Drew Brown, a native from Windsor Ontario, Canada, had several acceptance letters from prestigious doctoral programs across the country when he decided two years ago to further his graduate study. But Temple University's doctoral program in African-American studies quickly rose to the top of his list. Now, halfway into his second year at Temple,…

Since 1980, Tufts has offered a minor called Africa in the New World, but for reasons lost to time, the private university north of Boston did not join other schools in the 1960s and 1970s in creating a major in what was usually called Black studies. A faculty-student committee's recommendation in 1972 to do so went unimplemented. African-American…

After more than half a century, the music of Motown not only thrives, it transcends generations. The iconic sound of Motown has led a handful of scholars to write, teach, lecture and share the music, history and business of Motown on their campuses. In its golden age, from 1959 to 1972, the sound Berry Gordy pioneered at Motown Records in Detroit…

Even as a little girl, Dr. Nitasha Sharma aspired to become a college professor like her parents, whose careers let the family spend entire summers or longer in either her mother's native Brooklyn, New York, or her father's native India. She dreamed of long vacations as a grown-up and going home for lunch on weekdays. But during a stay in India…

It's been 21 years since the nation's first Ph.D. program in African American studies was established at Temple University. One of only 10 university departments in the U.S. that trains doctoral students in Black studies, the Temple program is the top producer of Ph.D. recipients in the field with 160 doctoral graduates. This fall semester, Dr.…

Senator Barack Obama's historic candidacy for president of the United States has generated an intense and thoughtful national discussion within Black America. His campaign has brought several issues to the fore. Recently, the author spoke with five of the most preeminent Black scholars in the nation to search out some of their thoughts on five key…

Chicago's South Side has long been a renowned laboratory for groundbreaking research on Black urban life. The city's vast Black population, largely the product of the Great Migration, has made Chicago the home of both a celebrated Black middle class and an unsettling Black lower class. These two extremes have been meticulously documented over the…

This article describes how Dr. Ben Vinson III, the new director of the Center for Africana Studies at Johns Hopkins University and a specialist in Latin American history, is strengthening the center's internationalist orientation. While it took more than three decades for Johns Hopkins University to approve a Black studies program in its arts and…

Every year, the Emerging Scholars edition features a diverse group of rising researchers, thinkers and leaders in various fields. Their credentials and accomplishments distinguish them, but it's the level of social consciousness among the members of this year's class that makes them truly excellent. Whether it's lending a hand to society's…

Last spring, at the height of the frenzy over accusations that three Duke University men's lacrosse players had gang raped a Black exotic dancer during a party, faculty from Duke's African and African American studies department chose to take a stand. With emotions running high, the faculty took out a full-page advertisement in student newspaper,…

In 1966, traditionally White colleges and universities were admitting more Black students than ever because of the Higher Education Act of 1965, which banned discrimination in education. However, the climate on most campuses was decidedly inhospitable to the newly arrived Black students. Thus, there grew a desire to create a political group that…

Black and Hispanic studies are separate fields at most universities. However, at Baruch College, part of the City University of New York system, the Black and Hispanic studies minors are housed under the same roof. The somewhat unique partnership seems to be working, as the minors are among the most popular on the business-oriented campus. Dr.…