Africana Studies at San Diego State University: A Model for Hiring in the Discipline

Session Submission Type: Roundtable Discussion

Abstract

Led by the activism of Dr. Bertha Maxwell Roddey, the National Council of Black Studies (NCBS) was founded in 1976 after “calling on Black scholars around the country to engage in dialogue on critical issues of Black Studies” (Karenga, 34). The creation of NCBS was one of the many strategies and institutions implemented in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s to help build the foundation for the discipline of Black Studies. Roughly a decade later, in 1988, Molefi Kete Asante founded the first doctoral program in Black Studies at Temple University. One of the reasons Asante sought to create a doctoral program in Black Studies twenty years after its institutionalization is because he did not see a thriving discipline but rather a dying discipline. As noted by Ibram X. Kendi in his discussion of this moment: a discipline will become extinct if it does not reproduce itself. Over the next few decades, more Black Studies doctoral programs were created across the country, resulting in roughly twenty programs to date. While Black Studies has slowly fought to establish and formalize itself in the academy, there are still challenges which complicate and contradict the ability for the discipline to sustain itself, to continue to grow and thrive. One of these challenges is the scarcity of faculty trained in Black Studies, who have received a terminal degree in the discipline, and are being hired to teach in Black Studies departments.

This panel will discuss the importance of hiring faculty with terminal degrees in the discipline and how this impacts factors such as curriculum, department culture, and student advising. This roundtable consists of tenured and tenure-track faculty in the Department of Africana Studies at San Diego State University, more than half of whom have received their doctoral training in the discipline. For the last twenty years, Africana Studies at SDSU has been intentional about hiring faculty trained in the discipline and considers non-disciplinary trained applicants only if they are extremely exceptional candidates. While departments with predominantly, if not all, disciplinary trained faculty should be the standard, SDSU’s Department of Africana Studies represents an anomaly in academia and can serve as a model for how other departments in the discipline can work to prioritize the hiring of terminal degree-holders. It is essential for the discipline that this model serves as the future vision for faculty teaching in Black Studies as it is imperative to the discipline’s survival and growth. As one of the few departments nationwide with as many terminal degree holders among the tenured and tenured-track faculty at SDSU's Africana Studies department, we believe this unique situation is important to bring forward to a national conversation.

During the roundtable discussion, discussants will consider the following questions:
How does the fact that we all have terminal degrees in Black Studies benefit our students?
What are the challenges for Black Studies and its relationship to hiring practices considering the current attacks on academia particularly liberal arts and Ethnic Studies programs?
What are the main barriers institutions still face or impose when hiring terminal degree holders in Africana Studies?
Does the prevalence of departments with non-terminal degree holders in the discipline invalidate or handicap the growth and stability of the discipline?
Do departments with majority non-terminal degree holders in the discipline impact the decisions students make when considering graduate and what graduate degree to pursue?
Similarly, do departments with majority terminal degree holders in the discipline impact where and what students decide to pursue in graduate school?
Further, how does the methodological and disciplinary orientation of non-terminal degree holders vs those with terminal degrees in the discipline impact teaching and research in Black Studies?

Sub Unit

• Theory, Practice & Struggle

Chair

• Charmane Perry, San Diego State University

Discussants

• Sureshi M. Jayawardene, San Diego State University

• Daniela Gomes, Ph.D.

• Anta Anthony W. Merritt Ph.D.

• Taharka Adé, San Diego State University