Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies - Ford Foundation

More documents

Recommendations

Info

54 Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies in the United States Wesleyan program has undergone changes designed to strengthen and improve it.) The program at the University of Rhode Island is also of interest in this regard. It offers special courses: one, for example, on free-enterprise zones, and another on human resources. Such courses are designed to serve students interested in working in the community or in Third World countries. These courses do not lead to a degree in Afro-American studies, but they serve students in special programs such as a master’s program in international development. The College The most radical kind of Afro-American studies program was that of the independent college—sometimes an all-Black college—within the university. That was the demand at San Francisco State and at Cornell. The ethnic studies department at Berkeley, existing outside the College of Arts and Sciences, had for a while something of a de facto college status. Afro- American studies, however, defected and became a standing department in Arts and Sciences in 1974. No other major university came close to acceding to this extreme demand. Local community colleges sometimes became de facto all-Black colleges. That was surely the case with Malcolm X College in Chicago. It is a community college, supported by public funds, but located in an area almost wholly Black. Formerly Crane Junior College, it became Malcolm X in 1968 when it moved to its present location. Its student population is about 80 percent Black, 8 percent Hispanic, and 12 percent other. While it offers a range of Black-oriented courses, it specializes in computer sciences and health services. Whether or not it was planned to be so, circumstance permits it to be the kind of college the separatists demanded. It is difficult to know how many other such community colleges there are. The Department The more practical model for those who insisted on autonomy was the department. A department had its own budget, could appoint and dismiss its
Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies in the United States 55 own faculty and staff, design its own curriculum, and service its student concentrators without any control or oversight by others. It was also assumed to be a more permanent structure than a program. Some institutions established Afro-American studies departments without much ado. In others, like Harvard, departmental status remained a bone of contention years after it was established. The more it was resisted, of course, the more it appeared to be worth fighting for and defending. The argument against it was mainly that a department normally represented a discipline. Afro-American studies, being interdisciplinary in character, should, critics said, be organized into a program made up of faculty from the various departments serving it. Its defenders most often claimed it was a discipline defined by its particular perspective on a topic none of the other departments offered.In these terms the argument was tendentious. As defined by the nineteenth-century German university, departments were identical with academic disciplines. By 1969, however, that had ceased to be true of American university departments. Interdisciplinary departments had developed within the sciences, and occasionally area studies were departmentally organized.On the other hand,a perspective,which was what Afro-American studies offered, could hardly be thought of as a discipline. Whatever it once was, a department is now largely an administrative convenience. Afro-American studies departments have worked reasonably well in some institutions, Berkeley and the University of Indiana being examples. It did not work well at Harvard, and its problems illuminate some of the weaknesses of the model. Departmental autonomy, it turns out, is not as absolute as some believed. Such autonomy as exists carries problems. Under a program, the president and dean can, in effect, direct departments to make searches and appoint competent faculty approved by the program’s committee. The department has the power and budget to make recommendations for appointment, but, lacking other arrangements, it must find scholars willing to take positions in Afro-American studies alone. In practice, most senior scholars with major reputations insist on joint appointments with the departments of their discipline. So, most often, an Afro-American studies department’s appointment is contingent on another department’s approval of
Page 1 and 2:
A 25th anniversary retrospective of
Page 3 and 4:
Copyright © 1985, 1990, 1994, 2000
Page 5 and 6:
Table of Contents Acknowledgments P
Page 7 and 8:
Preface The Ford Foundation is prim
Page 9 and 10:
viii Inclusive Scholarship: Develo
Page 11 and 12:
x Inclusive Scholarship: Developin
Page 13 and 14:
xii Inclusive Scholarship: Develop
Page 15 and 16:
xiv Inclusive Scholarship: Develop
Page 17 and 18:
xvi Inclusive Scholarship: Develop
Page 19 and 20:
xviii Inclusive Scholarship: Devel
Page 21 and 22:
xx Inclusive Scholarship: Developi
Page 23 and 24:
xxii Inclusive Scholarship: Develo
Page 25 and 26: xxiv Inclusive Scholarship: Develo
Page 27 and 28: The American University in Crisis a
Page 29 and 30: Inclusive Scholarship: Developing B
Page 35 and 36: The Huggins Report Contents Preface
Page 75: Inclusive Scholarship: Developing B
Page 101 and 102: African American Studies from Imple
Page 105 and 106: Three Essays: Black Studies in the
Page 107 and 108: Preface to the Harris, Hine, McKay
Page 109 and 110: 90 Inclusive Scholarship: Developi
Page 119 and 120: Black Studies: An Overview Darlene
Page 121 and 122: 102 Inclusive Scholarship: Develop
Page 127 and 128:
108 Inclusive Scholarship: Develop
Page 129 and 130:
Page 131 and 132:
professional scholars engaged in re
Page 133 and 134:
Page 135 and 136:
Page 137 and 138:
Funding Change: Introduction to the
Page 139 and 140:
Inclusive Scholarship: Developing B
Page 141 and 142:
Evaluation of Ford-Funded African A
Page 143 and 144:
Introduction Beginning in fiscal ye
Page 145 and 146:
General Assessments Beginning in fi
Page 147 and 148:
Page 149 and 150:
Page 151 and 152:
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
Page 169 and 170:
Page 171 and 172:
Page 173 and 174:
Page 175 and 176:
Page 177 and 178:
PART FOUR A Changing Political Cont
Page 179 and 180:
Page 181 and 182:
Page 183 and 184:
The Pinderhughes, Yarborough Report
Page 185 and 186:
Page 187 and 188:
Page 189 and 190:
Page 191 and 192:
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
Page 197 and 198:
Page 199 and 200:
Page 201 and 202:
Page 203 and 204:
Page 205 and 206:
Page 207 and 208:
Page 209 and 210:
Page 211 and 212:
Page 213 and 214:
Page 215 and 216:
Page 217 and 218:
Page 219 and 220:
Page 221 and 222:
Page 223 and 224:
Page 225 and 226:
Page 227 and 228:
Page 229 and 230:
Page 231 and 232:
Page 233 and 234:
Page 235 and 236:
Page 237 and 238:
Page 239 and 240:
Page 241 and 242:
Page 243 and 244:
Page 245 and 246:
Page 247 and 248:
PART FIVE Epilogue: Continuing Chal
Page 249 and 250:
Page 251 and 252:
Page 253 and 254:
Page 255 and 256:
Contributors Farah Jasmine Griffin
Page 257 and 258:
Page 259 and 260:
Page 261 and 262:
Page 263 and 264:
Index Note: Page references in ital
Page 265 and 266:
Page 267 and 268:
Page 269 and 270:
Page 271 and 272:
Page 273 and 274:
Page 275 and 276:
Page 277 and 278:
show all

Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies - Ford Foundation

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?