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This book employs a fiction-based approach to address the revolving door of Black faculty and staff in American colleges and universities as a national crisis that needs to be resolved systematically. Alex-Assensoh coins the acronym SOULS to promote the importance of safety, organizational accountability, unvarnished truth telling, love, and spirituality as the foundational ingredients for reimagining and rebuilding an Academy that harnesses the talents of Black faculty and staff. Chapters feature storytelling to illustrate common cracks in academic structures while interweaving interdisciplinary research to contextualize themes that the fiction-based method reveals. To conclude, the author provides a research-informed call to action within the context of institutional transformation, as well as reflective questions and recommendations for further reading.
List of contents
Introduction.- Farewell Again.- Passage One: Institutional Responsiveness in the Absence of SOULS.- Exodus and The Day of Reckoning.- The Board Room.- The Cleanup Woman.- Passage Two: Safety In The Academy.- Saving Our Children.- A Profound Act of Self-Preservation.- Students Catalyzing Change.- Our Shared Responsibility.- Passage Three: Organizational Accountability.- The Heart Transplant.- What about the Students?.- Culpability.- Passage Four: Unvarnished Truth Telling in the Academy.- No Tea, No Shade.- Towering University Goddam.- Call and Response.- Passage Five: Love and Spirituality in the Academy: A Change Is Gonna Come.- A Change Is Gonna Come.- Out of the Ashes.- From Farewell Again to SOULS Celebration.- Implications, Resources and Exemplars.
About the author
Yvette M. Alex-Assensoh is Vice President for Equity and Inclusion, Professor of Political Science, and Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Oregon, USA. A member of the Oregon and Indiana Bar Associations, she also serves as an elected Boardmember of the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education (NADOHE).
