The African continent remains at the periphery in world affairs, as many have argued. Similarly, many scholars have advanced cogent reasons for this unfortunate reality. The development of the continent is also unimpressive, relative to the potential of the African economies. It is therefore important that Africa pursues its own socioeconomic development approach instead of what appears to be inappropriate policies that are being implemented in most if not all African countries, as argued elsewhere. This article makes a case for African (traditional/indigenous) leadership and examines political leadership in particular with the view of ensuring that Africa reclaims its lost glory and recovers its stolen legacy (to paraphrase George James). The article argues that African leadership should be infused with thought leadership, thought liberation, and critical consciousness. And critical consciousness and thought liberation should be linked to decolonizing the minds of Africans, as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and others have argued.
In this article, the author demonstrates the spiral as being the basic symbol of the system of signs used in the Kongo religion, the Bukongo, to convey spiritual teachings as well as to help the initiates recall what they have been taught. This symbol is shown to be the summary of the teachings of the Bukongo; it explains the celestial origin and destiny of man, the divine completeness of being (the Verb) and universal salvation. The spiral simplified at the most results in the Kongo cosmogram; thus, this article shows that beyond its current cosmological interpretation, the Kongo cross is the synthesis of an African theology. The author also exposes the existence of the spiral in other African cultures in connection with the origin of mankind.
This original study examines the reluctance of oppressed populations to publicly criticize the recognized performance shortcomings of leaders who are members of their identity group. Using critical race theory (CRT), this article utilizes three case examples of Black American leadership that present evidence of what the authors identify as Historical Persecution Reaction Complex (HPRC). HPRC describes four elemental arguments reflecting an oppressed identity group’s attempt to protect itself from perceived further social marginalization, limit the exacerbation of oppression, and to preserve the identity group’s leadership gains in the larger society by supporting leadership despite recognized shortcomings in the leadership. Although asserting HPRC operates as a functional reaction to oppression by serving both as an act of cohesion and resistance to oppressive structures, the authors suggest that HPRC is paradoxically detrimental to oppressed identity groups due to maintaining substandard leadership.
The current study examines cyberbullying and victimization among African American college students who spend large amounts of time on the Internet and using their smartphones. In a survey of 321 African American college students, the most common venues for victimization occurred through text messages, phone calls, and social networking sites. Posting indiscreet images and sharing personal information with a large number of Facebook friends were positively associated with the victimization. Cyberbullying perpetration, as measured by Cyberbullying Questionnaire (CBQ), revealed a significant gender difference, with male students exhibiting higher prevalence. In a multiple regression analysis, the phenomenon of online disinhibition—a lessening of inhibitions during online interactions that would otherwise be present in face-to-face interactions—emerged as the strongest predictor of cyberbullying perpetration. Recommendations for future research include studying the negative impact of cyberbullying among African American adults, particularly in the workplace.
Francis Cress Welsing, a Black psychiatrist and medical school professor, advanced one of the most notable and controversial theories about the perpetuation of global White supremacy. The cress theory of color confrontation (CTCC) seeks to etiologically explain the varying degrees of White supremacist patterns of behavior that shape White interaction with Black people in particular and "non-White" people in general. White supremacy has been under-theorized in Africana Studies save for a few key scholars. The present investigation seeks to locate the CTCC within Africana Studies in terms of Christian’s, McDougal’s, Karenga’s, and Banks’s epistemological models, and to estimate the analytical value it adds to knowledge production in the discipline. This analysis concludes that CTCC both enhances and challenges Africana Studies. It offers a systematic scientific examination of White supremacist behaviors and psychology to equip Africana communities for the continuing needs of the freedom struggle. CTCC also challenges Africana Studies in that in order to move beyond a reactive posture toward racism, it is necessary to direct systematic attention, resources, and research toward studying White thought, in order to understand, anticipate, and defeat its efforts to oppress people of African descent.
Cornel West’s intellectual performance does not fit neatly into the usual academic categories. One of his goals from the beginning, as he himself repeatedly attests, has been "to examine critically the soul of American civilization." This article summarizes his understanding of America and explores some of the ways it has been articulated. It first examines some specific ways that West finds American civilization distinctive in both its institutions and attitudes. It then offers his analysis of what American citizenship means, the ethical commitments inherent in its founding vision, and any contemporary allegiance to it. Finally, it examines the significance West gives to blues and jazz in American life. Since they are, he argues, America’s most distinctive artistic creations, they have played an important role in expressing its democratic soul. The overall understanding of America that emerges from West’s prodigious and multifaceted work provides not only interesting possibilities for American self-reflection but also directions for political change.
Felony disenfranchisement is the removal of the right to vote following a felony conviction. Although it is clear that felony disenfranchisement constitutes diminished political capacity for citizens with felony convictions, what is not clear is the extent to which disenfranchisement reduces participation among those who are eligible to vote; particularly among African Americans who are overrepresented in the disenfranchised citizen population. In assessing the relationship between felony disenfranchisement policy and political participation, scholars have argued that socialization is the primary mechanism linking felony disenfranchisement to the political behavior of voting eligible citizens, finding that in the most policy severe states, turnout is lower. However, what the policy-severity-based perspective fails to acknowledge is changes to disenfranchisement policy that affect the restoration of civil rights; changes that often occur without affecting the severity of felony disenfranchisement policy while dramatically changing the size of the disenfranchised population in a given state. Given the role of socialization in the transmission of participatory norms, assessing the impact of disenfranchisement requires using measures that take into consideration both severity and restoration. Utilizing estimates of state-level disenfranchisement and African American disenfranchisement from the 2004 presidential election, this analysis investigates the relationship between disenfranchisement and African American voter turnout. The findings suggest that African American disenfranchisement plays a unique role in predicting African American voter turnout and lend themselves to the need to further consider the community and neighborhood effects of disenfranchisement on political participation and civic engagement.
The bulk of sociological work examines African American men who are young, unemployed, and poorly educated. In contrast, we offer a nuanced look at Black men living and working in mainstream society—men in the American mainstream although not always identifying as middle class. From 25 in-depth interviews, our data show an apparent contradiction. We find that men account for their success through their individual choices and declared personal motivation to succeed. Yet, throughout their interviews, these men revealed ways they were exposed to critical interactions and opportunities to a larger social network that provided them with tools for mainstream success. In talking about their experiences, these men shared instances in which their racial identity was questioned.
James Baldwin’s stories concentrate on racially and sexually marginalized identities placed within cosmopolitan capitals (Paris and New York). In such novels as Another Country, Baldwin explores antonyms, contrasting ideals and ideologies, and the formation of nonconforming relationships. Individual desire and external social pressure create a complex tension that pulls white and black, homo- and heterosexual characters toward and away from each other. Space repeatedly appears as reflective of the inner landscapes of the characters who are intricately linked to the space in which they act. Similar tensions that characterize their inner conflicts appear also in the concept of cosmopolitanism that defines the cities they inhabit. Indeed, a cosmopolitan world citizen, who is at home everywhere but not belonging anywhere, is torn between opposing forces, between inclusion and exclusion. Similarly, Baldwin’s fiction examines inclusion and exclusion, steering, however, away from simplified constructions of centrality and marginality.
For decades, higher education research has recognized the importance of cross-cultural interaction among students. However, this body of scholarship has largely examined this phenomenon across races, with few researchers examining within race interactions. Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to examine how native-born and foreign-born Black students interact in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) classrooms. Findings reveal that there were both similarities and differences in how each group perceived each other, and that ultimately, cross-cultural engagement was beneficial for their academic development.
The year 2016 not only marks the 20th anniversary of Bernard Magubane’s classic book in historical sociology, The Making of a Racist State: British Imperialism and the Union of South Africa, 1875-1910, but it is also a year in which White South Africans engaged in racial bigotry on social media. A number of commentators, together with South African politicians, have argued that racism in South Africa should be "criminalized." This review essay argues that such an approach is not only ahistorical but that it also mistakes the unessential for the essential. In particular, the review essay conducts a close reading of Magubane’s book in an effort to gain insights on how best to understand racism.
In the 21st century, there still exists a wide degree of misunderstanding concerning the discipline of Africana Studies. The continued lack of information regarding the different schools of thought and clear markers of the differences is problematic on many levels. This work seeks to bring clarity to the questions surrounding the epistemological and methodological locations and to introduce a conceptual metric that speaks to the African-centered school of thought specifically.
A great amount of literature is dedicated to racial identity and self-perception, but very little addresses how hair may play a critical role in how African American women view themselves and others. African American women choose to wear their hair in a variety of styles, including weaves, wigs, dreads, chemically processed, or non-chemically processed (often referred to as "natural hair"). Researchers conducted a study that explored 282 African American females from urban and rural communities, varying in age, socio-economic status, and education levels and discussed the reporting of the hairstyles they currently wear, what styles they believe are more attractive/unattractive, what styles they believe are more professional/unprofessional, and what influenced the style they currently wear. In addition, these women completed the Rotter’s Locus of Control and Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scales. Regression analyses indicated there was a slight but significant positive correlation between a higher internal locus of control and those who choose to wear their hair in a natural state; however, the regression showed no statistically significant predictive value for hair selection. A discussion of the psychological implications for the findings, thoughts of self-perception, and how these findings can be used for future practice is addressed.
Housing dispersal strategies (scattered sites) have its roots in efforts to construct public housing in more ethnically diverse and affluent communities as a result of the overrepresentation of Blacks/African Americans living in public housing developments with concentrated poverty and racial segregation. Today, the use of scattered site housing is more indicative of nonprofit housing providers seeking to end homelessness. Comparable with the demographics of public housing residents, Blacks/African Americans are severely overrepresented in homeless populations across America. This study examined the impact of scattered site supportive housing, located in an affluent and predominately White/European American community to determine any reductions in social isolation and any levels of improved socio-economic status of men who were formerly homeless and primarily Black/African American. This study used five variables identified from earlier studies thought to influence socio-economic well-being: resident satisfaction, a sense of community, impact on income, neighbor opposition or not-in-my-own backyard (NIMBY) attitudes, and impact of scattered site housing on property values. The results showed that the respondents were, on average, more satisfied with the buildings where they lived than their landlord relations or external neighbors. Furthermore, the study found very little neighbor opposition based on race or class and no negative impact on property values from nearby scattered site developments. Based on these findings, recommendations to continue implementing housing dispersal strategies are offered. In addition, directions for future research are provided.
While scholars have long considered the relationship between genre and Black film production, less is known about African American directors’ participation in contemporary Hollywood film genres, especially the spaces where they are least included. An examination of post-2000 Hollywood films reveals that Black directors are routinely underrepresented in the most financially lucrative film genre, science fiction, and are therefore denied the success that comes with it. The underrepresentation of Black directors in the science fiction genre operates in dialogue with racialized ideological discourses about the place of African Americans in U.S. society—stereotyping them out of intellectual cultures. Race-bound practices of marginalization in science fiction films, and thereby top franchises, also impedes Black directors’ ability to attain the highest levels of economic success in the Hollywood film industry. Both outcomes present material and symbolic barriers for the complete inclusion of African Americans in contemporary media institutions and in U.S. society.
This study examined the efficacy of the Jawbone UP platform for increasing physical activity and improving sleep quality among African American college women using a randomized controlled trial. Participants were college-aged (19.9 ± 1.7 years) African American women (N = 69) at a southeastern midsize university in United States. The trial began in September 2013 and concluded in February 2014. Each group received similar brief training to use the respective platforms and weekly emails encouraged regular continued engagement. There was a significant difference at the 8-week follow-up, such that the intervention group decreased step counts relative to the comparison app (9,378 vs. 11,287 steps; p = .02). For sleep, neither group demonstrated any changes in sleep duration, sleep onset latency, wakefulness after sleep onset, or sleep efficiency at the 6-week posttest or 8-week follow-up. This study found no evidence for initial efficacy as a stand-alone tool for increasing physical activity or improving sleep.
Scholars engaged in the history of ideas have given very little attention, if any, to the intellectual history of African-centered psychological thought. Yet, there are pertinent issues addressed in the literature and the various discourses emanating from the literature produced by African-centered psychologists. Intellectual histories allow us to uncover the intellectual antecedents and trace the theoretical steps of the great thinkers that set the foundation for the road contemporary scholars travel. This brief intellectual portrait uses the pioneering work of Kobi Kambon as a representative model of important ideas discussed in African-centered psychology. Kobi Kambon is an internationally renowned scholar in African-centered psychology, Black personality, mental health, and cultural oppression. While this is not an exhaustive treatment of all of Kambon’s major works, it is an attempt to provide a theoretical and conceptual sketch of the intellectual influences, the intellectual contributions, and the intellectual spaces in which his scholarly activity took place. Kambon’s laborious work in developing and defining the parameters of African-centered psychology provides a blueprint and conceptual road map that future African-centered psychologists can consult as they continue to travel along the path of navigating the intellectual terrain of African-centered psychology.
While fun is the ostensible object of hip hop music, the politically conscious aspect of hip hop culture was part of Austrian hip hop from the very beginning. Against a dominant view that Austrian hip hop was an apolitical genre carried by White Austrian middle-class artists only, this article explores the political messages in the early stages of German-speaking Austrian hip hop music. Although only few hip hop artists—especially marginalized youth and people of color—explicitly connected issues of racism in Austria with the African American experience, many Austrian rappers conveyed a political message that related to their immediate environment. U.S.-American hip hop introduced rappers to a more global perspective on politics and was thus an educational cultural project. At the same time, most hip hop groups targeted the political far-right. And racism in a unique Austrian context had even supported political movements.
This study examines the 21st-century Historically Black College and University (HBCU) presidency. First, we gathered information on the skills needed for the 21st century HBCU president. Then, we examined the background of future HBCU presidents. Through an analysis and discussion of the responses of current HBCU presidents, trustees,1 and presidential search consultants, we determined what skills are pertinent for HBCU presidential hopefuls to attain. Lastly, we made recommendations, based on our findings, regarding the skills needed for HBCU presidential aspirants to not only reach the presidency but to perform well upon doing so.
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 24 Black social fathers to understand their reasons for assuming fatherly roles, their impacts on the children, how their non-biological father status affects their parenting experiences, their treatment of their biological children compared with their non-biological children, and how the men are affected by the experience of social fathering. Coding revealed several dimensions of the social father experience related to reasons for becoming involved in non-biological children’s lives (the package deal concept, the need for a male role model, passing on a blessing, and biological father inadequacy), influences on social fathers’ lives (responsibility and self-conscious role modeling), social fathers’ influences on children’s lives (providing love and caring, emphasizing education, and providing discipline), challenges due to social father status (anxiety due to the biological father and limited/questioned authority), and differential treatment of biological and non-biological children (discipline and severity of physicality and comfort with intimacy).
I approach Suzan-Lori Parks’s play Fucking A from the perspectives of postmodern drama and show how the discourse of postmodernism enables Parks to make intertextual links with some other literary works in order to reinvent the past and address a number of social ills and historical scars in the present. I also explore a number of key preoccupations of postmodern aesthetics, which contribute to the creation of indeterminacies in the play and argue how the creation of indeterminacies enables the playwright to increase incredulity toward a number of dominant metanarratives—manifesting themselves in the form of ruling economic, social, cultural, and political systems. Furthermore, I show how Parks raises the issue of African American history and imprints it from a fresh perspective to reshape identities for African Americans in her neo-slave narrative.
Racial gerrymandering in the U.S. state of South Carolina offers a case study to take a unique look at political control, power management, and government communication from the critical perspective of hidden reward structures. These reward structures result from strategic messaging by which an elite’s perspectives deliver to them power by marginalizing others and their perspectives. More specifically, we interrogate one dominant narrative advanced in the United States—American Exceptionalism—by highlighting the irony of how South Carolina elected officials use the 1965 Voting Rights Act to assure a Black Democratic member of the House of Representatives, but simultaneously by gerrymandering elected officials actually reduce the likelihood of a second Democratic representative of any race/ethnicity. Using the paradox of the positive as a critical political public relations framework, we highlight the ways that American Exceptionalism is used to impose control, a control that favors one voting perspective to the marginalization of others in U.S. Southern politics.
Archives are not neutral spaces; the memories and stories of minority communities are often overlooked and underrepresented. Narratives are symbolic representations of the past, and it is vital that a diversity of stories and memories is represented. Likewise, ephemeral artifacts, such as political buttons, are largely marginalized as objects of study because researchers tend to favor evidence found through written, textual documents. However, political buttons are significant because of their role as political memorabilia, marking a nation’s socio-political past, and their role as a narrative tool. Behind every political button, there is a potential narrative or story that is not often told. This article will attempt to address the lack of literature on political buttons in a Canadian context as well as give voice to counter-memory of the women’s movement in Canada and the experience of Blacks organizing for racial equality. Using a case study of selected political buttons from the archival collection of Jean Augustine, the first Black female Member of Parliament in Canada, stories of gender and racial equality rights activism in Canada, told by Jean Augustine, will be examined and contextualized. In particular, buttons representing stories about the National Black Coalition of Canada, the Congress of Black Women of Canada, and the anti-apartheid movement will be explored.
Affirmative action debates remain hotly contested across America. Given how the topic is presented in respective disciplines and core textbooks, students are often misinformed. Introductory textbooks may be one of the few places where students are exposed to significant discussions on affirmative action. In this study, we examine affirmative action policy in American government introductory textbooks published between 2005 and 2014. Our study is modeled on previous, similar analyses of introductory textbooks. We use content analysis to examine the extent to which affirmative action discussions challenge or reinforce affirmative action myths and meritocracy. We conclude that textbook discussions that emphasize the policy intent over policy interpretation tend to debunk affirmative action myths and meritocracy. Meaning, the policy intent focus—presented as the "equality of opportunity" view—challenges historical discrimination and racism while the policy interpretation focus—presented as the "equality of outcome" view—seems to reinforce negative views.
The whole culture of the Black man, his religion, his cosmology, his technology, and so on possesses scientific bases. However, the epistemological bases of his science differ from those of modern Western thought. And, this difference prevents those who study Black African culture on the basis of Western epistemology to discover its scientific scope. In this article, the author develops the naturalized epistemology of the African traditional science. This epistemology teaches us that the African starts from the notion of God, to whom all reality is attributed; the Black African science is mainly a deductive science in which knowledge is of a revelatory nature. Contrary to the Western epistemology, the focus of the epistemology of the African science is the moral and spiritual conformity of the initiate to the religious norms and the praxis of the knowledge he produces. Far from being a bunch of superstitious beliefs, the African traditional religion, which is the basis of African lore, is demonstrated today, thanks to the apologetic tools developed by the Institut des Sciences Animiques, to be a scientific knowledge whose cosmology leads to the holistic "theory of everything." This proves the natural convergence between African traditional lore and Newtonian physics.
This paper studies the dialectics of modernist, postmodernist and neomodernist mind style as exemplified in Peter Palangyo’s novel, Dying in the Sun (DITS). Set in East Africa, the novel, especially its first half with its tragic vision replete with harrowing images of sickness, suffering, despair, and death, has often been described as an example of African neomodernist writing. However, this study appropriately locates it within the context of the "antimodernist" temper of postmodernism. The research investigates the author’s and main character’s narrative mind style referred to in modernism as stream of consciousness, its historicity, and landscape imagery as symbols of the defeat of despair and cynicism, as well as the resurgence of hope that dominates the second half of the novel. It considers the development of the character’s perception as well as the narrator’s point of view from cynicism and death to hope and understanding, and concludes that Palangyo’s visionary mind style in the novel is an African solution to modernist cynicism and nihilism.
The African liberation struggle fought against two intertwined forces, colonization and colonialism. The former implied physical occupation and dispossession of Africans’ land, while the latter implied destruction of their culture. While "political independence" succeeded in an artificial and superficial sense in granting space for African cultural reclamation, this success presented little or no joy in restoring the dignified space that African women enjoyed in pre-colonial Africa. African women — in spite of the granting of "independence" and "freedom"— continue to be denied their freedom in African communities, and relegated to a second-class citizen status. I argue that if freedom is to have any significant meaning for Africans, it must prioritize the African cultural reclamation that puts African women in the center. This can and will be possible when Africans interrogate African philosophical assumptions about women’s "place" in traditional Africa. A thorough exercise in this regard will assist in giving meaning to an African renaissance that will secure liberation not only for African men but also for women.
Public opinion about gay rights is often shaped by egalitarian values. While the extant literature has suggested that African Americans’ value structure tends to be very egalitarian, many popular media accounts as well as some scholarly research indicate that Blacks have, at times, opposed gay rights. We assert that when the media frame gay rights as equality issues, Blacks are more likely to rely on egalitarianism to form their opinions. We use content analysis to show that equality framing of gay rights dramatically increased in 2012, and we use national survey data to show that Blacks’ support for marriage equality also precipitously rose beginning in 2012. Then, we use data from an original framing experiment to show that exposure to an equality frame does, indeed, encourage Blacks to be more reliant on their egalitarian values to form an opinion about same-sex marriage and to be more supportive of the policy.
Diversity or multiculturalism is a concept that includes words such as acceptance and respect. A movement toward diversity should include the examination of differences in a safe, cultivating, and constructive environment. One such environment is classrooms located on college and university campuses across the United States. The purpose of this study was to examine a cross-section of hospitality management students based on their ethnicity. A self-selected convenience sample of students were used with data being collected using a paper-and-pencil survey measuring attitudes and perceptions toward various diversity concepts. It was found that differences existed between the two ethnic groups around specific concepts of workplace equity.
Inter-media agenda setting has assumed growing relevance in the field of media and communication studies. However, there is still a paucity of research regarding how the concept operates within the African media landscape. This research attempts to extend the inter-media agenda-setting concept to sub-Saharan Africa by examining relationships between a wire service (Ghana News Agency [GNA]—ghananewsagency.com) and the online versions of three other news organizations in Ghana (
Despite significant changes in American society, Blacks still lag behind Whites on several important socioeconomic indicators. Attributing this gap to structural reasons (e.g., racial discrimination) or to person-centered reasons (e.g., individual willpower) is highly correlated with the extent to which individuals feel that the government should implement policies to ameliorate racial disparities. Scholars have shown that Blacks have shifted their explanations of Black disadvantage from structural attributions to person-centered over the past three decades. Some suggest that this change is because all Blacks are becoming more conservative while others suggest that cohort replacement is undergirding the shift. I used a newly developed method, the intrinsic estimator, to determine whether period, age, and/or cohort effects are responsible for the shift. I find that, generally, Blacks are less inclined to suggest that discrimination is a credible explanation due to period effects, but the increase in person-centered attributions is primarily due to cohort variation.
While consensus has grown about the prevalence of negative Black media images, measuring the influence of these images and youth rejection or endorsement of these images on Black youth well-being and identity is a new and understudied phenomenon. This study was designed to create a measure of Black media stereotypes for use with adolescents. Focus groups with Black youth ages 14 to 21 were conducted and the data were used to design the Black Media Messages Questionnaire (BMMQ). One hundred thirteen Black youth completed the BMMQ along with measures of racial socialization, racial identity, Black history knowledge, body image, and self-esteem. Confirmatory factor analysis of the BMMQ resulted in three scales with six factors. The factors were entered into correlation and ANOVA analyses. Age, gender, and TV viewing consistently correlated with BMMQ factors. ANOVA results demonstrated that few variables were significant for the positive stereotype BMMQ factors, but endorsement of negative Black stereotype media messages resulted in significant age and gender differences. Analyses also revealed expected relationships among BMMQ, racial socialization, racial identity, and Black history knowledge variables.
The author argues that the continuous connection between Zimbabwean Diasporic Canadians (ZDC) and their homeland Zimbabwe is facilitated by the ZDC’s ongoing relationship and involvement with Zimbabwean African Indigenous Religion (AIR) and Zimbabwean African Initiated Churches (AICs). The two spiritual institutions are used as vehicles to alleviate cultural and racial discrimination as well as the socioeconomic challenges faced by the ZDC. The methodologies of interviews and participant observation were used. Research indicates that ZDC maintain their ties with Zimbabwe through continued engagement with AIR and AIC, who establish and assert themselves as vehicles of interaction and interdependence between Zimbabwe and the ZDC. In addition to their religious preoccupation, these institutions also play an important economic and social role in the lives of the ZDC. The conclusion is that ZDC did not make a complete break with their homeland.
Race is one of the most contested topics. With the political victory of Barack Obama as the first African American president, discussions about racial issues in the United States have surfaced to the forefront of political debates. Yet, critics have argued that there is not much discussion about race given its significance in the history of this country. Informed by critical race theory, this paper examines the underlying reasons explaining the silence of many people about race. It goes on to examine race through a mosaic lens, pointing out various factors directly connected to it, such as racial identity politics, racism, multiracialism, and White hegemony. Finally, this paper analyzes the manner in which socially constructed racial stereotypes have contributed to and have been used to justify the poor socioeconomic situation and marginalization of People of Color, including linguistically and culturally diverse students.
The purpose of this study was to obtain body image information from African American (AA) college-age women (age 18-25) from a historically Black college and/or university (HBCU) and a predominately White college (PWC) with regard to their body image, body shape, appearance, and related factors. Findings from this study will provide the health education profession with valuable information on body image from a cultural perspective of AA women. A one-way ANOVA was used to analyze comparisons between the two groups. Results from the Young Women’s Experiences with Body Weight and Shape were analyzed using five different factors: weight dissatisfaction, slimness as quality of life, interpersonal messages regarding slimness, rejecting the value of thinness, and valuing exercise. Significant differences were found with: weight dissatisfaction (p = .010), slimness as quality of life (p = .000), and interpersonal messages regarding slimness (p = .000). AA women at the HBCU were more satisfied with their body image on these three factors and similar to AA women at the PWC on two factors: rejecting the value of thinness (p = .229) and valuing exercise (p = .828). These findings will assist in developing programming based on racial differences and similarities.
African American candidates have usually struggled to win statewide elections, but they often perform relatively well in some localities, while doing badly in others. Drawing on unique time-series cross-section data collected in the State of Illinois, we examine how racial and socioeconomic contexts determine support for Black candidates in statewide elections. We show that African American candidates tend to do better primarily in counties that have witnessed a growing inflow of highly educated residents. Furthermore, only in communities where a high level of racial diversity interacts with a highly educated environment do residents seem to become more willing to embrace Black statewide candidates. Our findings may help shed light on the enduring question of what the future of a diversifying society holds.
In this article, historical womanist theory, which situates Black women as a unique racialized and gendered laboring class in the United States, is empirically validated through testing of several key fundamental assumptions of the theory. This research identifies ways in which images of Black women’s reproduction and parenting are manipulated in order to justify ongoing regulation and dominance of Black labor: biological, reproductive, and productive through an analysis of popular film and policies that disproportionately impact Black women in the United States.