Black Studies Departments and Community Relevancy: An Exploratory Assessment by Miciah Z. Yehudah, Ph.D. Founder/Director The SBA Center
Clyde Ledbetter Jr., Ph.D. Assistant Professor Cheyney University of Pennsylvania
In the United States, the discipline of Black studies emerged in the 1960s in response to persistent demands by people of African descent for the inclusion of curricula featuring accurate examples of Black life, both ancient and contemporary, at all levels of education. These demands are essentially a calling to task of K–12 school districts, higher education and academia, community enrichment programs, and public policy spaces to invest in a scientific approach that (1) privileges the study of the Black experience, (2) is sober yet optimistic, and (3) does not assume Black intellectual, historical, or civilizational experiences to be deviant. In the early years of the discipline, Black living spaces witnessed the establishment of community enrichment programs nationwide to offset the anti-Black curriculum that the youth were subjected to in public and private schools. The Black Panther Party’s breakfast program and the Philadelphia weekend Freedom Schools are prominent examples, among others. Within academia, in addition to curriculum changes, Black students and faculty from the so-called “traditional” disciplines received community backing to demand that institutions hire new Black faculty to teach their courses. While community enrichment programs continued to be developed by and in Black communities across the country, on college campuses, activists, progressive students, faculty, and staff struggled to create a new home for the courses exploring the Black experience, and to hire the faculty who would teach these courses. Eventually, however, this quest for a more permanent space led to the emergence of Black studies departments in higher education institutions across the United States. While defining the mission and scope of Black studies, program chairs recognized the huge debt owed to the Black communities across the country that offered the initial push for the inclusion of Black studies in higher education spaces. 166
