Notes on Black Studies: Its Continuing Necessity in the Academy and Beyond

Abstract

This article relates specifically to the discussion concerning the state of Black studies in the United States. Paradoxically, although providing a defense for its longevity, it is acknowledged ultimately that there is no real need to substantiate its efficacy. However, the continued attacks on the discipline from within and without make for such a defense. Employing an African-centered approach, there will be an attempt to emphasize the continued importance of Black studies to both the university and lay communities. This article will also offer some solutions to the problem of nonspecialists who proliferate the field and do little for its growth and development. They have been deemed as “Black studies opportunists” who have no allegiance to, nor philosophical grounding in, the discipline.

The Emerald International Handbook of Activist Criminology

“…Given that militarised policing and the prison industrial complex never existed in Africa and in most Indigenous communities until they were imposed as part of the race-class-gender discriminatory repressive fetishes of European conquest and domination, the example of how people of African descent and Indigenous peoples resisted these institutions can be seen as paradigmatic for activist criminology (Agozino, 2020;Blagg & Anthony, 2019;Cunneen & Tauri, 2016). Scholar-activism is the preferred paradigm in Africana Studies (Agozino, 2016;Asante, 2007;Christian, 2007;Kershaw, 2007) and criminologists can learn from the suitability of this paradigm for the study of all systems of oppression and to change the world for the better.…”