This section provides a broader historical context of Charlottesville and its surrounding region.

To understand and reckon with the history of race and racism in healthcare, we must consider the interworking of American history – particularly, the experiences and legacies of colonialization, enslavement, and segregation – and acknowledge Virginia’s central role in this narrative. Virginia’s history embodies the violence of slavery and the resistance of enslaved people. It also reflects the advances, resistance, and setbacks of segregation and desegregation that were happening across the country in the decades after the Civil War. Virginia’s history has also been shaped by settler colonialism, the process by which a nation strives to eliminate Indigenous people and replace them with a new colonial society on the expropriated land. Since the early 20th century, Virginia has also been a site of transnational migration, particularly of Filipino servicemen and nurses. Filipino migration to Virginia, and to the United States more broadly, has been shaped by the American colonization of the Philippines, which began following the outbreak of the Spanish-American 1898 and continued until 1946.

You can read more and access additional resources on each of these topics. And you can read about the importance of historic, predominantly Black neighborhoods, and the segregated schools that served African American students in Charlottesville and Albemarle County during the era of segregation.

• Race and Ethnicity
  • African American History
  • Filipino American History
  • Native American History
• Historic Neighborhoods
  • Gospel Hill
  • Vinegar Hill
  • Starr Hill
  • Profit Historic District
• Historic Schools
  • Albemarle Training School
  • Jefferson School
  • Jackson P. Burley High School