Twenty years after the introduction of the Africana Studies degree at the University of Arizona, the program maintains the same strong ties to Tucson’s tight-knit Black community that brought it to life in the first place.
A direct product of the social movements of the 1950s and 1960s, the Africana Studies program at the U of A was formally established in 1976, with an Introduction to Black Studies course introduced the following spring. The bachelor of arts degree was created in 2005 and in 2022, the program officially became the Department of Africana Studies, with 13 tenured, tenure-track and career-track faculty.
Like elsewhere across the country, Black students and community organizations in Tucson demanded a curriculum that directly addressed their particular history, identities, cultures and social problems. And for current Department Head Praise Zenenga, that origin will always be respected by the faculty and students, who actively work to maintain strong ties with the community members who fought for the program and have supported it for decades.
“For me, it’s a huge responsibility. We have to keep the legacy going. First of all, it’s about excellence, in terms of our faculty research and our teaching,” Zenenga said. “Part of our job is to make sure the field keeps growing and the field keeps serving the communities it was created to serve, and part of our job is moving with the times.”
Africana Studies is by its very nature an interdisciplinary course of study, Zenenga said.
“What is it that has shaped the Black experience? Number one is history, the forced movement of large numbers of people, for Blacks in the United States, Blacks in Brazil, the Caribbean, the UK, Europe, and how they moved from the African continent to be where they are presently,” he said. “Then we talk of politics, of laws, of religion and how it was used for purposes of enslaving Africans and colonizing Africa. We are talking of anthropology, of practices and cultures, everything from the arts to the structure of societies. Those disciplines are inherently built into Africana Studies. They’re all blended and we’re studying them all together as one.”
None of that existed at the U of A when Richard Davis enrolled in 1965. Davis was a founder and the first president of both the Black Student Union and the Zeta Theta Chapter of the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1969 and a law degree in 1972.
“When I got my law degree, there was no such thing as Africana Studies. We talked about it, but never dreamed it would get to the point it’s now arrived. When I was thinking about Africana Studies, I was primarily thinking about African American history and it being included in history books because it was excluded,” said Davis, now recognized as one of the top trial lawyers in the country. “That was my vision and I’ve been very pleased to see that it’s gone way beyond that.”
Davis has long supported the program and become somewhat of a spokesperson, asked from time to time to come in and talk about the pre-Africana Studies history at U of A and all the benefits the program has provided in the years since it began.
“I’ve watched it evolve and it’s well beyond the scope I envisioned back then. When I talk to the professors, I hear what they’re doing and I’m so impressed,” Davis said. “That’s what education is all about, to expose students to many different things and they’ve done a tremendous job. I’m just amazed by the things they do.”
Daisy Jenkins, who held executive positions at both Raytheon and the Carondelet Health Network, said she supports the university as a whole, but focuses significantly on Africana Studies, hosting fundraisers at her home.
“The department has made a continuous effort to be connected with the Black community, to learn about the Black community, to connect with leaders in the Black community and to ensure there was an awareness, not only of the need for the department, but the value proposition of having Africana Studies,” Jenkins said. “This is especially true for a community like Tucson, where the African American population is about 4 percent and there hasn’t always been the perspective among Black citizens that the university had any real connection with the Black community, other than athletics.”
Styne Hill, Chair of the university’s Black Community Council, said Zenenga, his predecessor Alain-Philippe Durand and faculty members have all reached out to the community and welcomed the support and the understanding they’ve received in return.
“The community absolutely loves working with them because they ask ‘How can we help?’” she said.
For her part, Hill, who retired as Chief Information Officer for Raytheon Missile Systems, enjoys working with students on whatever their future goals may be.
“We use mentor as a catch-all word. Students might not know how they need help. But if you approach them as interested in their growth and development and would love to know where they’d like to focus their energy and efforts, they can think about it better,” she said. “I’ve seen a lot of students that we’ve talked to from Africana Studies who really appreciated those conversations. It wasn’t the way they thought about needing support.”
For Durand, who directed Africana Studies from 2010 to 2016 and now serves as Dorrance Dean of the College of Humanities, cultivating close ties with the community ultimately benefits the students, who can be exposed to a myriad of career paths and ways they can apply the versatile skills they gain in the program.
“Africana Studies has unique advantages for students, who gain such a wide breadth of knowledge that they can find meaningful employment anywhere,” he said. “We have very trusted partners in the community who’ve ensured that Africana Studies has the support it needs to thrive.”
Lehman Benson, now U of A Vice President of Black Advancement and Engagement, served as interim director of Africana Studies from 2008 to 2010, brought in from the Eller College of Management to stabilize and reorganize the program.
“It was fun for me working with the community and we had great support from the Black Community Council,” he said.
As vice president, Benson’s initiatives for students, faculty and staff include financial literacy, healthcare and career-advancement skills, all of which he sees strongly reflected in Africana Studies.
“It really is an interdisciplinary program. They’ve done a great job with the curriculum and cross-listing courses,” he said. “The major is for everybody.”
Africana Studies faculty members themselves are integral parts of the local Black community, said Professor of Practice Tani Sanchez, who was also the first president of the Tucson chapter of the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society.
The Department of Africana Studies is unusually active in holding events with broader public appeal, especially during Black History Month. In recent years, faculty have organized talks from hip-hop legend Grandmaster Flash, acclaimed journalist Jelani Cobb, historian and activist Pamela Mays McDonald, and scholar and author Regina Bradley, among many others.
“It’s been so valuable for Africana Studies to bring that intellectual component in,” she said. “Students have been energized and happy they came and community members enjoy it as well. The speakers we’ve brought in are the ones who really connected everything.”