Michael Tillotson’s Agency Reduction Formation theory is designed to expose, situate, and explain ideological trends that are intended to compel African people to distance themselves from their collective identity (Tillotson 2011, 62). Identity provides African people the internal construction to seek self-determination that allows them to strive for agency, the ability to provide the psychological and cultural resources necessary for the advancement of human freedom (Asante 2007, 40-41). In this study, I have added an agential location dimension to the discourse of “identity names” utilizing Afrocentric analysis to interrogate whether those specific “identity names” position African people toward victorious consciousness, an attitude which reflects a commitment to Africana history, values, and culture. In addition to exploring why it is problematic for African people to identify with terms such as “Nigga”, “Bad Bitch”, “Savage” and “Trap Queen” given the controversy sustained by their overuse as racial epithets and radical forms of misnaming, I also address how such “identity words” are aggressive forms of Agency Reduction Formation. To demonstrate how the use of the previously mentioned “identity words” is an agency reducing activity, I analyzed the words and photographs of African men and women featured on the social networking platform Instagram. Through content analysis, I claimed that African people identifying particularly as a “Nigga”, “Bad Bitch”, “Savage” and “Trap Queen” within their profiles and posts create an environment for dis-empowerment, identity dislocation, and internalized oppression. If tendencies to use these “agency reducing identity words” continues in this manner, African people will experience ongoing cultural dislocation that diminishes their “need for a collective agency that fights against oppression.” / African American Studies

Since the emergence of RastafarI communities within 1930's Jamaica following the coronation of Ras Tafari Makonnen as Haile Selassie I, Negus (king) of Ethiopia, RastafarI continuously articulate his divinity within their discourse. While the specific nomenclature for and significance of Haile Selassie I may vary in accordance to time and affiliation, it is unquestionable that Selassie I remains central to the RastafarI way of life for more than 70 years. What scholars and thinkers on RastafarI question, and very fervently so during the past 10 years, is the authenticity of the divinity of Selassie I within RastafarI thought. The few scholars who attempt to solve what for them is the "problem of authenticity," claim, through christological and apologistic approaches, that RastafarI need to reconsider the possibility of his status, as it is conjecture and blasphemy. Adhering to African epistemological assumptions that everything in existence comprises the whole of existence, we rely on an African symbolic approach to examine RastafarI conceptualizations of Selassie I within pre-coronation, coronation and post-coronation RastafarI writings. Given that the material reality seemingly degenerates the collective body and consciousness in accordance with the cycles of time as expressed within the most ancient of Kemetic cosmologies, our aim is to suggest that Haile Selassie I emerges as a ba, the soul template, of Asar, a force manifesting as the human ability and potential to exist within the material realm in accordance with the unseen realm of existence. We conclude, unlike previous academic thinkers who examine RastafarI thought, that RastafarI thinking about Haile Selassie I is therefore an authentic perspective, one that undoubtedly occurs in accordance with the structure and origin of the universe and the cyclical journey of Africana reclamation of a primordial consciousness. / African American Studies

The purpose of this research was to investigate ways classical composers of African descent have been included in the mainstream academic canon. I examined the insights of four scholars who have been committed to including classical composers of African descent throughout their music careers. The initial research questions of this study were: 1) How do participants describe their frameworks for making the commitment to include classical composers of African descent throughout their careers? 2) What have been the challenges and benefits associated with their commitment? 3) What might contemporary scholars view as strategies for integrating classical composers of African descent into the mainstream academic canon? Four musicians, who have contributed to the scholarship related to classical works by composers of African descent in very different ways, participated in this qualitative collective case study: Dr. Ysaye Maria Barnwell, a composer and performer; Dr. Dominique-Rene de Lerma, musicologist; Dr. Anthony Thomas Leach, educator, conductor, and organist; and Mr. Hannibal Lokumbe, composer, trumpeter, and visionary. Through two in-depth interviews with each of the four scholars, a related question emerged: How have the participants contributed to the inclusion of classical composers of African descent throughout professional careers and personal lives? I transcribed the interviews, returned them to the participants for member checks, and prepared final, revised transcripts based on their feedback for analysis. I examined the interview data to obtain a collective representation related to the research questions. I analyzed the data for emerging codes, categories, and themes until details considered substantive to the research emerged. Themes that emerged focused on the need to identify the importance of seeing the contributions for classical composers of African descent from an Afrocentric as well as a Eurocentric perspective; the impact of the Civil Rights Movement on how each participant engaged the music throughout their lives; the importance of informal and formal education and the roles family, community, and school played in their relationship with the music they shared; and, the significance of creating access to their works through publications and professional associations. / Music Education

From the animal and trickster tales told by enslaved Africans in America to current education and performance based storytelling by contemporary African American storytellers, this study traces the aesthetics and epistemologies of the collaborative African diasporic oral expressive traditions. Through systematic analysis based on data derived from bibliographic and archival sources, interviews, and participant observation, it delineates the progression of the repertoire and content of Blackstorytelling through the lives and works of national and internationally known storytellers, Jackie Torrence, Linda Goss and Charlotte Blake Alston. Its theoretical framework is inspired by Kariamu Welsh Asante’s aesthetic senses coupled with pertinent ideas of other scholars in the field. The study demonstrates the existence of significant evidence of cultural preservation and artistic re-interpretation of the African aesthetic in Blackstorytelling. The genre comprises both traditional and contemporary expressions of African American culture. As such, it is a major component of the universal African oral continuum / African American Studies

This dissertation examines the various discursive expressions of black agency that formed the stereotypical representations of African descendants found in Victorian racial discourse. It is, therefore, an analysis of the discursive practices of peoples of African descent and not of the actual stereotypes frequently associated with Victorian racial discourse. I believe that a close reading and analysis of the discursive practices of peoples of African descent subject to British rule will generate more focused critical narratives about the fantasies that plagued the British imagination well into the twentieth century. This study also suggest that contemporary scholars should start looking at Victorian racial discourse as an active dialogue and conversation with the Other, rather than a description of the psychology of power. / English

Seizing the Power to Define!" Afrocentric Inquiry and the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem Miciah Z. Yehudah Doctoral Dissertation Doctoral Committee Advisory Chair: Iyelli Ichile; Ph.D. Temple University, Philadelphia Pennsylvania, United States of America This dissertation critically examines the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem, a group of African American Hebrews from Chicago that migrated to Liberia in 1967 and Israel in 1969. The greater part of the scholarship engaging the group since 1967 has consistently labeled them along four lines: as a people seeking constant external acceptance; as a cultic or "new religious movement"; as an oppressed and downtrodden people seeking success in any way in which it could be achieved; or as a people with a strange affinity towards Jewish people so extreme that they intend not only to emulate and eradicate them but to serve as their replacements. In the literature reviewed it was rare that the actual philosophy of the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem was interrogated. In the rare cases in which their philosophies were examined they were situated only in regards to their relationship with an already assumed universal White normativity. In studying the group, methodological concerns arise, as do questions with regards to who the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem truly are. To investigate the methodological parameters of studying the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem the Afrocentric Paradigm is employed. Afrocentric inquiry's focus on agency and the privileging of the voice of the African subjects within its own narrative differs drastically from the methodology underlying those scholars that have studied the group previously. In order to explore who the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem identify with (orientation), how they navigate the issue of epistemology as both a people of African and Israelite heritage (grounding), and how they define freedom and its parameters in conversation with the larger African world they claim to be amongst (location) this dissertation analyzes major publications of the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem since the 1980s. This work challenges the argument that the Afrocentric Paradigm is ill suited to appropriately study the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem. / African American Studies

Doctor of Education / Department of Educational Leadership / Trudy Salsberry / Institutional advancement is a constant challenge for leaders at institutions of higher education. The continued threat to historically black college and universities (HBCU) survival, due to the lack of resources they need to operate and compete, is at the forefront of concerns for many HBCU presidents and supporters. Research suggests that to have success in acquiring more resources, universities will need to work with their alumni associations and foundations. The purpose of this qualitative, multi-case study was to contribute to the limited research on the relationships among HBCU leaders responsible for growing resources. Numerous aspects contribute to increasing alumni giving and this study will contribute to that knowledge. The discussion of inter-organizational relationships and how the processes of cooperation, coordination, and collaboration transpire should be a part of the dialogue. Exploration of these relationships and processes can highlight possible solutions and deficiencies in the success of institutional advancement. Sites for this study were purposefully selected to examine these inter-organizational relationships. Data included in-depth interviews and related documents and artifacts. Thirty patterns and three themes emerged from the data analysis. The three themes include an understanding that (a) “working together” enacts cooperation, coordination, and collaboration; (b) human capital and organizational structures affect coordination and the ability to reach goals; and (c) the goal for increased resource capacity focuses the efforts of cooperation, coordination, and collaboration. This study extends the discussion to looking at inter-organizational relationships as another perspective to enhance resources. This investigation also introduces dialogue about alumni association and foundation volunteerism as an important component in developing effective solutions. The understandings portrayed in the identified themes will help university officials, practitioners, advancement volunteers, and supporters of higher education enhance their institutional advancement strategies and help set forth norms for productive behaviors.

Comme une grande partie des îles de la Caraïbe, pour des raisons économiques basées sur le mercantilisme, justifiées par une législation, la Martinique, née il y a trois siècles, a connu un emmêlement massif de diverses ethnies. Suite à l’abolition de l’esclavage en 1848 et à la crise agricole qui en découla, c’est un brassage de coutumes qui s’opéra avec l’immigration des Hindous, des Africains, des Chinois et des Indochinois. Ce faisant, ces coutumes ont conservé leurs traditions et croyances propres, expliquant ainsi la fusion d'éléments de ces cultures, encore présente aujourd’hui. En abolissant l’esclavage, la « Loi » abolit également la réification, rétablissant ainsi l’humanité de l’homme, puisque l’esclave noir était considéré comme un bien meuble . Il en résulte la création d’un nouveau monde, modifiant la vie culturelle, déployant des habitus, ainsi qu’une manière de penser et d’agir. Aussi, un nouveau langage se structure progressivement. En 1946, la Martinique est reconnue département français d’Amérique. Aujourd’hui, elle se trouve dans une dépendance économique et sociale. De cet état de fait, un conflit s’impose à l’Afro-Martiniquais quant à la question de l’identité. Il se trouve partagé entre le contexte franco-européen et le milieu afro-antillais. Cette contradiction émane aussi de situations de confrontation, d’où se dégage souvent un ressenti de « fatalité » voire de « malédiction » entraînant « un sentiment de culpabilité collective » d’oser défier l’ordre social en place. Notre recherche vise à analyser ce dilemme de la dépendance à partir de l’énoncé des malédictions puis des considérations historiques suivies d'une perspective psychanalytique. / As a large part of the islands of the Caribbean, for economic reasons based on mercantilism, justified by law, Martinique, created three centuries ago, was a massive tangle of various ethnic groups. Following the abolition of slavery in 1848 and the agricultural crisis that arose in this patch is a custom which took place with the immigration of Indians, Africans, Chinese and Indochinese. In doing so, these customs have preserved their traditions and beliefs, thus explaining the fusion of these cultures still present today. Abolishing slavery, the "Act" also abolishes reification, since the black slave was considered as furniture, restoring the Humanity of Man. This results in the creation of a new world, changing the culture, deploying habits and a way of thinking, acting and structuring a new language. In 1946, Martinique is renowned French department of America. Today Martinique is at a state of economic and social dependence. In fact, a conflict requires the Afro-Martinique on the question of identity. The subject is divided between the Franco-European and Afro-Caribbean middle class. This contradiction comes as confrontation situations where it often follows a feeling of "fate" or "curse" causing "a sense of collective guilt" for daring to challenge the existing social order. » .

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2009. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-06, Section: A, page: . Adviser: Anne Haas Dyson. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 234-245) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

In an attempt to close the gaps between diaspora and regional studies an Afro-Asian comparative perspective on African and Indian identity will be explored in the countries of Guyana and South Africa. The overlying aim of the ethnographic research will be to see whether blackness can be used as a unifier to those belonging to enslaved and indentured diasporas. Comparisons will be made between the two race models of the Atlantic Ocean and Indian Ocean worlds. A substantial portion will be set aside for a critique of the concept of Coolitude including commentary on V.S. Naipaul. Further, mixing, creolization, spirituality and the cultural politics of Black Consciousness, multiculturalism, and dreadlocks will be exemplified as AfroAsian encounters.