When I was in my first year as a tenure-track faculty member, a friend of mine summed up a concern that many of us newly minted African-American professors had. She said: "I am not so sure that I am willing to become the person I must become in order to gain tenure." Her remark drew a round of "uh-huhs" and "I know what you means" from the audience. My friend and I were speaking at a symposium on African-American faculty members at predominantly white institutions, held at a national academic conference. Members of the audience -- primarily African-American academics -- obviously felt that the stories my friend went on to tell were their stories, too.
I had had the same reaction during an earlier conversation with my friend, during which we had decided that our feelings about and perceptions of tenure were not just the conclusions of two paranoid faculty members. Since then, many of my friends and colleagues, particularly other African-Americans at predominantly white institutions, have shared experiences with me that were not just parallel to my own, but virtually identical. Disciplines and fields notwithstanding, we had all gone through similar triumphs and struggles, victories and defeats. Five themes were almost universal.
| Continue Fred Bonner's Chronicle of Higher Education essay "Black Professors: On the Track but Out of the Loop"
posted in articles on June 10, 2004 11:44 AM | t (1)
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