“The Eyes of Texas,” once sung at minstrel shows, will remain a campus anthem at the University of Texas at Austin, the school announced on Monday.
The University of Texas at Austin said it would rename a building named for a racist professor, erect a statue of the school’s first Black football player and commission a monument to its first Black undergraduates. What’s not changing? “The Eyes of Texas,”a campus anthem with minstrel rootsthat student-athletes want abolished.
Athletes at the university had called on campus officials to find a song “without racist undertones” in place of the anthem, which has lyrics that were in part inspired by the words of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general.
“‘The Eyes of Texas,’ in its current form, will continue to be our alma mater,” Jay Hartzell, interim president of the university, said in a statement on Monday.
“It is my belief that we can effectively reclaim and redefine what this song stands for by first owning and acknowledging its history in a way that is open and transparent,” he continued. “Together, we have the power to define what the Eyes of Texas expect of us, what they demand of us, and what standard they hold us to now.”
Replacing the song was among a long list of requests made by the athletes, who said that if their demands were not met, they would no longer help the university recruit new players or participate in donor events.
On Monday, after the announcement was made, many athletes said they were grateful for the actions the university had decided to take.
Caden Sterns, a defensive back on the Longhorns football team, thanked the administration on Twitter.
“Great day to be a Longhorn,” he wrote, adding, “Looking forward to make more positive change on campus.
