Graduate Program

Director of Graduate Studies: 
Glenda Gilmore

History and Structure

In 1993-94, African American Studies developed a unique graduate program in cooperation with a number of other departments and programs across the University. This program, which grew out of the M.A. program that African and African American studies had launched in 1978, now offers a Joint Doctoral Degree in African American Studies and another field or discipline. The program became a department in July 2000.

African American Studies offers a combined Ph.D. in conjunction with several other departments and programs. Departments and programs which currently offer a combined Ph.D. with African American Studies are: American Studies, Anthropology, English, Film Studies, French, History, History of Art, Political Science, Psychology, Religious Studies, Sociology, and Spanish and Portuguese. Within the field of study, the student will select an area of concentration in consultation with the directors of graduate studies of African American Studies and the joint department or program. An area of concentration in African American Studies may take the form of a single area study or a comparative area study: e.g., Caribbean or African American literature, a comparison of African American literature in a combined degree with the Department of English; an investigation of the significance of the presence of African cultures in the new World, either in the Caribbean or in Latin and/or South America in a combined degree with the Spanish and Portuguese department. An area of concentration may also follow the fields of study already established within a single discipline, e.g., race/minority/ethnic studies in a combined degree with Sociology. An area of concentration must either be a field of study offered by a department or fall within the rubric of such a field. Please refer to the description of fields of study of the prospective joint department or program.