Black Studies Had Their Dark Ages

Black studies are now known to be in their 'golden age'.
Hindsight provides perfect clarity
Reality was very different.

By Mario Cacciottolo

A famous quote doing the rounds in 1964 went something like this: "The two things that we black folk need most is a lot of patience and a sense of irony." It was said by Juenbug Jabbo Jones in a Pool Hall address, and turned out to be rather prophetic. Irony might not be everyone's way of dealing with matters, but patience has certainly paid off for black culture, and black academia in particular.

Black studies are now known to be in their 'golden age'.

Black studies are now known to be in their 'golden age'. There are graduate degrees available in places such as Yale and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Black colleges are established and numerous, with research institutes and Afro-American departments present throughout mixed institutions. Those who participate, by both teaching and studying, are praised and rewarded.

But it wasn't always this way.

This academic field has activist origins, and these were pitted against much hesitancy and reluctance from not only the white establishment but black academics also. During the 1960s many campuses around the nation witnessed the emergence of a black student-led movement, whose objective was to increase awareness of the presence and cultural heritage of black students within the university environment.

With these activist beginnings most prominently instigated by Maulenga (Ron) Karenga and his compatriots at San Francisco State University in 1967, Black Studies took on a highly militant temper of legitimising and institutionalising Black Aesthetics - their indigenous forms and tones. These were later refined into the cultural nuances of African American celebration and material advancement.

But when Black Studies were being fought for in the 60s, there was not universal support from within the ranks of Black intelligentsia, as might be expected. Established Negro intellectuals who were dubious about Black Studies included Sir Arthur Lewis, the West Indian economist then residing at Princeton and Bayard Rustin and Kenneth Clarke who resigned from the Board of Trustees of Antioch College after they acquiesced to student demands for a hall of solely black residents.

Their opposition seems incredible now, especially in the light of the success and overwhelming acceptance of Black Studies today. But the attitude of the time amongst such individuals is well reflected by Sir Arthur Lewis' statement that "Black Studies will not prepare a black student to be president of General Motors."

Indeed, following the late 60s meeting of The United Negro College Fund there is a story which circulated that further demonstrates the spirit amongst certain black academics towards this subject. Most of the administrators present at this meeting were admitting, with some embarrassment, that their establishments were initiating "some kind of Black Studies" programs to anticipate and forestall student militancy.

However, according to a report in the New York Times, their attitude toward the process was clearly demonstrated by an anecdote which excited great amusement amongst them. The tale was of a student applying for a job and being told by a computer that his training in Black Studies has prepared him only to pick cotton.

Years later, current statistics show the folly of such flippancy. Nearly 92 percent of graduates in social sciences and humanities are very well placed in the public life, and African American Studies majors are as desirable in the market for highly tuned skills of literacy, critical analysis and public diplomacy as everybody else. Business, politics, agriculture, research, law, and even medicine along with engineering have been very successful fields for graduates. Naturally, the more stereotypical opportunities in social programs such as museums and counselling have been equally strong.

Hindsight provides perfect clarity

Hindsight provides perfect clarity, of course, but examination of past attitudes and concerns does generate much interest, particularly when these anxieties are put into context of today's results. Some of the major concerns for those in the upper echelons of college departments in the 60s, particularly those in the humanities and social sciences, were that an autonomous entity - be it department, program or institute - of Black Studies would create a false dichotomy, smack of separatism and violate the concept of academic objectivity.

Assurances were sought that what would take place within the autonomous entity would be educational and not indoctrination. Questions were also raised about the academic credentials of the black lecturers, under guise of wishing to provide black students with the best quality teaching available. This fear was also voiced by Bayard Rustin, the Negro intellectual who was concerned that white colleges would attempt to shirk what he saw as their responsibility to the black community by the expedient of hastily manufactured and meaningless programs designated as 'Black Studies', taught by "semi-literate dahsiki-clad demagogues" with nothing to offer but a "militant black rap". From other members of various faculties there was also the claim that there was simply not sufficient material to support and justify Black Studies as a major field of academic endeavour.

Reality was very different.

The reality was very different. Henry Louis "Skip" Gates Jr., chairman of Harvard University's acclaimed Afro-American Studies Department recently stated in an article printed in The Baltimore Sun that "Black Studies has been legitimised by time". Now many of the most gifted African Americans and others of diverse hue and thought take the classes. Often two-thirds of the student clientele are conscientious whites without any need of liberal pretentiousness. The University of Georgia's major had young white women amongst the first three graduates, including one who finished magna cum laude. One white male who completed his senior honour's thesis in the program there graduated as a first honour graduate with a 4.0 GPA.

One of the University of Georgia's most talented black students is a woman who manages the community outreach of a congressman. Their Institute directs a consortium of eight allied departments that teach nearly 2,500 undergraduates and a dozen graduate students a year. In the case of Georgia's Institute for African American Studies, the basic funding is state, as are most non-science disciplines, but their faculty secured a five-year Rockefeller grant worth a quarter of a million dollars for the consortium.

Professor R. Baxter Miller is the Director of this Institute. When asked about famous alumni, he was reluctant to comment. "The answer could be misleading," he said. "How many accomplished professionals and leaders, for instance, were enlightened by courses of the African American Studies major whatever their own major might have been?" The answer to this question would surely be more telling about the actual impact Black Studies has had on America.

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