachers and researchers. Less remembered are those figures whose voices challenged the status quo – individuals who (quietly or loudly) advocated on behalf of the excluded and marginalized. Duke Health has a rich legacy of such insider/outsider agents of change, many of whom came from underrepresented minority backgrounds. These stories, while often left out of “official” institutional histories, are the ones that need to be collected, preserved and made accessible.

During the 2023 fall semester, our team explored existing scholarship on the history of Duke Health and identified a variety of potential “change agents” from Duke Health and the Schools of Medicine and Nursing during the second half of the twentieth century. We sought to highlight figures representing a variety of backgrounds and identities (e.g., race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, class, religion) and a range of forms of activism, from radicals directly engaged in political and organizational work to reformers working within the constraints of the system. We also collaborated with a local oral historian, Josephine McRobbie, who provided in-depth training in oral history best practices, including consent, interviewing, ethics and documentation.

After identifying candidates, we worked hard to schedule interviews with the change agents or with their friends and family for deceased individuals. Not every person that we approached agreed to be interviewed and we had to pivot when a few individuals dropped out due to a variety of circumstances.

During the 2024 spring semester, our team completed 20 interviews to highlight 18 activists. The six undergraduate members of our project team conducted all the interviews. They worked in pairs with guidance from our graduate and professional student team leaders.

All the interviews were transcribed and will be preserved in the Duke University Medical Center Archives where they will be open for access to the Duke community and public. Our team showcased the activists in a video gallery that was consciously modeled after the “Heritage Hall” display in the Duke School of Medicine.

We also created a digital exhibit website. The website profiles each individual and organizes them around the themes of racial justice, community health, educational equality, reproductive justice, LGBTQIA+ and sexual health, and labor rights.