Consortium of Prestigious Academic Institutions to Collaborate on SlaveVoyages.org
Emory University in Atlanta will now bring in a group of partners to help it maintain and enhance its SlaveVoyages.org project. The website documents nearly 50,000 transatlantic passages of slave ships between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries.
University of Colorado Establishes the Center for African and African American Studies
The center will support teaching, research, and creative work on the history, culture, and struggles of people of African descent and provide a platform to build on the work of the more than 25 CU Boulder faculty members already making contributions to African and African American studies. Professor Reiland Rabaka will direct the new center.
Black Studies at Georgia State University Transitions to Africana Studies
The department of African-American studies at Georgia State University has been renamed the department of Africana studies, reflecting a global approach to teaching and research in the department, as well as national trends in academia, according to the university.
Pennsylvania State University Launches Its Center for Racial Justice
The new center will be dedicated to research and scholarship around racism and racial bias. It will be housed within the Social Science Research Institute, which aims to foster research addressing critical human and social problems.
Hettie Williams Will Be the Next Leader of the African American Intellectual History Society
Dr. Williams is an associate professor of African American history in the department of history and anthropology at Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey. Her teaching and research interests include: African American intellectual history, gender in U.S. history, and race/ethnicity studies.
Oberlin College in Ohio to Establish the Center on Race and Inequality
President Carmen Twillie Ambar said that “this new center will ensure that Oberlin is consistently contributing to the national conversation on race. The center will bring together academic opportunities, co-curricular experiences, career programming, mentorship, community building, and civic engagement.”
San Diego State University Decides Not to Accept the Donation of a Black Music...
In 2020, alumni of San Diego State University donated their John Coltrane Memorial Black Music Archive to the university. Later the university requested $500,000 from the donors to properly handle the collection. The university has now decided not to accept the donation.
Louisiana State University Acquires Large Collection of African American Poetry
Louisiana State University has acquired The Wyatt Houston Day Collection of Poetry by African Americans. This collection of more than 800 works includes poetry from the 18th century, the Harlem Renaissance, and later works including up to the present.
The University of Tennessee Acquires the Personal Archives of Artist Beauford Delaney
The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Libraries has acquired the complete personal archive of internationally renowned modernist painter Beauford Delaney (1901–1979). Delaney was a member of the Harlem Renaissance and one of the leading modernist painters of his time.
Brandeis University Creates Its First Endowed Chair in Black Studies
The Marta F. Kauffman ’78 Professorship in African and African American Studies will support a distinguished scholar with a concentration in the study of the peoples and cultures of Africa and the African diaspora.
Northwestern Faculty Seek to Change the Name of African American Studies Department
The department of African American studies at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, has voted unanimously to rename the department to Black studies. The process of officially renaming the department could take as long as a year.
Henry Louis Gates Jr. Is Editor-in-Chief of the Oxford Dictionary of African American English
Oxford University Press has announced that it is embarking on a project to create the Oxford Dictionary of African American English. Harvard University's Henry Louis Gates Jr. has been named editor-in-chief of the project.
Emory University Offering the First Ph.D. Program in Black Studies in the Southeastern United...
Carol Anderson, the Charles Howard Candler Professor and chair of the African American studies department at Emory University in Atlanta, has announced that the first cohort of Ph.D. students in African American studies will begin the program in the fall of 2023. It will be the first doctoral program in the field in the southeastern United States.
Black Bibliography Project Gets Increased Funding to Expand Its Database
Meredith McGill, chair of the department of English at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and Jacqueline Goldsby, a professor of English, African American studies, and American studies at Yale, are developing a digital database dedicated to the study of Black-authored and Black-published books, magazines, and newspapers.
UCLA Law School Project Tracks Anti-Critical Race Theory Efforts Nationwide
The law school’s CRT Forward Tracking Project is the first in the United States to precisely identify, catalog, and contextualize these efforts at the local, state, and federal levels.
The Center for the Study of African American Preaching Established at Anderson University
The Center for the Study of African American Preaching at Anderson University in South Carolina will have two missions: developing significant new scholarship regarding the use of preaching in the Black church and creating a publicly available online library of audio recordings of well-known African American preachers.
Henry Louis Gates Jr. Is Editor-in-Chief of the Oxford Dictionary of African American English
Oxford University Press has announced that it is embarking on a project to create the Oxford Dictionary of African American English. Harvard University's Henry Louis Gates Jr. has been named editor-in-chief of the project.
Thomas Jinnings: The First Black Student at Harvard?
Who was the first African American student at Harvard? This question is not as easy to answer as one might think – and, with the recent discovery of a name buried in an 1841 Harvard catalogue, a new possible answer has come to light.
The College Board Introduces an Advanced Placement Course on African American Studies
This fall for the first time, there is an Advanced Placement course in African American studies. The course is being offered in 60 high schools throughout the United States. The new offering makes a total of 40 Advanced Placement tests and it is the first new subject added since 2014.
Emory University Has Announced the Debut of a Ph.D. Program in African American Studies
Emory University states that the doctoral program is the first of its kind in the southeastern United States and the first at a private university in the entire South. Each student in the program will receive specialized training in one of three fields: gender and sexuality; social justice and social movements; or expressive arts and cultures. The first students will enroll in the fall of 2023.
University of Rochester in New York Establishes a Black Studies Department
The new Black studies department will work in close collaboration with the university’s Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies, which was established in 1986.
Williams College in Massachusetts to Add an Africans Studies Major
The nine-course major will consist of three required courses and six electives. Currently, there has been a five-course concentration in Africana studies that consists of two required courses and three electives. With the addition of African studies as a major, the concentration will be eliminated by 2026.
University of Arkansas to Offer a Master’s Degree in Black Sacred Music
The University of Arkansas at Fayetteville has announced that beginning next fall it will offer a master's degree program in Black scared music. The university states that this will be first degree program of its kind in the United States.
Wayne State University Announces a Cluster Hire Program for 30 Scholars Focused on Black...
Wayne State University is launching a cluster hire program that will recruit and hire 30 new humanities faculty and create the Detroit Center for Black Studies. The initiative will support Wayne State's goal to build a more inclusive and equitable university by prioritizing faculty and research centered on the Black experience.
Ron DeSantis Mounts Effort to Challenge Diversity Programs at State Universities in Florida
Ron DeSantis, the newly re-elected governor of Florida, has notified all state-operated universities in Florida that they are required to “provide a comprehensive list of all staff, programs, and campus activities related to diversity, equity, and inclusion and critical race theory,” as well as an accounting of all state funds used to fund such efforts.
The College Board and Governor Ron DeSantis Add Fuel to the Fire Over Black...
On February 11, the College Board issued a statement that said, "we are proud of this course. But we have made mistakes in the rollout that are being exploited. We deeply regret not immediately denouncing the Florida Department of Education’s slander." On February 13, Governor Ron DeSantis said that Florida may reevaluate Florida's entire relationship with The College Board.
University of Pittsburgh to Offer a Ph.D. Program in Africana Studies
The University of Pittsburgh’s graduate program in Africana Studies has announced that it will enroll its first cohort of students in its Ph.D. program this coming fall. The new Ph.D. program will offer students the choice of three different concentrations: Race & Equity, Migration & Community Transformation, and Culture & Creative Production.
Vanderbilt University Scholar Has Established the “Possibilities Project”
The Possibilities Project, under the direction of Chezare Warren, an associate professor of leadership policy, and organizations at Vanderbilt’s Peabody College of education and human development “is an arts-informed knowledge hub committed to improving Black students’ well-being in education and beyond.”
Huge Number of the Nation’s Political Leaders Have Director Ancestors Who Enslaved People
New research by Reuters has found that of the 536 members of the current U.S. Congress, at least 100 have ancestors who had ties to the institution of slavery. More than one quarter of all U.S. Senators have an ancestor who enslaved at least one person. Two justices of the U.S. Supreme Court and 11 of the nation's 50 governors had ancestors who were involved in slavery.
Huge Number of the Nation’s Political Leaders Have Direct Ancestors Who Enslaved People
New research by Reuters has found that of the 536 members of the current U.S. Congress, at least 100 have ancestors who had ties to the institution of slavery. More than one quarter of all U.S. Senators have an ancestor who enslaved at least one person. Two justices of the U.S. Supreme Court and 11 of the nation's 50 governors had ancestors who were involved in slavery.
Dartmouth College Launches the Institute for Black Intellectual and Cultural Life
The new institute will host visiting scholars, artists, writers, activists, and postdoctoral fellows; provide research grants to Dartmouth faculty and staff; fund student internships; and sponsor events such as symposia, performances, and courses, among other activities.
Grinnell College in Iowa Launches the Department of African Diaspora Studies
In 1971, the members of Concerned Black Students at Grinnell College in Iowa presented President Glenn Leggett with a list of 10 demands to improve life on campus for Black students and faculty. Among these demands was the creation of a Black studies major. Now that demand has become true.
Morgan State University Museum Added to the National Register of Historic Places
In 1935, Lillie Jackson was elected president of the Baltimore Branch of the NAACP. Under her leadership, the NAACP membership rose from less than 200 in 1935 to over 25,000 by 1946. She remained president until 1970. Her home was made into a museum and later ownership was transferred to Morgan State University,
Ohio State University Is Launching a Hip-Hop Studies Program
Jason Rawls and Stevie “Dr. View” Johnson have been hired as assistant professors to lead the new hip-hop studies program.
Ball State University Combines Women’s, Gender, and African American Studies
The women and gender studies program and the African American studies program at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, have been combined to form the Department of Women's, Gender and African American Studies. Sharon Jones, a professor of English at Ball State University, has been named chair of the new department.
Vanderbilt’s New Center for Research on Inequality and Health
The center’s scholarship aims to deepen society’s understanding of the causes of health-related inequalities, how they intersect, and how they affect population health. The center’s research hopes to formulate potential solutions to these challenges through advocacy, intervention, and public policy.
