Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies - Ford Foundation

218 Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies in the United States
solidifying collaboration among the Midwest Consortium institutions, the
Ford funds contributed to building “a stable platform” for graduate training
in the field. It is critical to note here that, in addition to a strong institutional
base for African American Studies, Michigan is fortunate enough
to have Earl Lewis as the Dean of Graduate Studies. Although one person
can rarely make a sustained difference at a university (especially a huge state
school), that Lewis is both an established African American scholar and also
an aggressive advocate for the field provides Michigan with an advantage
that few, if any, of the other institutions under review can claim.
Summary and Recommendations
One fundamental question confronting the Ford Foundation at this point
is whether it should continue its aggressive support of African American
Studies as a specific discipline.
Can a case be made that African American Studies merits Ford funding
more than other Ethnic Studies, Women’s Studies, or Area Studies? In
theory, the answer may be probably not. In practice, however, the answer
depends upon the specific goals driving Ford’s ongoing investment in
African American Studies.We can identify three such related goals. The first
involves nurturing African American Studies as a field of scholarship. In
terms of the work being produced and materials making their way into curricula
in many mainstream disciplines, one can say that the field, in general,
is as healthy as it has ever been, if not more so. (This judgment must be adjusted,
of course, as we shift from one discipline to another; for example,
from History to Economics, where departments are fairly reluctant to support
faculty whose research focuses specifically on racial policy issues.
Economists who study race are more likely to be located in policy schools
and Schools of Social Work than in Economics departments.)
The second goal involves the building of African American Studies institutionally;
and with the exception of a scant handful of units, the future
of the field on this front is hazy. One problem evident to varying degrees at
every university visited is that of leadership development.Another is the ex-