Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies - Ford Foundation

64 Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies in the United States
conflict over departmental status—have tended to enjoy the easiest relationship
in their academic communities. For the others, the legacy of conflict
and bickering about status and legitimacy have continued to be
troublesome. Evaluations and judgments about every program must therefore
be made in the context of its particular college and history. At schools
like Berkeley, Cornell, Columbia, and Harvard, the events of 1968 through
1970 deeply divided the faculty; bitterness stemming from those divisions
remains,though muted and controlled.Issues and problems related to Afro-
American studies continue to provoke emotional rather than reasoned responses.
In most places, however, the programs are accepted as “here to
stay,” so both hostility and anxiety tend to be more latent than overt. 40
The history of the efforts to establish Afro-American studies makes us
aware of how deeply conservative faculties are. Change is usually very slow
in academic institutions, and most conflict is resolved by consensus. In this
sense, Afro-American studies was a shock to the system. In the past, new departments
(biochemistry, for instance) were created only after years of development
within established disciplines; the production of scholarship
and fresh knowledge was antecedent to, and justification for, the new department.
Even so, there was friction and dissent. It was many years before
English departments acknowledged the importance of American literature,
and many advocates of the establishment of American studies programs (or
departments) have failed to overcome resistance to what some see as their
novelty. Little wonder that Afro-American studies had a chilly reception.
Many scholars—some out of ignorance and bigotry, others out of healthy
skepticism—wondered whether there was enough there to make a field of
study. Many have yet to be convinced. Those scholars of Afro-American life,
history, and culture who are careless of and indifferent to the opinions of
Whites and Blacks outside their fields will not convince many skeptics. Others,
however, are successfully influencing the scholarly community. Most
often, they are based in the more viable Afro-American studies programs
and, to my mind, constitute the strongest argument for such programs.
With falling enrollments and the budget crunch, there has been considerable
anxiety that Afro-American programs will lose support within
the university. Anxiety has been increased by the fact that most such pro-