This research project has embarked upon the investigation of the representation of Africa in the media and its impact on the way African American perceive Africa and identify with it. Findings from this investigation indicate that not only is Africa consistently represented negatively (with a colonial metaphor) in the media, but such a representation is ideologically embedded in the manner the African continent and its denizens have been portrayed in the West for centuries. This representation of Africa with the colonial metaphor projects the continent and its denizens into the evolutionary past. That is, Africa is a place of primitivism where civilization has eluded humanity, and where crises fester day in day out. In a second disquisition, findings from this investigation project subsequently reveal that television exposure has a negative influence on how African Americans perceive Africa and identify with it. Explicitly, the more African Americans watch television, the more they have a negative perception of Africa, and the less they identify with it (Africa). African Americans' level of education is another contributing, significant factor to their perceptions of, and identification with, Africa. The less African Americans are educated, the more they perceived Africa negatively, and the less they identify with Africa. The association between perceptions of, and identification with, Africa is an indication that media (particularly television) representation of Africa can thwart the building of coalition between continental Africans and African Americans (diasporan Africans in America).

The purpose of this research project is to expand Harter and Pike's Pictorial Scale of Perceived Competence and Social Acceptance to include physical and cognitive competencies that are specific to African American children. Two pictorial tests were administered to a group of African American preschoolers (n = 30) (Harter and Pike's Pictorial Scale of Perceived Competence and Social Acceptance and Boykin and Allen Revised Afro-cultural dimensions). Observations of seven of the children during structured and unstructured periods of the day were formulated into mini case studies of “acting up” or “acting out behavior” (Boykin's 1992 Prescriptive Pedagogy for African American children). Parent interviews explored African American child-rearing practices. Teacher questionnaires provided teacher perspective on children's physical and cognitive competencies. The results of the study suggest that Harter and Pike's Perceived Competence and Social Acceptance Scale can be combined with the Boykin and Allen Revised Scale to create a culturally appropriate scale. Mean and standard deviations in both instruments indicate that children in this study feel competent. The subscales attained adequate reliability using Cronbach's alpha level .79. Multiple regression findings reveal spirituality as the significant predictor strongly correlated on the cognitive subscale (Harter & Pike). The spirituality and movement expression subscales from the Boykin and Allen Revised Scale were moderately correlated with the physical subscale from Harter and Pike. The teacher/child correlations showed weak agreement between tested behavior of children and teachers assessment of children's cognitive development. The physical domain from Harter and Pike showed agreement between tested behavior and teachers assessment. The seven mini-cases showed four steps of teacher interventions in “acting up” or “acting out” behaviors in young children: verbal and or physical guidance, ignoring inappropriate behavior, time out, and removal of child to another classroom for part of the day. Movement expression, verve, communalism, and spirituality are concepts to include when assessing African-American children's competence development.

This dissertation traces the early origins of Shirley Graham Du Bois, a well known Negro achiever in the 1930s and 1940s, from the decades preceding her birth in 1896 up through the mid-twentieth century when she has reached mid life and achieved a number of successes. It attempts to reclaim from obscurity the significant cultural production that Shirley Graham contributed to American society. Her artistry and activism were manifested in many ways. As a very young woman she conducted, throughout the northern and eastern parts of the U.S., musical concerts extolling the beauty and significance of spirituals. While attending school at Oberlin College, she wrote a musical opera that was regarded during its time as the world’s first race opera. In 1936 she assumed the role of Director for the Chicago Black Unit of the Federal Theatre Project (FTP). After the FTP phased out, she attended Yale School of Drama to learn the craft of playwriting, and proceeded to write several plays that were staged and viewed by interracial audiences. As the country prepared for WWII, she was selected to head USO activities in Fort Huachuca, Arizona where the largest aggregation of Negro soldiers were stationed before being sent off to battle. She subsequently became a field secretary for the NAACP during this period of tumultuous change in the nation and the world. The early 1940s would see Graham reach the pinnacle of success during this phase of her life by writing biographies for a national children’s audience. This success was short lived due to the political climate of red-baiting that became fashionable during the political reign of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Graham’s progressive politics, communist affiliation and marriage to W. E. B. Du Bois placed her on the wrong side of the establishment. Each chapter develops the varying forms her activism took shape in each given situation. Following the example of fore-parents who were politically and socially engaged during their lifetimes, Graham follows suit. Her efforts reveal a woman who educated, inspired and empowered others while demonstrating the different ways one could use her abilities to confront racism.

The period of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is one of the darkest epochs in American race relations. During the ‘nadir,’ African Americans responded to their conditions in numerous ways, including among others the promotion of self-help, racial solidarity, economic nationalism, political agitation, and emigration. This dissertation focuses on the various organizational responses of African Americans to the rise of racial segregation and violence, from the 1880s through the first decade of the twentieth century. In particular it examines the activities of the Afro-American League, the National Afro-American Council, the Constitution League, the Committee of Twelve and the Niagara Movement, demonstrating how these organizations' platforms and activities foreshadowed the creation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909. Shifting attention away from the leadership role of W. E. B. Du Bois and his involvement in the Niagara Movement, a secondary aim of this dissertation is to highlight the roles of intellectuals and activists such as T. Thomas Fortune, Bishop Alexander Walters, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mary Church Terrell, Jesse Lawson, Lewis G. Jordan, Kelly Miller, Archibald Grimké, Booker T. Washington and John E. Milholland. The dissertation explores the way in which their participation in the organizations mentioned above contribute to the foundation of the NAACP. The ideas and the activities of the Afro-American League and the National Afro-American Council antedated those of the Niagara Movement, and much of the leadership of the aforementioned groups brought their experiences together to create the NAACP.

The retention of Black students in higher education is a problem faced by virtually all institutions. Despite early contact programs and admissions procedures designed to best assess the likelihood of success, and despite the plethora of programs intended to relieve the discernible problems facing students, the attrition rate for Black students remains high. Vincent Tinto suggests that we understand early departures from higher education as a process. He discusses leaving as a function of social or academic "incongruence," the mismatch of student and institution that makes leaving seem the only choice. Effective planning thus necessitates our understanding the students' experience from their perspective, and mandates that "local conditions," the circumstances which determine the particular suitability of any program to an institution, be accommodated. Research data about retention concerns was gathered from three sources: (1) the review of literature, which was used as the external criteria for discussing the university's programs; (2) the programs of the university as described in its publicly-disseminated material; and (3) the perceptions and experiences of Black students, gathered through an interview-survey-data process. Additional data about the university came from the experience and observations of the researcher, a teacher there for six years. These data were then compared: literature to university, university to student perception and experience, and literature to student concerns. Racism was a key student concern. Yet what emerged as an equal or greater concern was their experience of "welcome" or "unwelcome" in their relationships with faculty, administration, and the social environs. Faculty and administration behaviors and priorities, understood as part of the "local conditions" and whether or not directly aimed toward students, had a pronounced negative effect on the Black students' experiences and perceptions. Potential areas of academic and social "incongruence" ultimately centered not in the programs which were offered (or their lack thereof), but in the students' general and specific experiences of unwelcome at the institution.

My project explores the impact of the great Orishas (Yoruba: "deities") of the crossroads, Eshu-Elegguá, on the thriving literary and visual arts of the African diaspora. Eshu-Elegguá are multiple figures who work between physical and spiritual realms, open possibilities, and embody unpredictability and chance. In chapter one I explore the codes, spaces, and functions of these translating, intermediary deities through cultural anthropology, religious studies, and art history. Chapter two explores patterns in the artistic employment of Eshu-Elegguá by analyzing these figures' appearance in visual arts and then in four texts: Mumbo Jumbo (Ismael Reed, 1972), Sortilégio: Mistério Negro (Abdias do Nasicmento, 1951), Chago de Guisa (Gerardo Fulleda León, 1988), and Brown Girl in the Ring (Nalo Hopkinson, 1998). Chapter three explores how those patterns converge in Midnight Robber (Nalo Hopkinson, 2000) by looking closely at the novel's narrators and translators, Eshu and Elegguá. I argue that Midnight Robber, when read through the literary theories and poetry of Kamau Brathwaite, is a novel "possessed" by the Orishas and that they take on authorial roles. Chapter four analyzes the translation of Midnight Robber into Spanish ( Ladrona de medianoche, Isabel Merino Bode, 2002); presents a way of translating the novel's multiple languages; and puts contemporary translation theories in dialogue with Eshu-Elegguá's translative and interpretive functions. Chapter five argues for a way of reading Wide Sargasso Sea (Jean Rhys, 1966) through the figures of Eshu-Elegguá. ^ The objective is to explore the aesthetic codes and philosophies that the figures of Eshu-Elegguá carry into the texts; trace their voices across multiple forms of cultural expression; and navigate the dialogues that these intermediary figures open between a group of literary texts that have not yet been studied together. The dissertation extends the critical work on the selected literary texts; uses the arts to further understand the nature of these deities of communicability; and analyzes Afro-Atlantic texts through figures and interpretive systems from within the tradition. By surveying contemporary translation theories and based on my close reading of the translating capacities and metaphors that Eshu-Elegguá embody, I offer a new model for translation.^

While a plethora of studies have examined the effects of divorce on children, fewer have looked at young adults who have experienced parental divorce after they were 18 years of age, and even fewer have examined the experiences of Black American adult children. Using concepts from Social Identity Theory, the goal of this study was to understand the experiences of Black adult children whose parents have divorced and the phenomenon of their self-perception based on family identity. This was a phenomenological study conducted through guided face-to-face interviews and utilizing Photovoice with four Black adult children of divorce, whose parents divorced after they were 18 years old. The data collected from narrative interviews and photographs through this study were analyzed using narrative and visual content analysis. Findings were that adult children who are emerging as adults with their identity struggle to reidentify themselves, their familial relations not only with their divorced parents, but even more so with their siblings; where relationships are also impacted. This study contributes to social change by identifying the needs of this population at an important time in their lives. Therapists, universities, and communities may use this study to better support Black adult children of divorce of American descent.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / Two studies of the mass media were conducted to investigate the roles of Blacks in magazine and television advertising. Study I was a longitudinal study of 6266 pictorial advertisements in five categories of general magazines. Study II was a descriptive study of one week of 705 commercial network television advertisements. In both studies, the amount of exposure and status relationships of Blacks were studied vis-a-vis their White counterparts. Results showed a marked tendency toward all-white characters in both magazines and television with some indication that status for Blacks is increasingly that of an "equal". / 2031-01-01

This study traces the evolution of the anti-apartheid movement from its emergence in the radical diaspora politics of the 1940s through the civil rights and black power eras and its maturation in the 1980s into a national movement that transformed US foreign policy. Chapter one traces the emergence of this counter-hegemony discourse in the radical African Diaspora politics of the 1940s and its repression through government intervention. Chapter two takes a close look at the government's efforts to reestablish discursive hegemony in the United States by co-opting African-American leaders and organizations through “enlightened paternalism” that included covert and overt CIA funding and the establishment of anticommunist journals. Chapter three examines the re-emergence of anti-apartheid sentiment during what became known as the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Chapters four and five look at the radicalization of the black freedom movement and the development of an anti-apartheid discourse and culture in the 1970s. Chapter six examines the emergence of TransAfrica—the black lobby for Africa and the Caribbean and its challenge to Reagan's “constructive engagement” policies. Chapter seven examines the Free South Africa Movement and the revival of direct action to pressure Congress to pass anti-apartheid sanctions. Chapter eight looks at role of the Congressional Black Caucus in passing sanctions against South Africa over President Reagan's veto. And finally chapter nine examines the impact of sanctions on the release of Nelson Mandela and his colleagues from prison and his eventual election as the first democratically elected president of South Africa.

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