Memorialization has been a growing trend over the past few decades. To date, limited research exists on how memorials affect modern relationships between groups as well as individual attitudes and behaviors. This project focuses on understanding how the first large-scale memorial to victims of lynching in the United States-the Memorial for Peace and Justice (Montgomery, AL)-impacts racial attitudes in the surrounding community. Utilizing results from a longitudinal, two-wave survey of Montgomery residents and two comparative samples of Alabama residents (the treatment group that was made aware of the memorial's contents and the control group that was not exposed to any mention of the memorial or the term lynching), a comparison over time was run on four racial attitudes variables: two resentment items, feelings of racial competition, and social distance. We hypothesize that representation of the memory (i.e. the memorial), exposure to the idea of the memory (i.e. the term lynching), and a respondent's race will affect if and how racial attitudes change. Preliminary results reveal a complicated story: full regression models demonstrate that the memorial had limited effects on feelings of racial competition, but it did lead to increased feelings of resentment and social distance among members of different racial groups. Resentment levels are significantly dependent upon the interaction between race and exposure to the term lynching. In both relationships, blacks without exposure to the term lynching exhibited the least change, followed by whites without exposure, whites with exposure, and then blacks with exposure. While whites' levels of resentment were not substantially increased by exposure to the term lynching, blacks' levels of resentment more than doubled upon exposure. Regarding social distance, being a resident of the memorial city increased levels of social distance from members of other racial groups. Full models also demonstrate that previous racial attitudes at time one are the most consistent predictors of attitudes at time 2. The preliminary results reveal that the role and use of memorialization in promoting positive race relations is potentially fraught with complexities, including the specific content of the memorialization.
