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Have an idea for Subject of the Month?
February 2018
Selectors: Alison Stankrauff and Alison Greenlee
Wayne State University created the Center for Black Studies after a student demonstration in 1970. It gained department status in 1989 following another student rally. In 2015, the name changed from the Department of Africana Studies to the Department of African American Studies. Learn about the student activism that led to the establishment of Black studies at Wayne State.
Alpha Kappa Alpha, 1947
A photograph of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority from the 1947 Wayne University yearbook. AKA started in 1908 with the mission to cultivate and encourage high scholastic and ethical standards and promote unity and friendship among college women of color.
Looking Back on the Revolution - eBooks
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Acting Black : College, Identity, and the Performance of Race by ISBN: 0415944090Publication Date: 2003-01-16Also available in print.
Sarah Willie asks: What's it like to be black on campus. For most Black students, attending predominantly white universities, it is a struggle. Do you try to blend in? Do you take a stand? Do you end up acting as the token representative for your whole race? And what about those students who attend predominantly black universities? How do their experiences differ?
The Black Campus Movement : Black Students and the Racial Reconstitution of Higher Education, 1965-1972 by ISBN: 9781137016508Publication Date: 2012-03-12This book provides the first national study of this intense and challenging struggle which disrupted and refashioned institutions in almost every state.
The Black Revolution on Campus by ISBN: 9780520953529Publication Date: 2012-08-06The Black Revolution on Campus is the definitive account of an extraordinary but forgotten chapter of the black freedom struggle. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Black students organized hundreds of protests that sparked a period of crackdown, negotiation, and reform that profoundly transformed college life.
Harlem vs. Columbia University : Black Student Power in the Late 1960s by ISBN: 9780252034527Publication Date: 2009-07-15In 1968-69, Columbia University became the site for a collision of American social movements. Black Power, student power, antiwar, New Left, and Civil Rights movements all clashed with local and state politics when an alliance of black students and residents of Harlem and Morningside Heights openly protested the school's ill-conceived plan to build a large, private gymnasium in the small green park that separates the elite university from Harlem.
White Money/Black Power : the Surprising History of African American Studies and the Crisis of Race in Higher Education by ISBN: 0807032700Publication Date: 2006-02-01Also available in print.
The history of African American Studies is often told as a heroic tale, with compelling images of black power and passionate African American students who refuse to take "no" for an answer. Noliwe M. Rooks argues for the recognition of another story that proves that many of the programs that survived were actually begun due to heavy funding from the Ford Foundation or, put another way, as a result of white philanthropy.
Views from the Revolution - Print
All the Women Are White, All the Blacks are Men, but Some of Us Are Brave by Call Number: E 185.86 .A4 1982ISBN: 0912670959Publication Date: 1982Second edition available electronically.
This ground-breaking collection provides hours of enjoyment for the general reader and a wealth of materials needed to develop course units on black women.
Blow it up! The Black Student Revolt at San Francisco State College and the Emergence of Dr. Hayakawa by Call Number: LAW LD 729 .C98 K37Publication Date: 1971In 1968-1969 a long, bitter and highly important conflict raged on the campus of San Francisco State College. Little noted or understood by the nation at large, as compared with events at Berkeley, Columbia, Harvard, Cornell and Wisconsin, the significance of the struggle at San Francisco lies in the fact that it was the first attempt by militant black students to control an American college. This is where there demands were formulated and their tactics tested in action. The author of this tense, on-the-scene account of the strike was himself a student at San Francisco and editor of the student newspaper, The Gator.- The Student Voice, 1960-1965 : Periodical of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee by Call Number: OVERSIZE E 185.61 .S916 1990ISBN: 0887363237Publication Date: 1990The Student Voice was the magazine of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the organization that was on the cutting edge of the Civil Rights movement during the 1960s.
Videos (February 2018)
- "University Programs," American Black JournalThis show is a discussion of the effects of a protest at Wayne State to get an Africana studies program. Guests include spokespersons and negotiators for the students Darrell Dawsey, Mikal Ansari, and Leigh Smith, as well as Michigan Chronicle reporter, Michael Goodin. Robert Lasker, editor in chief of South End newspaper (Wayne State's university paper) also joins the discussion over the phone.
Requires Flash.
Under the direction of assistant professor Billicia Hines, WSU students Brandon Wright, Ernest Bentley, Rachel Smith, & Yakeem Tatum perform at the Wayne State University Martin Luther King, Jr. Tribute, January 13, 2017.
Current struggles to make colleges welcoming and relevant for students of color continue movements which swept across campuses fifty years ago. AGENTS OF CHANGE tells the timely and inspiring story of how successful protests for equity and inclusion led to establishing the first Black and Ethnic Studies departments at two very different universities: San Francisco State (1968) and Cornell (1969).
WSU Access ID & Password Required
Websites (February 2018)
- American Black JournalThe ABJ programs represent a wide variety of African-American viewpoints on issues important to the city of Detroit, the state of Michigan, and the nation as whole, ranging from labor unrest in the automobile industry, to the urban civil disturbances in Detroit and across the nation riots of 1967, the emergence of outspoken African American political leaders, and the explosion of Motown music.
- BlackPast.orgThis 13,000 page reference center is dedicated to providing information to the general public on African American history and on the history of the more than one billion people of African ancestry around the world.
Databases (February 2018)
WSU Access ID & Password Required
- African American Experience This link opens in a new window
- African American Newspapers, 1827-1998 This link opens in a new window
- America: history and life This link opens in a new window
- Ethnic NewsWatch This link opens in a new window
- JSTOR This link opens in a new window
- Oxford African American Studies Center This link opens in a new window
Electronic Journals (February 2018)
WSU Access ID & Password Required
- The Black ScholarLaunched in the USA in 1969 The Black Scholar (TBS) is the first modern black studies and research journal. It was founded on the premise that black writers, scholars, activists and artists could participate in dialogue within its pages. TBS' primary mission has been to chronicle, analyze and debate the conditions of and the emancipatory efforts by black people, against a multitude of oppressions that include and cross class, nationality, gender, generation, sexuality, and ideology.
Wayne State University Sesquicentennial
On May 18, in 1868, Wayne State University was officially founded as the Detroit Medical College. The first academic term began on Nov. 3, 1868. On April 22, 1956, the Michigan Legislature adopted Act 183 “to establish and regulate a state institution of higher learning to be known as Wayne State University.”
Throughout 2018, the WSU Libraries invite you to join us as we celebrate our University's rich history and sesquicentennial. The official celebration period will run from Jan. 1, 2018 to Nov. 1, 2018. In addition to the Subject of the Month displays, please check the University Calendar for Special Events and Exhibits.
Pictures of the Display
Main Display
Material from the African American Literature Special Collection
Special Collections in the WSULS
Use the "Request from Closed" button on the catalog record to access these books in the African American Literature Special Collection.
How to Make Black America Better : Leading African Americans Speak Out by Call Number: AALSC E 185.86 .S633 2001ISBN: 0385502141Publication Date: 2001-01-09One of America's most celebrated and respected commentators, BET talk-show host Tavis Smiley brings together the voices of countless widely admired African Americans in a rich, provocative, and solutions-oriented exploration of the challenges facing Black America. How to Make Black America Better opens with Tavis Smiley's twelve "challenges" to the African American community.
Mays and Morehouse : How Benjamin E. Mays Developed Morehouse College, 1940-1967 by Call Number: AALSC LC 2851 .M72 R6 1995ISBN: 0931761891Publication Date: 2004-11-01In this first book-length biography, Rovaris presents an insightful view of Benjamin E. Mays, a giant who represented human dignity, perseverance, dedication, and spiritual harmony to many. The text is supported by interviews with those who knew Mays, as well as primary and secondary sources.
Race and Resistance : African-Americans in the Twenty-First Century by Call Number: AALSC E 185.615 .R21215 2002ISBN: 9780896086524Publication Date: 2002-07-01The "colour line" defined American society in the twentieth century. Will the same be true for the twenty-first? Leading African-American scholars and activists discuss the state of Black America today and the prospects for achieving full civil rights and equality. This broad, inclusive anthology makes a vital contribution to our understanding of racism and how it can be overcome.
WSU Theses and Dissertations
- Learning and Living While Black : Black Students, White Universities, and the Age of Post-Affirmative Action and Post-Racialism by Publication Date: 2013With Critical Race Theory (CRT) and social justice serving as complementary conceptual frames, this ethnographic study investigates the learning and living experiences of ten African American students of a predominantly White university in the Midwest. While several studies have investigated Black students' experiences at PWIs, most notably Feagin, Vera and Imani (1996), much of this research was conducted pre-2000, prior to two important and notable social developments: the systematic dismantling of post-secondary affirmative action policies and the increasingly popular, but highly contentious, ideology of post-racialism. Thus, the purpose of this study was to understand how Black students are faring present-day, in the wake of efforts to dismantle affirmative action in higher education, and to characterize the United States as post-racial, as having moved beyond considerations of race.
Black Students Today - eBooks
WSU Access ID & Password Required
African American Student's Guide to College Success by ISBN: 9781440829307Publication Date: 2015-10-31This encouraging guide coaches African American and first-generation college students on strategies for maximizing their experiences and success on university campuses.
Being Black, Being Male on Campus : Understanding and Confronting Black Male Collegiate Experiences by ISBN: 9781438463995Publication Date: 2017-02-01Explores how race and gender matter on campus and how Black males navigate college for academic and personal success.
Black Men in Higher Education : a Guide to Ensuring Student Success by ISBN: 9781134699186Publication Date: 2015Black Men in Higher Education bridges theory to practice in order to better prepare practitioners in their efforts to increase the success of Black male students in colleges and universities.
Immigrant and Native Black College Students : Social Experiences and Academic Outcomes by ISBN: 9781593327040Publication Date: 2014The literature suggests that African Americans (native Blacks) differ from Black immigrants and children of Black immigrants (immigrant Blacks) in their educational outcomes.
Black in the Academy
eBooks
WSU Access ID & Password Required
Black Faculty in the Academy : Narratives for Negotiating Identity and Achieving Career Success by ISBN: 9781317917878Publication Date: 2015Through candid discussions and personal counter-narrative stories, Black Faculty in the Academy explores the experiences and challenges faced by faculty of color in academe.
Written/Unwritten : Diversity and the Hidden Truths of Tenure by ISBN: 9781469630168Publication Date: 2016-11-07The academy may claim to seek and value diversity in its professoriate, but reports from faculty of color around the country make clear that departments and administrators discriminate in ways that range from unintentional to malignant.
Books in Print
The Black Professoriat : Negotiating a Habitable Space in the Academy by Call Number: UNDERGRAD LC 2781.5 .B53 2011ISBN: 9781433110276Publication Date: 2011Although Black faculty have been present in the academy since the late nineteenth century, it has been during the twentieth century that they have established a presence which has had political, cultural, and epistemological implications.
Presumed Incompetent : the Intersections of Race and Class for Women in Academia by Call Number: LAW LB 2332.3 .P74 2012ISBN: 9780874218695Publication Date: 2012-09-21Also available electronically.
Presumed Incompetent is a pathbreaking account of the intersecting roles of race, gender, and class in the working lives of women faculty of color.
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