Throughout this article we argue that collectivity and soul inform the work of the expert teachers who we refer to as Jazz Pedagogues. Jazz's complicated history, like teaching, calls for a consideration of the painful, the messy, the beautiful, and the healing. We, a team of university researchers and classroom teachers, examine the ways jazz can…

Purpose: This study aims to investigate multimodal composition as an exercise or tool for teaching students theory building. To illustrate, an analysis of artifacts comprising a student's multimodal composition, which was created in response to a multipart literacy assignment on theorizing Blackness, is analyzed. Design/methodology/approach:…

From a particular vantage point, as an African-born scholar with a politics to affirm my Black subjectivity and Indigeneity in a diasporic context, my article engages a (re)theorization of Blackness for decolonial politics. Building on existing works of how Black scholars, themselves, have theorized Blackness, and recognizing the fluid,…

Two Afro Caribbean immigrants share our individual experiences of navigating the United States (US) academy, and the strengths we derived in the process. We explore the questions: How do we make meaning of our experiences as members of the academe? What accounts for our ability to perform, develop, and grow as scholars in the US? We used the…

It's been 21 years since the nation's first Ph.D. program in African American studies was established at Temple University. One of only 10 university departments in the U.S. that trains doctoral students in Black studies, the Temple program is the top producer of Ph.D. recipients in the field with 160 doctoral graduates. This fall semester, Dr.…

This article provides the syllabus for the course "WRA 125--Writing: The Ethnic and Racial Experience: An Afrocentric Approach." This course will examine writing the American, ethnic and racial experience, using an Afrocentric framework to explore the field of Composition Studies. Students will be introduced to Ebonics/African American Language…

This article focuses on the sense of what an "African" (American) identity could mean when viewed through the processes of migrations and fluid identities of contemporary African immigrant children as they interact with their African (Americans) peers in schools. The purpose of this article is to use data from a study of West African…

This integrative review uses two of Asa Grant Hilliard's books, "SBA: The Reawakening of the African Mind" and "The Maroon Within Us: Selected Essays on African American Community Socialization", to discuss aspects of his scholarly legacy in teaching, history, and psychology. His scholarship is provocative. Hilliard rejected the supremacy of the…

Develops a theory of black studies by examining the works of the foremost writers in, and critics of, the field. Uses the history of the black intellectual tradition as a frame and places black studies in the context of multicultural studies, the contemporary academy, and the development of the global economy and culture. Discusses Afrocentricity…

This article explicates the literature on cultural reattachment Africentric education. Cultural reattachment is a process whereby people of African descent begin to adopt (in whole or in part) aspects of an African culture (e.g., Wolof or Akan). Africentric education is defined as the adoption of Africentric ideology and cultural relevancy.…

Presents a historical perspective on important questions about the scientific status of Afrocentricity, its thrust toward community, advocates of Afrocentrism, nationalism and communality, gender issues, and Afrocentricity's role in comparative studies. The current emergence of African-American studies curricula in universities reflect a…

Black Studies is increasingly being shaped and defined for Blacks rather than by Blacks. Black Studies scholars must adopt a position apart from, outside, or in critique of the established paradigm of Eurocentric scholarship, and operate within an Afrocentric historical paradigm. (BJV)

Reviews Maulana Karenga's "Introduction to Black Studies" (1982). Discusses the academic and social relevance of the discipline and its growth out of economic, political, and historical forces. Concurs with Karenga's Afrocentric approach but notes the difficulties in its implementation within the current academic climate. (GC)

Considers Black Studies as a vital social science, and recommends Afrocentrism as the guiding principle for Black Studies. Identifies the mission of Afrocentrism discipline as a solution to the cultural problems of the African diaspora. (DA)

Discusses how Afrocentricity entered the picture in the western world. Afrocentricity seeks to obliterate the mental, physical, cultural, and economic dislocation of African people by thrusting Africans as centered, healthy human beings in the context of African thought. Examines Eurocentric approaches (dialectical materialism, structuralism, and…