Word: afro
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What’s in a name? For some, the switch from a department named Afro-American Studies to one entitled African and African-American Studies in 2003 simply reflected the department’s growing focus on two separate, although necessarily intertwined, fields of study...
...others, this change represented a dramatic shift in a university administration that has not always been welcoming to the existence of a department focused on “black studies.” Throughout the late seventies and early eighties, the Afro-American Studies department had to fight not only to teach courses on African subjects but also simply to stay alive. For these early advocates, this name change was a long time coming...
...After initially denying the demands of students and faculty for the creation of an Afro-American studies concentration—instead of the creation of a committee—University administrators finally reneged on their decision on April 22, 1969 after protests by student and faculty. While this creation story is well-publicized both in Harvard history and on the Af-Am department’s Web site, what is largely obscured in the department’s history is the way these debates continued to inform the creation of the struggling department throughout the seventies and early eighties...
...experience of former Associate Professor Ephraim Isaac epitomizes this struggle. The first associate professor in the newly created Afro-American Studies department in 1969, Ethiopian-born Isaac designed some of the first core courses in the department. The courses included “Black Civilization”, “An Introduction to African Languages”, “Introductions to African Religions and Philosophies,” and “A History of Slavery.” It was understood, according to Isaac, that the courses would focus on topics not only centered around the United States...
...Isaac was put up for tenure as a professor in Afro-American studies along with two other professors but—unlike them—he was not up for a joint appointment. The other two professors were eventually given tenure while Isaac was denied a position. According to Isaac, this reflected a desire on the part of University administrators to shift the focus of the department away from African studies...