Date of Award
May 2020
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
History
Committee Member
Pamela Mack
Committee Member
Joshua C Catalano
Committee Member
Orville V Burton
Abstract
As NASA propelled mankind beyond the limits of the earth, women and African American employees fought against discriminatory structures and systems within the agency. Since its inception, NASA administrators and NASA’s black employees had a tenuous relationship. Black employees did not trust their supervisors, NASA Equal Employment Opportunity staff, or the discrimination reporting processes. Utilizing the case files of the class action lawsuit MEAN v Fletcher, new oral interviews, NASA EEO and administrative archives, and US Congressional hearings, this thesis argues that NASA was structurally and systemically racially discriminatory. NASA’s problems were similar to those at other technological agencies, both within the US and globally, but NASA lagged behind other US governmental agencies in both the number and the percentage of minority employees.
Recommended Citation
Calvino, Ruth Joy, ""A Phenomenon to Monitor:" Racial Discrimination at NASA, 1974-1985" (2020). All Theses. 3281.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_theses/3281