Damien Schnyder
Awarded UC President's Postdoctoral Fellow, 2009-2010

Damien Schnyder is a University of California President’s Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Black Studies at UC Santa Barbara.

His dissertation addressed the connection between the public education and prison systems. In conversation with the school-to-prison pipeline scholarship, Damien’s dissertation analyzed the micro-processes by which public education as a state structure facilitates the movement of black male bodies into the labyrinth of the prison system. However, departing from the body of literature, he details how the public education structure is an ideological and pragmatic extension of the organizational logic of prison.

Building upon his dissertation project, Damien’s current research as a postdoctoral scholar builds on his dissertation project and provides a needed analysis with regard to the effects of the expansion of the prison system upon public education. In addition, building upon the work of scholars of prison masculinity, his analysis will provide detailed linkages with respect to the construction of black masculinity by the prison and public education systems.

Damien received his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin. He holds a M.A. in sociology and B.A. in African and African American Studies from Stanford University.

Visit the President's Postdoctoral Fellowship Program website

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Week-long International Conference:
"Women In Africa and the African Diaspora (WAAD)"

Over 200 women and men from 41 countries in five continents recently converged in Abuja under the auspices of the Association of African Women Scholars for a week-long international conference tagged: Women In Africa and the African Diaspora (WAAD).

Coordinated by Dr. Jude Akudinobi of the University of California, Santa Barbara, the WAAD Film Series tagged Tales-for-Thoughts ran throughout the summer conference from Monday to Friday.

Read Article.

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"Black Hair, Still Tangled in Politics"

Professor Ingrid Banks is part of a New York Times discussion on the politics of straight or natural hair for black women, including Michelle Obama and her daughters.
Read Article.

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"In the Black Culture, a Richness of Hairstory"

Read the article at CNN about black culture that focuses on "Hairstory" and Ingrid Banks' forthcoming book on contemporary black beauty salon culture.

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THE GUARDIAN: Should You Straighten Your Afro Hair?

The issue of how black women wear their hair is more contentious than ever, according to a recent Gaurdian article.

Ingrid Banks, an Associate Professor of Black Studies, and author of Hair Matters: Beauty, Power, and Black Women's Consciousness, offers her expertise on Black popular and beauty culture.  

Read Article

Read more news at the Social Sciences Division website

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George Lipsitz Visiting Fellow at Stanford

George Lipsitz is spending the 2008-2009 academic year as a Visiting Fellow at the Center for Compararive Studies in Race and Ethnicity at Stanford University. His work at the center includes research on "Colorblindness and the Court: School Desegregation, Race, and Space" and collaborating with Kimberle Crenshaw and Luke Harris on a book about affirmative action.

http://ccsre.stanford.edu/FP_visitFac.htm

http://ccsre.stanford.edu/RI_resInst.htm

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Gaye Johnson Visiting Fellow at Stanford

Gaye Theresa Johnson is a visiting fellow at Stanford University in the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity for the 2008-2009 academic year. She is completing a manuscript entitled "The Future Has a Past: Politics, Culture, and Memory in Afro-Chicano Los Angeles." She also researched and wrote a paper on the "sal-soul" music of Celia Cruz and the Fania All-Stars at the Zaire music festival in 1974.

http://ccsre.stanford.edu/FP_visitFac.htm

http://ccsre.stanford.edu/RI_resInst.htm

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Ingrid Banks Visiting Scholar at Russell Sage

Ingrid Banks is a 2008-2009 Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation in New York City. During the Fall Semester at Russell Sage, she will complete a paper that examines contemporary manifestations of segregation and integration in black beauty salons as part of a larger multi-city ethnographic study on black beauty salon culture.

https://www.russellsage.org/scholars/byYear?year=2008%20-%202009

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Professor Jeffrey Stewart Curates Black History Month Exhibition  

Hemphill Galleries
Washington, DC
January 31 to March 7, 2009

Read Details

"Myself" by John Robinson

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Jude Akudinobi Interview

Professor Jude Akudinobi was interviewed and cited in the major Chilean/Latin American paper, 'El Mercurio.'

Article in Spanish.

Click to view article (pdf).

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Cedric Robinson Receives Errol Hill Award

Professor Cedric Robinson was the 2008 winner of the Errol Hill Award which is given by the American Society for Theatre Research.

Read Details

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Claudine Michel Receives Award from Haitian Studies Assoc.

Claudine Michel, Professor of Black Studies at UC Santa Barbara and Director of the campus's Center for Black Studies Research, has received the Haitian Studies Association Service Award.

The award recognizes Michel's commitment to the advancement of Haitian studies, particularly as editor of the association's official publication, The Journal of Haitian Studies. The award was presented earlier this month at the organization's annual meeting in Port Au Prince.  

Read the complete Press Release

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Black Studies Newsletters

2005 Newsletter (pdf)

2006 Newsletter (pdf)

2007 Newsletter (pdf)