African American Studies is a change agent for the ideology of Black Americans. Black studies as an academic discipline serves to reorient the perspective of African Americans in an effort to regain a sense of pride and cultural identity stolen by white society.
Abstract
Ever since the Europeans forcefully brought Africans west, black people have struggled with a loss of their true culture and identity. The vulnerability of a displaced and victimized race subjected them to view conformity and assimilation as a panacea for racism, discrimination, and oppression. It wasn’t until the 1960s that students began to realize and protest the traditional methods of higher learning where the curriculum was taught through the White perspective without the acknowledgment of contributions black people have made to society. Through rallies and organizations, it was made clear that something had to be done about the stolen ideologies of African Americans being replaced with an outlook from the European perspective. African American Studies is a change agent for the ideology of Black Americans. Black studies as an academic discipline serves to reorient the perspective of African Americans in an effort to regain a sense of pride and cultural identity stolen by white society.
Critical Review of Scholarship
I will be referring to multiple articles and in-class discussions to explain the origin, development and purpose of African American/Black/Africana Studies. The names for the courses and departments: African American Studies, Black Studies, and Africana Studies, will be used interchangeably. James Stewart’s and Talmadge Anderson’s article, “Introduction to African American Studies: Transdisciplinary Approaches and Implications” will aid me in talking about the history and development of Black Studies while also providing the definition of “Black Power.” I will also be referring to the article, “Dr. Nathan Hare” from blackthinktank.com to discuss Dr. Nathan Hare’s role in Africana Studies. From in-class discussions, I will pull a couple points from the videos of Dr. Julia Hare and Stokely Carmichael to add more value to Africana Studies and the meaning of Black Power. Discussion
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In order to understand the purpose of reorienting the perspective of African Americans and the origin of Black Studies, it must first be clear why the current orientation is wrong. Upon arriving in America, Blacks were forced to conform to the ways of western colonialism. “Americanization” for Blacks meant (and unfortunately still means) to “subscribe to and adopt White Western Anglo-Saxon history and culture… (It) requires their social and cultural adaptation to White middle-class norms and European values.”1 Curriculum in learning institutions did not include the benefactions of Africans on society. After many generations of learning everything about what it is to be White, African American people lost hold of what it means to be Black.
Their minds were unknowingly disoriented from being taught to view the world from a White man’s perspective; and what a White man’s perspective was, was that it was bad to be black. To be knowledgeable was to know White history; to be cultured was to know White art; to be American was to know Whiteness. Black people began to believe they themselves were inferior, reaching for the Whiteness placed on a pedestal in front of them. Their sense of pride was lost. What would have been the point of seeking a connection with your ancestral ideology if everything one learned says it is undesirable? Black was not beautiful; it was ugly. This discernment was accepted until the 1960s – a time “marked by the emergence of student power.”
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African American students (and enlightened White students) conceived that the traditional ways of American education was not at all in the interest of black people. The realization of the absence of and the desire for Blackness in education began to boil in the pot of institutions for higher learning after the establishment of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the momentum they created towards abolishing racial discrimination. Black Power, the idea of “…African Americans controlling the social, political, and economic institutions in their community,”3 coined by Stokely Carmichael, harvested the support of blacks across America as they saw that “integration is the illusion of inclusion.”4 The idea of “Black Power” was meant “…to start bringing black people together under a slogan that everyone understood.”5 “Students began to challenge the meaning and purpose of education and forced colleges and universities to reexamine their role and function in American Society… (They) demonstrated that education should and did serve to enlighten a people relative to their civil rights and social justice.“
The birth of first department for Africana Studies took place on the campus of San Francisco State College on February 1, 1968 during a “five-month strike by a campus-wide, multiracial coalition of thousands of students and faculty members.”7 Dr. Nathan Hare was called in by college president, S. I.Hayakawa, to write a proposal and become the first coordinator of the new Black studies program. Prior to Dr. Hare’s acceptance of Hayakawa’s offer, he had been a professor at Howard University. At Howard, he joined with “militant” student leaders to create a Black University Manifesto, which said, “…the Negro University…should be overhauled and transformed into ‘a black university, relevant to the black community and its needs.’”8 Dr. Hare wanted to enlighten the students of Howard on the condition of black people in America in hopes of them becoming the “…leading Negroes if not the Negro leaders’ and in turn have an impact on the entire race.”9 However, his plan was cut short when he and five other professors were fired from Howard for engaging in activities associated with the Black Power Movement. His acquittal from Howard was foreshadowing for his experience at San Francisco State when his refusal to side with Hayakawa and end the strike resulted in the declination of his contract renewal. With his goal still in sight, Dr. Hare continued to promote Blackness and joined the Black Student Union and others in the strike for Black studies.
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The origin of Africana Studies is realization of how America’s education system was inhibiting the minds of Black people and further promoting “racialist and racist ideas.”10 Africana studies serves to “reclaim the minds of our children”11 so they can be able to combat a naturally racist society and push anti-Black attitudes and sentiments out of the social dynamic. Knowledge of and connection with ones origin is what will turn American from a melting pot, where the ingredients are mixed and blended so finely that their individuality is unrecognizable, to a salad where every addition is embraced with its own shape, color, feel, and taste. With the repossessing of the true identity of Black people and the education system emphasizing the “equality, interrelatedness, and interdependence of all races,”12 Black people will be able to thrive at their utmost potential.
Notes
1. Talmadge Anderson and John Stewart; “Introduction to African American Studies: Transdisciplinary Approaches and Implications,” Introduction and Development of African American Studies, (2007): 32
2. Anderson and Stewart, Introduction and Development of African American Studies, 27
3. Anderson and Stewart, Introduction and Development of African American Studies, 30
4. Dr. Woods, Dr. Julia Hare Video
5. Dr. Woods; Stokely Carmichael Video
6. Anderson and Stewart, Introduction and Development of African American Studies, 27
7. The Black Think Tank; “Dr. Nathan Hare,” http://blackthinktank.com/Drnathanhare.html, (2013): 1
8. The Black Think Tank, Dr. Nathan Hare, 2
9. The Black Think Tank, Dr. Nathan Hare, 3
10. Anderson and Stewart, Introduction and Development of African American Studies, 33
11. Dr. Woods, Dr. Julia Hare Video
12. Anderson and Stewart, Introduction and Development of African American Studies, 34
