African American Studies Commons^™

Jessie Fauset’S Not-So-New Negro Womanhood: The Harlem Renaissance, The Long Nineteenth Century, And Legacies Of Feminine Representation, Meredith Goldsmith

English Faculty Publications

Fauset’s texts offer a repository of precisely what critic Alain Locke labeled retrograde: seemingly outdated plotlines and tropes that draw upon multiple literary, historical, and popular cultural sources. This essay aims to change the way we read Fauset by excavating this literary archive and exploring how the literary “past” informs the landscape of Fauset’s fiction. Rather than viewing Fauset’s novels as deviations from or subversive instantiations of modernity, I view them as part of a long nineteenth-century tradition of gendered representation. Instead of claiming a subversiveness that Fauset might have rejected or a conservatism that fails to account for the …

What Does White Supremacy Look Like Today?, Jacob Bennett Mfa

Explorer Café

The introductory slides provide a framing definition: “White supremacy is believing not only that white people are superior based on their skin color, but that they have the right to rule over other people.” Additional concepts that help frame the presentation include “imperialist white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy,” “racialization,” and “colonial ideology.” The presentation then provides an overview of U.S. legal and penal statutes, starting in 18th century Massachusetts, moving through 18th and 19th century federal “fugitive slave” laws, the end of Reconstruction and the beginning of Jim Crow, the 20th century militarization of police force, and the discrepancy between crack and …

Smith, Candace, Bronx African American History Project

Oral Histories

Candace Smith was born and raised in the Bronx. From what she recalls her family lived on the top story of a two family home in the Tremont neighborhood until moving to the Patterson Houses in 1957 when she was around age 8. The home in Tremont was in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood and she does not recall there being any other black families in the neighborhood. On the other hand, when they moved to the Patterson Houses, she does not recall any white families in the neighborhood there. Both of her parents had also grown up in the Bronx, …

Carr, Sylvia, Bronx African American History Project

Oral Histories

Racial dynamics of the Bronx was the central theme of this interview. There was a consensus shared amongst each interviewee that the Bronx during their childhoods was a racially heterogeneous area. The area known as Fish Avenue were Sylvia Carr grew up was primarily composed of very well off blacks. However, the blacks who lived in this area were lighter skinned as each interviewee pointed out. Each participant acknowledged a certain light skinned v. dark skinned power dynamic. Indeed, some of those interviewed were able to “pass” and were often mistaken for white. In addition to the presence of blacks …

Education, Crystal C. Gray

Eddie Mabry Diversity Award

Education is a spoken word poem that explores many aspects of the African American struggle within (self-knowledge). It starts with an African American college student who is disappointed with the lack of courses about her culture. Most curricula in the United States tend to be from a Eurocentric perspective, leaving out a multitude of information about people of color. All groups of people of color have unique experiences, however, African Americans have the most known (or perhaps I should say, unknown) history. The standard explanation of their existence is often limited to the start of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, when …

Playing With History: A Black Camera Interview With Kevin Willmott, Derrais Carter

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

The George Bernard Shaw quotation in the epigraph is both a charge and a warning. Truth is a bitter pill best taken with syrup. Failure to comply could result in the truth-teller’s figurative death. In the case of the black filmmaker, that death looks like empty theater seats. It is a film with no audience, no home. The Shaw quote opens Kevin Willmott’s 2004 film C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America. The film is a mockumentary about what the United States would have become had the South won the Civil War. Using satire to poke fun at a seemingly ludicrous …

Respiration: Breathing Between The Stacks, Jerome D. Clarke

SURGE

How rare are we, who brandish Black and Male identity, in Academia?

In the past two weeks, I have been reminded of my Black maleness in a multitude of ways. I sat alone, subordinate in number, in a dialogue about Internalized Oppression at Diaspora House. Strong women of color discuss this issue while I work to stay respectful and non-oppressive in this space. I sat alone, subordinate in number, in each of my classes, where I am often the only one of my race and class. My race-gender circumstance is a matter of fact to me. How does this Black …

“I’M Trying To Get My A”: Black Male Achievers Talk About Race, School And Achievement, Quaylan Allen

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study seeks to challenge deficit views on Black male education by highlighting the perspectives of academically successful Black males in a secondary school setting. Employing interpretive qualitative methods, I present the narratives of academically successful Black males, emphasizing their reflections on race, school and academic achievement. In particular, this study highlights the educational dispositions and expectations of Black males, including the influences of their support systems on their academic trajectories. One support system comprised of parents, including the academic expectations held of their sons as well as their racial socializing practices. Another support system included their teachers, particularly those …

“El No Murio, El Se Multiplico!” Hugo Chávez : The Leadership And The Legacy On Race, Cynthia Ann Mckinney

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

“Chávez, Chávez, Chávez: Chávez no murio, se multiplico!” was the chant outside the National Assembly building after several days of mourning the death of the first President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. This study investigates the leadership of Hugo Chávez and his legacy on race as seen through the eyes and experiences of selected interviewees and his legacy on race. The interviewees were selected based on familiarity with the person and policies of the leadership of Hugo Chávez and his legacy on race. Unfortunately, not much has been written about this aspect of Hugo Chávez despite the myriad attempts …