As we write this paper in late 2023, Advanced Placement (AP) Black history, psychology courses and the use of diverse literature written for children and young adults is being banned by many school districts across the United States. Educators are being threatened, sanctioned, reprimanded, and fired. Despite this, some teachers stand steadfast in…

The Library of Congress has acquired the Omar ibn Said Collection, including an exceptional artifact, the autobiography of Omar ibn Said, written in ancient Arabic by an African enslaved man. In this article, I analytically examine the role of literacy in Omar ibn Said's life as informed by African cultures, ethnicities, histories, languages, and…

In this R. Freeman Butts Lecture, the authors engage this year's AESA theme, "Dreaming of Otherwise Worlds and Alternate Nows: Unsettling Colonialisms and Racism in the Social Foundations of Education," through a set of Black knowledge traditions and schools of thought and how these implicate our ideologies about education, specifically…

"Systemic racism" implies that racist policies are embedded in laws and institutions. That claim is patently false as evidenced by Americans having elected a biracial president for two terms and, more recently, a biracial vice president--not to mention blacks serving in the cabinet, in the highest ranks of the armed services, and in…

This essay outlines how Black placemaking, a sociological framework used to study Black residents in urban contexts, might be used to study Black students' experiences at historically White institutions (HWIs) of higher education. Black placemaking engages with the intersection of Blackness, place, structure, and agency. The author argues that…