This paper reports on the development of a school-based Afrocentric intervention for middle school male adolescents who are at risk for academic failure or underachievement. The intervention combined the principles of the rites of passage movement within African American communities and current thinking on the process of second culture acquisition…

This book uses leading poststructuralist thinkers to expose the mechanisms that U.S. public schools employ to form subjectivity. Political issues that inform pedagogy such as cultural pluralism, the Deweyan legacy, and feminist classroom strategies are read applying constructs taken from philosophers such as Barthes, Derrida, Foucault, and…

Describes and evaluates an adolescent health promotion program that uses the Nguzo Saba and African philosophy to address violence and attitudes that reinforce the use of violence. Results from public housing adolescent reports indicate that the Nguzo Saba had a strong, positive influence resulting in fewer delinquent/violent acts. (GR)

Calls for education that acknowledges the multiple perspectives of our multicultural society to build a community that is attentive to differences and open to the idea of cultural plurality. African Americans and other minority groups must be allowed to tell their own stories. (SLD)

Discusses the growing disagreement between Afrocentrists and supporters of Western tradition. Addresses separatism, ethnocentrism, and the push for a pluralistic national curriculum with national testing. Suggests that the more important question may be how and whether schools can function in the profound religiosity of both sides. (DK)

Analyzes the perceptions and expectations of 35 African-American parents regarding African-American independent schooling, using the framework of M. K. Asante (1980). Interviews with these parents suggest that Afrocentrism is a process of individual transformation. More African-American parents are looking at schooling in broader social contexts.…

Traces the historical origins of the controversy surrounding Afrocentric education versus education based on the traditional canon of the Western world to W. H. Ferris' work and his 1913 study "The African abroad or His Evolution in Western Civilization, Tracing His Development under Caucasian Milieu," which has relevance today. (SLD)

The Afrocentric curriculum in many schools tends to oversimplify history in general and African history in particular. Although Afrocentrists want a curriculum that informs and strengthens African-American students, they forget the real need to teach that Western Civilization is a truly multicultural body of knowledge, ideas, and values. (SLD)

Discusses ways in which selected factors limit human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevention efforts in African-American communities, focusing on the stigma associated with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), reliance on traditional models of health, and the lack of funding for needed services and research. (SLD)

Reviews "Understanding Black Adolescent Male Violence" (Amos N. Wilson, 1991). Violence among young African-American males is explored, with a comprehensive analysis of causes of violence in the inner-city and suggested remediation and preventive methods for solving the violence problem. Theories of male development and the role of an…

Examined the interaction of social class and racial identity in urban school reform. Presents a case study of reform at one urban California high school which used an Afrocentric curriculum to help improve academic performance, arguing that the effort was ineffective because it failed to consider ways in which poverty influenced the identities of…

W.E.B. Du Bois was a significant 20th-century educational thinker. His works and educational views have relevance to the social, economic, and political realities of contemporary African-American life. The paper places Du Bois' thinking within the historical context of 1930s African-American life, juxtaposes his educational thinking with that of…

The chapters of this report provide a starting point for the development of authentic prevention strategies for use in the African-American community, specifically for high risk youth. It is neither a "how to" manual nor a mandate for specific program details, but it does highlight the key components of alcohol and other drug abuse…

This article examines the development of Temple University's Institute for Africana Social Work, which is designed to foster an explicit African-centered perspective and practice for social work intervention in African American communities. Various programs and policies initiated by the institute are reviewed. (MDM)

Explores the intersection of race and gender by examining two ascendant political discourses about African American males: (1) Afrocentrism; and (2) black feminist thought. Reviews recent African American history and the development of both Afrocentrism and black feminism. (CFR)