Two philosophical approaches are prominent in race studies: an interpretive phenomenological method, utilized by Sartre, Fanon and Schutz, that describes how Blacks and non-blacks interpret eac...

This wide-ranging, multidisciplinary collection of newly commissioned articles brings together distinguished voices in the field of Africana philosophy and African-American social and political thought. Provides a comprehensive critical survey of African-American philosophical thought. Collects wide-ranging, multidisciplinary, newly commissioned articles in one authoritative volume. Serves as a benchmark work of reference for courses in philosophy, social and political thought, cultural studies, and African-American studies.

A recent message on one of the e-mail bulletin boards sent by a college student read, “I believe that the AIDS virus was developed in government labs for the purpose of controlling black folks.” In September 1990, Essence, an African American magazine with a circulation of 900,000, had as a lead article “AIDS: Is It Genocide?” In 1991, the New York Times quoted Clarence Page, African American columnist and Pulitzer prize winner: “You could call conspiracy theories (...) about AIDS and drugs fringe ideas, but they seem, to have a large following among the black intelligentsia. … [And] you find it at all levels.” In April 1992, Lorene Gary explained in Newsweek “Why it's not just paranoia.” In that same month, another New York Times article reported: “Bizarre as it may seem to most people, many black Americans believe that AIDS and the health measures used against it are part of a conspiracy to wipe out the black race.”4 In February 1992, Science quoted Peter Breggin, director of the Center for the Study of Psychiatry in Bethesda, Maryland, as saying that research on violence “cloaks the intention to identify problem black children and then … prescribe pacifying drugs.”. (shrink)

This article focuses on the experiences of 29 African American teachers in K–12 institutions in Southern California. The article reports on the major themes of the participating teachers’ shared narratives in light of the theory of racial micro-aggression; their responses include evidence that racial micro-aggression during interactions with nonminority organizational members have had a negative impact on their experience. These findings, which are consistent with the neophyte literature, reveal a unique opportunity for scholars to engage in cutting edge (...) research and also suggest the need to integrate training specific to racial micro-aggression in professional development and teacher education programs in order to improve the experience of African American teachers in the future. (shrink)

Traditional African American foods, also referred to as “soul food,” are often given a blanket label of “poor food choices.” The cultural value of these ethnic foods may be disregarded without sufficient study of their nutrient content. This study showed that of the various foods perceived as traditionally African American by the local sampled population, greens were the most often identified as such by 78% and the most frequently consumed (22%) by the subjects. 37% perceived chitterlings (...) as a traditional food, yet only 30% consumed them, and only on an occasional basis. Okra, yams, and black-eyed peas had relatively high consumptions but were not often perceived as traditional African American foods. The latter may suggests a lack of historical food facts, relating to indigenous African foods or may indicate the mainstreaming of these foods. Cowpeas or black-eyed peas, okra, sesame seeds, and watermelon seeds were originally brought to North America from Africa. The literature contains scant information on this particular topic, which leaves unanswered: (1) the current consumption of traditional foods by African Americans, (2) certain availability of these foods; and (3) the positive contributions to the diet that these foods may contribute. The author recognizes that “African American” is the most appropriate and preferred term used widely today, to refer to African descendants in North America, however “Black” and “Black American” will be used interchangeably, to reflect consistency of literature cited herein. First, this article will define traditional African American foods and relate their historical significance. Secondly, it will present data on current food consumption from a sample population of African Americans surveyed in San Diego. Lastly, this article will explore possible applications of the research itself. (shrink)

This essay considers the recuperation of beauty as a productive critical strategy in discussions of African American dance. I argue that black performance in general, and African American concert dance in particular, seeks to create aesthetic sites that allow black Americans to participate in discourses of recognition and appreciation to include concepts of beauty. In this, I suggest that beauty may indeed produce social change for its attendant audiences. I also propose that interrogating the notion of (...) beauty may allow for social change among audiences that include dance theorists and philosophers. Through a case-study consideration of work by three African American choreographers, Donald Byrd (b. 1949), Ulysses Dove (1947 – 1996), and Abdel Salaam (b. 1949), I ultimately hope to suggest critical possibilities aligning dance performance with particular aesthetic theory relevant to its documentation and interpretation. (shrink)

Focused on preparing educators to teach African American students, this straightforward and teacher-friendly text features a careful balance of published scholarship, a framework for culturally relevant and critical pedagogy, research-based case studies of model teachers, and tested culturally relevant practical strategies and actionable steps teachers can adopt. Its premise is that teachers who understand Black culture as an asset rather than a liability and utilize teaching techniques that have been shown to work can and do have specific (...) positive impacts on the educational experiences of African American children. (shrink)

One can understand humor in terms of one or some combination of the three types of humor and also by envisioning humor as a finite-province of meaning in the tradition of Alfred Schutz’s essay “On Multiple Realities”. Exemplifying varieties of humor articulated by philosophical theory, especially the superiority theory, which undermines those thought “superior,” African-American humor, from the days of slavery until the 1960s, struggled against widespread cultural suppression, as a brief survey of its history shows. Contemporary philosophical (...) discussions of trust elucidate why it would have been perfectly rational and prudent for African-Americans to avoid sharing humor that vents legitimate aggressiveness against whites even though modified by humor, and yet these discussions present the possibility that by trusting another one can transform that other. One can find examples in African-American folklore, particularly the John/ole Massa stories, of a dream of doing what was impossible in pragmatic everyday life, namely to engage in a comic engagement with white slave-owners. In that dream, African-American slaves utopianly imagined themselves as able through humor understood as a finite province of meaning shaped by an epoché, form of spontaneity, reduced tension of consciousness, sense of self, and a distinctive temporality and sociality, to express outrage at injustice, transform even white slave-owners, and even win freedom for humorists themselves. (shrink)

In the burgeoning field of whiteness studies, What White Looks Like takes a unique approach to the subject by collecting the ideas of African-American philosophers. George Yancy has brought together a group of thinkers who address the problematic issues of whiteness as a category requiring serious analysis. What does white look like when viewed through philosophical training and African-American experience? In this volume, Robert Birt asks if whites can "live whiteness authentically." Janine Jones examines what (...) it means to be a "goodwill white." Joy James tells of beating her "addiction" to white supremacy, while Arnold Farr writes on making whiteness visible in Western philosophy. What White Looks Like brings a badly needed critique and philosophically sophisticated perspective to central issue of contemporary society. (shrink)

The black women's club movement is frequently seen as definitive of "first-wave" African American feminism. However, this six-volume collection from the History of Feminism series draws together key documents that show the varied political work African American feminists were undertaking well before the turn into the 20th century. African American Feminisms brings together writings that document distinctly African American feminist organizing from as early as the late 1820s through female benevolent and literary (...) societies, as well as writings that document African American feminist participation in black political concerns such as emigration and colonization, discrimination in public transportation, and anti-lynching. African American women also negotiated competing demands within interracial reform movements like abolition, woman's rights, temperance and suffrage, as well as within organizations like the black church, making documents that offer insight into those unique demands key to understanding black feminist arguments and rhetoric. Pursuing a varied feminist rhetoric that ranged from advocating domestic and maternal feminism to defending black womanhood, African American feminists focused on larger social reforms as well as agitating for material changes in the lives of African American women and girls. African American feminists were also keenly attuned to opening useful venues to black feminist voices, from the pulpit to the press, and urged the women that followed them to continue this work. This collection, which includes a variety of genres from the spiritual autobiography to the platform speech and the pamphlet, goes beyond the more common focus on the "greats" of black feminism to include lesser known black feminists and some unidentified women who contributed to black feminist debate on a variety of topics. _African American Feminisms, _edited and with an introduction by Teresa Zackodnik, is destined to be welcomed by those interested in women's studies, feminism, and African American history as an invaluable reference resource. (shrink)

: This paper reviews current and suggested policies designed to increase organ donation in the United States and indicates the problems inherent to these approaches for increasing organ donation by African Americans. Data from a population-based study assessing attitudes and beliefs about organ donation among white and African-American respondents are presented and discussed. We pose the question of whether it is reasonable to maintain the existing system or whether we should institute a system that uses policies based (...) on the attitudes and beliefs of a minority group that is in greater need than the majority. In light of the discussion, we suggest that the current policies guiding the organ procurement system are not adequate to address existing concerns within the African-American community and that a different set of assumptions may be needed to drive organ procurement policy. (shrink)

If we are dissatisfied with our situation in life, we often dream of how our life could be improved. Most basically, we want a full stomach, decent clothing and housing, and a sense of security, and millions of people in the world today do not now have these things. Throughout American history, African Americans were kept from achieving this most basic decent life, let alone the more complex needs that become possible for those who fulfill the first needs. (...) All the elements of this fundamental vision are included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted in 1948 but was not ratified by the United States until 1992. Among the rights included in the Universal Declaration are Article 4. No one... (shrink)

Recent studies suggest that terminally ill African Americans’ care is generally more expensive and of lower quality than that of comparable non-Hispanic white patients. Scholars argue that increasing hospice enrollment among African Americans will help improve end-of-life care for this population, yet few studies have examined the experiences of African American patients and their loved ones after accessing hospice care. In this article, we explore how African American patients and lay caregivers evaluated (...) their hospice experiences. Drawing from 39 in-depth interviews with 26 participants, we use a modified version of Bute and Jensen’s (2011) narrative typology to organize patients’ and caregivers’ stories into three general categories: narratives of satisfaction, narratives of regret, and narratives of ambivalence. Building from these categories, we discuss the implications of this research for understanding hospice experiences, promoting hospice access, and improving end-of-life care for marginalized populations. (shrink)

Swiss and Japanese villagers have learned the relative benefi ts and costs of privateproperty and communal-property institutions related to various types of land and uses of land. The villagers in both settings have chosen to retain the institution of communal property as the foundation for land use and similar important aspects of village economies.1..

(1999). Internet Review: African-American Sources in the Library of Congress American Memory Project. Educational Studies: Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 99-102.

Researchers have given some attention to women law enforcement officers' experiences and perceptions of sexual harassment. Yet, few studies have determined how the interaction of gender and race affect African American women's perception of this workplace impediment. This article explores one group of women's experiences in a U.S. sheriff's department. Interview data gathered from 65 African American women who are active and former law enforcement officers provide a comprehensive examination of how African American (...) women in nontraditional criminal justice occupations experience racialized sexual harassment. Differences in degree and frequency of harassment are found among the women in different cohorts based on their job tenure, marital status, and the race of their harassers. (shrink)

This review essay surveys the contributions of the new edited volume African American Political Thought: A Collected History. The thinker-based approach to the study of African American political thought advanced in the volume highlights the ways in which thinkers reformulate the central political questions of the intellectual tradition and constitute the canon through the citation and invocation of earlier figures. It also draws attention to the rhetorical, strategic, and tactical dimensions of their political thought. The volume (...) sets a new standard for study of African American political thought and makes a persuasive case for the tradition’s important contributions to political theory broadly. However, by tying its significance too closely to its interventions within American political thought, the volume inadvertently minimizes the global resonances of African American political thought. (shrink)

This review essay surveys the contributions of the new edited volume African American Political Thought: A Collected History. The thinker-based approach to the study of African American political thought advanced in the volume highlights the ways in which thinkers reformulate the central political questions of the intellectual tradition and constitute the canon through the citation and invocation of earlier figures. It also draws attention to the rhetorical, strategic, and tactical dimensions of their political thought. The volume (...) sets a new standard for study of African American political thought and makes a persuasive case for the tradition’s important contributions to political theory broadly. However, by tying its significance too closely to its interventions within American political thought, the volume inadvertently minimizes the global resonances of African American political thought. (shrink)

A focus group study using four groups of food shoppers provides insights into consumers’ knowledge, beliefs, and behaviors regarding organic foods. Two focus groups consisted of shoppers who regularly bought organic foods and two focus groups of shoppers who predominantly purchased conventional foods. Participants in one of the conventional groups were all Caucasian; in the other they were all African-American. While familiarity with organic foods was much lower in the African-American group, its members were more receptive (...) and positive towards organic foods. Likewise, the African-American shoppers were more accepting of price premiums for organics foods. In comparing the two organic shopper groups with the two conventional shopper groups, it was found that the former were generally more knowledgeable about organic foods. They were also more likely to follow a special diet than conventional Caucasian shoppers. However, the behavior of organic shoppers varied widely. The research supports examining social justice and access as motivations for changing policies to support organic agriculture. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Philosophy and the Modern African American Freedom Struggle: A Freedom Gaze by Anthony Sean NealKordell DixonPhilosophy and the Modern African American Freedom Struggle: A Freedom Gaze Anthony Sean Neal. Rowman & Littlefield, 2022.Philosophy and the Modern African American Freedom Struggle begins with a clear and concise establishment of its aim: to analyze and expand upon those figures mentioned when discussing the academic (...) project of studying black people. Neal broadens the account of black scholars examining racialized existence by centering his work on the modern era and its initiator W. E. B Du Bois. Neal develops an ethnic reflective canon that documents the long history of black thinkers attempting to define their blackness and advance the conception of freedom. This book does an excellent job of capturing the genealogical structure of the struggle for freedom. Within the work, Neal denotes that all relevant figures in this tradition are freedom gazers. These gazers are spectators of a radically imagined future liberated from the oppressive systems that encumber the persecuted. Du Bois's approach to freedom gazing uses academic training to examine his blackness and inevitably to solve the "race problem." What Neal provides the reader is a road map of the intellectual work of black scholars. This road map details the common themes among black thinkers and how these themes relate to Du Bois. Neal's intricate network of philosophers uses their experience and their expertise to write about what is necessary for black people to obtain freedom. Neal composes a complex and remarkable catalog of black scholars that demonstrates the interconnectedness and progression of black thought on oppression and liberation.In the second chapter, Neal elucidates why Du Bois is chosen as the inaugurator of the modern era. As a formally educated black man, Du Bois questions his experience and what tethers him to oppression. Neal uses Du Bois as a focal point, not because Du Bois is the first black person to document their struggle with their racialized existence, but because he believes that Du Bois is the first scholar to analyze the black experience completely. The holistic nature of Du Bois's study of the existential conflict that race can manifest within its subjects allows Du Bois's analysis to be used as a tool to unify other works that discuss race and the struggle for freedom. Neal expresses how other scholars such as Frederick Douglass, Martin Delany, and Anna Julia Cooper all had work that takes up a similar task as Du Bois's but lacks the fullness of Du Bois's study. Here, Neal does not articulate clearly [End Page 87] how these figures are inadequate with respect to their work. It could be argued that each scholar named could be said to have accomplished a task similar to that of Du Bois. However, how these figures are studied throughout different disciplines gives the impression that their examination of race and freedom is much more focused on one specific field. This point speaks to how we interpret the work of these scholars and not to these scholars' work itself. Neal proceeds to describe Du Bois as a freedom gazer and explains how Du Bois's imagining of black persons as freed would allot a perceptual framework that motivates them to proclaim their right to mental and physical freedom. Further, Neal establishes that Du Bois's position as a freedom gazer allows him to expand the ethnic reflective canon. This canon includes Ida B. Wells, whose journalism on the lynching of black people during the Reconstruction era made headway on what social sciences could contribute to the struggle against injustice. Anna Julia Cooper is included in this canon; her radically imagined future was thought to be achieved through education. Wells and Cooper proceeded and directly influenced the work of Du Bois, creating a lineage of radical social thought. Neal maps his transition through the intellectual work of black scholars by using conceptions of peace, rebellion, revolution, and freedom as relational markers. The reader can identify the relationships among the varied work of freedom gazers despite the vast range of their spatiotemporal placement.In the third chapter, Neal examines the subjects Hubert Harrison, William H... (shrink)

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study is often cited as a major reason for low research participation rates among racial/ethnic minorities. We use data from a random-digit-dial telephone survey of 510 African Americans and 253 Latinos drawn from low income Los Angeles neighborhoods to investigate associations between knowledge of the study and endorsement of HIV/aids conspiracy theories. Results indicate African Americans were significantly more likely than Latinos to endorse HIV/aids conspiracy theories and were more aware of the study. Nevertheless, few (...) Americans and Latinos had ever heard of Syphilis Study suggesting that awareness is not a major factor in low participation rates. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 22 (2002) 234-236 [Access article in PDF] Book Review Dreaming Me: An African American Woman's Spiritual Journey Dreaming Me: An African American Woman's Spiritual Journey. By Jan Willis. New York: Riverhead Books, 2001. 321 pp. This book invites comparison with Diana Eck's Encountering God: A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Banaras(Boston: Beacon Press, 1993). Both are by prominent women scholars, both have (...) "spiritual journey" in the subtitle, and both are about Christians who come to terms with a non-Christian religion—Hinduism in Eck's case, Buddhism in Willis's case. But as soon as one gets past the titles, it is the differences that strike one. Where Eck maintains an Olympian poise, hobnobbing with Hindus but remaining a Christian and an objective scholar, interpreting and analyzing as she goes, Willis plunges into Buddhism without rejecting her family's Baptist tradition, becoming a fully participant observer so as to ask how her own history and the history of her fellow African Americans can be healed by an intensely personal internal dialogue. Eck gives us theology. Willis gives us herself. Recognized as "one of the first American scholar-practitioners of Tibetan Buddhism" (294), her students ask her if she practices meditation as well as teaching it. She gives a carefully crafted answer that unifies the practice of Buddhism with the practice of academic teaching as an authentically human activity within the Humanities.The book has the form of a Hindu epic, incidents from Willis's life interrupting the frame story, the dreaming of the title. This dream (whether actual or metaphorical, we are not told) moves with considerable dramatic power from the terror of being pursued by lions to the dreamer's transformation into a lioness who roars the Dharma like Queen Shrimala. Its five parts are called Birth, Odyssey, Choices, Becoming, and Return, taking us from her childhood as a Baptist in Docena, Alabama, to Cornell University, to India and Nepal, and back to Docena, as a self-described Baptist-Buddhist (310).Willis's journey is intimately bound up with her search for self-acceptance as a "white gal"—a noticeably light-complexioned black woman in the Jim Crow South —and for the nobility of African Americans as fully human beings. Her early experiences [End Page 234] were not encouraging. Blacks were not only physically segregated in Docena, they were electronically expunged from television shows by spurious technical difficulties ("trouble along the cable"), and she endured an attack by the Ku Klux Klan on her family's home. The customary but thoroughly illegal suffrage examination administered to her father included such questions as "How many words are there in the U.S. Constitution?" (58, italics in original). He had been specially prepared for such absurdities, and he passed. Midway in her pilgrimage Willis searches for her roots (or "kin," as she says, using the Southern word) in county and federal records, and her initial excitement turns to humiliation as the white historian tells her, with disdainful triumph, that her intelligence must have come from the white slave owner who "everybody says" was her "granddaddy's daddy" (251). A black woman was presumed to be lacking in native intelligence, and Willis's intellectual powers suffered insult not only from whites but from her own mother, who, perhaps having internalized the white folks' contempt, regarded being smart as somehow evil (25). As a student at Cornell, Willis discovered black power and participated in Black Student Alliance (BSA) demonstrations, sometimes involving guns, but she came to believe that direct political action was not for her. She was, she decided, a teacher at heart, and after much soul searching she opted for the "peaceful transformation" (129) that she hoped would come from the study and practice of Buddhism.Although her skin color was a puzzlement to some Indians, who wondered about her caste, her Tibetan teachers in Nepal accepted her as a student who was at least the equal of the white students, and even, perhaps, superior to them. A spot of blonde in her hair was interpreted as the... (shrink)

The literature on gender and health typically addresses behavioral patterns when discussing men’s attitudes to health. Few of these studies explore men’s anxieties or presentations of self in relation to health problems, particularly for stigmatizing conditions such as sexually transmitted infections. Through direct observation and focus group interviews of health workers, clients, and students, this study explores African American men’s attitudes toward attending STI clinics in the Deep South. The men’s concerns about STI clinics center on realistic (...) health or stigma-related concerns. Using a gender-relational analysis, three main sources of fear are identified in relation to attending the clinics: Gender anxiety, social anxiety, and racial anxiety. These fears present a barrier to STI care for African American men. (shrink)

Introduction Biobank-based research is growing in importance. A major controversy exists about the return of aggregate and individual research results. Methods The authors used a mixed-method approach in order to study parents' attitudes towards the return of research results regarding themselves and their children. Participants attended four 2-h, deliberative-engagement sessions held on two consecutive Saturdays. Each session consisted of an educational presentation followed by focus-group discussions with structured questions and prompts. This manuscript examines discussions from the second Saturday which focused (...) on the benefits and risks of returning aggregate and individual research results regarding both adults (morning session) and children (afternoon session). Attitudes were assessed in pre-engagement and post-engagement surveys. Results The authors recruited 45 African-American adults whose children received medical care at two healthcare facilities on the South Side of Chicago that serve different socioeconomic communities. Three dominant themes were identified. First, most participants stated that they would enrol themselves and their children in a biobank, although there was a vocal minority opposed to enrolling children, particularly children unable to participate in the consent process. Second, participants did not distinguish between the results they wanted to receive regarding themselves and their children. Supplemental survey data found no attitudinal changes pre-engagement and post-engagement. Third, participants believed that children should be allowed access to their health information, but they wanted to be involved in deciding when and how the information was shared. Discussion Participant attitudes are in tension with current biobank policies. An intensive educational effort had no effect on their attitudes. (shrink)

This essay is a reflection on how ethical violations continue to have an impact across generations within families of vulnerable populations that have experienced significant breaches in biomedical research. The focus is on the surviving family members of the United States Public Health Service Syphilis Study at Tuskegee (USPHS). Emphasis will be on responsible ethical practices in research and the use of an unique approach narrative storytelling to address the needs of family descendents who have been impacted by the USPHS (...) Syphilis Study. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:African American Theological Ethics: A Reader ed. by Peter J. Paris and Julius CrumpCory J. MayAfrican American Theological Ethics: A Reader Edited by Peter J. Paris and Julius Crump LOUISVILLE, KY: WESTMINSTER JOHN KNOX PRESS, 2015. 350 PP. $45.00African American Theological Ethics: A Reader (AATE) is a thought-provoking title that piqued my interest upon first sight. I am an African American Christian (...) who studies African American Christianity, culture, history, and black theology. I wondered how the book would discuss African American theological ethics in terms of its articulation, embodiment, and practice. I also had reservations regarding the book's structure, the diversity of themes emphasized, and the balance between discussion of theology and of ethics. A few questions surfaced as I reflected upon the contents of the book. How is the term "theology" defined? Would the book discuss the particular ethical systems derived from monotheistic and polytheistic religions? How have African Americans contextualized their ethics in relation to God(s)? What is the central role of God(s) in this volume?The aim of the editors "is to provide a collection of resources that depict a broad range of theological and ethical reasoning that African Americans developed during two centuries of slavery, a subsequent century of racial segregation and discrimination, and another half century of continuing inequalities of opportunity and achievement" (xvii–xviii). Thus, the book has a strong sociopolitical emphasis. The reader should not expect theological ethics emphasizing the worship of God(s), religious doctrines, or proper religious living. Rather, AATE is a book of loosely interpreted political theologies and sociopolitical theological ethics. The themes of liberation, oppression, race, slavery, and white supremacy are governing hermeneutics that saturate the book's content. As Peter Paris and Julius Crump suggest, "it is important to note that African American theological ethics is not an abstract theoretical enterprise. Rather, it is a form of inquiry that is clearly related to African American studies in history and sociology both of which either imply or reveal a normative bias for racial justice" (xviii).AATE is a collection of thirty-seven essays and excerpts written by influential thinkers in African American history. Works are presented by such popular figures as Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Martin Luther King Jr., Booker T. Washington, and W.E.B. DuBois. The first four sections of the book are ethical in their approaches and display works emphasizing opposition to white supremacy. Part 1, titled "Opposing the Doctrine of White Supremacy," has a solitary essay from Martin R. Delany's work, The Origin of Race and Colour. Parts 2, 3, and 4—"Opposing Slavery," "Opposing Racial Segregation," and "Opposing Racial Discrimination," respectively—contain works from Shirley Chisholm, Barack [End Page 217] Obama, Adam Clayton Powell Jr., Barbara Jordan, and more. The last two parts change the focus of the book from the theme of opposition and theologically center the discourse on African American ingenuity toward different aspects of life. Part 5 assembles essays from scholars such as Jacquelyn Grant and James Cone under the title of "African American Religious Creativity." The last section displays essays from James Weldon Johnson and Peter J. Paris under the banner of "African American Themes and Perspectives."AATE is a good anthology of discourses that have a strong emphasis on social justice. It would be greatly complemented by other selections that emphasize African American theological ethics apart from sociopolitical issues. It is an informative book that contributes to the genre of African American anthologies; it would strengthen any introductory course on African American theology and is beneficial for anyone seeking broad exposure to the development of African American theological ethics. AATE could be read alongside titles such as Katie G. Cannon and Anthony B. Pinn's The Oxford Handbook of African American Theology, or Paul E. Johnson's African American Christianity: Essays in History.Cory J. MayThe University of AberdeenCopyright © 2017 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

In a mixed-methods study of the barriers and facilitators to homeownership for African American women with physical disabilities, self-concept emerged among the primary themes. This article discusses how participants in the study perceived themselves and negotiated how they were perceived by others as multiply marginalized women. Using what I call a feminist intersectional disability framework, I suggest that participants’ relationships to care strongly contributed to their self-concept. The “Strong Black Woman” trope and associated expectations had cultural and material (...) relevance for how they interpreted themselves and were interpreted by others as receivers, managers, and providers of care. The material reality of owning or not owning a home did not reveal significant differences in the self-concepts of homeowners versus nonhomeowners. Rather, it was through conversations about homeownership that this data around self-concept in relationship to care was revealed. (shrink)

Much research on women’s religious participation centers on their abilities to act within constricted institutional spaces. Drawing on five years of ethnographic fieldwork, this study analyzes how African American Muslim women use the mosque as a physical space to enact public performances of religious identity. By occupying, protecting, and appropriating spaces in the mosque for meaningfully gender-specific ways of engaging Islam, the women further a project of religious self-making that bonds African American Muslim women together. In (...) their maneuverings of different forms of physical space as a sisterhood, the women enable themselves to resist gender, economic, and racial oppression. This study reveals that even within men-dominated religious organizations with limited symbolic and material spaces for women, women participants successfully exert agency over their own religious experiences. (shrink)

This special issue addresses the legacy of the U.S. Public Health Service Syphilis Study on health reform, particularly the Affordable Care Act. This article offers readers a guide to the themes that emerge in this issue. These themes include individual consent interrelated to consequences in populations issues, need for better government oversight in research and health care, and the need for overhauling our bioethics training to develop a population-level, culturally driven approach to research bioethics. We hope the guidance offered in (...) this issue will help shape a new framework to bioethics that can be integrated into the foundation of health care reform. (shrink)

The images of human suffering from New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina remain seared in our nation's collective memory. More than 8 years on, the city and its African-American population still have not recovered fully. This reality highlights an important truth: the disturbances that accompany climate change will first and foremost affect minority communities, many of whom are economically disadvantaged. This paper: (1) describes how Hurricane Katrina, an example of the type of natural disaster that will (...) become more prevalent with intensifying climate change, has impacted the black community of New Orleans; (2) explores the notion that African Americans, in the midst of racial oppression, have developed a unique and powerful brand of environmental thought that has much to contribute to mainstream environmentalism; and (3) argues that the voice of the black community, which has a vested interest in climate outcomes, is critically needed in today's climate debate. (shrink)

(2012). On Human Kinds and Role Models: A Critical Discussion about the African American Male Teacher. Educational Studies: Vol. 48, Black Teachers Theorizing, pp. 296-315.

This paper describes a case study of a program called WATCH: Workshop for Actively Thinking Computationally and Historically. The focus of the program and this paper was on using mobile application development to promote historical thinking using a plantation site visit as the focus of inquiry. WATCH was delivered during an academic enrichment youth program at a major research university in the Southeast and served a total of 30 African American and Latino high school students from low socio-economic (...) backgrounds. Through the theoretical framework of historical thinking, this case study provides descriptions of the class sessions, students’ perceptions of and interests in history and students level of historical thinking through their apps. We make suggestions about how the instructional activities could be adapted for classrooms, discuss the tensions of using technology and inquiry pedagogy to support and promote historical learning, and review the program's impact on students’ agency as learners and critical consumers and producers of historical accounts. (shrink)

This study explores the ethical ideol-ogies and ethical beliefs of African American consumers using the Forsyth ethical position questionnaire (EPQ) and the Muncy-Vitell consumer ethics questionnaire (MVQ). The two dimensions of the EPQ (i.e., idealism and relativism) were the independent constructs and the four dimensions of the MVQ (i.e., illegal, active, passive and no harm) were the dependent variables. In addition, this paper explores the consumer ethics of African Americans across four demographic factors (i.e., age, education, gender, (...) and marital status). A sample of 315 African American consumers was used to explore these relationships. Results confirmed that consumers who score high on the idealism scale are more likely to reject questionable consumer activities, but there was no relationship between relativism and consumers' rejection of questionable activities. Older, more educated and married consumers rejected questionable activities more than younger, less educated and single consumers. Gender did not have any significant relationship to consumers' ethical orientation. (shrink)

This paper shows how amatonormativity and its attendant social pressures converge at the intersections of race, gender, romantic relationality, and sexuality to generate peculiar challenges to polyamorous African American men in American society. Contrary to the view maintained in the “slut-vs-stud” phenomenon, I maintain that the label ‘player’ when applied to polyamorous African American men functions as a pernicious stereotype and has denigrating effects. Specifically, I argue that stereotyping polyamorous African American men as (...) players estranges them from themselves and it constrains their agency by preemptively foreclosing the set of possibilities of what one’s sexual or romantic relational identities can be. (shrink)

Recent studies show that racism still exists in the American medical profession, the fact of which legitimizes the historically long-legacy of mistrust towards medical profession and health authorities among African Americans. Thus, it was suspected that the participation of black patients in end-of-life care has always been significantly low stemmed primarily from their mistrust of the medical profession. On the other hand, much research finds that there are other reasons than the mistrust which makes African Americans (...) feel reluctant to the end-of-life care, such as cultural-religious difference and genuine misunderstanding of the services. If so, two crucial questions are raised. One is how pervasive or significant the mistrust is, compared to the other factors, when they opt out of the end-of-life care. The other is if there is a remedy or solution to the seemingly broken relationship. While no studies available answer these questions, we have conducted an experiment to explore them. The research was performed at two Philadelphia hospitals of Mercy Health System, and the result shows that Black patients’ mistrust is not too great to overcome and that education can remove the epistemic obstacles as well as overcome the mistrust. (shrink)