Re/making men and women for the race: Coeducation, respectability and black student leadership at Fisk University, 1924-1970

Praylow, Perzavia

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/34584 Copy

Description

Title

Re/making men and women for the race: Coeducation, respectability and black student leadership at Fisk University, 1924-1970

Author(s)

Praylow, Perzavia

Issue Date

2012-09-18T21:26:41Z

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

• Anderson, James D.
• Roediger, David R.

Doctoral Committee Chair(s)

• Anderson, James D.
• Roediger, David R.

Committee Member(s)

• Barnes, Teresa A.
• McDuffie, Erik S.

Department of Study

History

Discipline

History

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Degree Level

Dissertation

Keyword(s)

• Black higher education
• Black colleges
• Coeducation
• Students
• Leadership
• Gender
• Respectability
• Activism
• Protest
• Fisk University

Abstract

This dissertation analyzes the relationship between student self-determination, the existence of competing ideologies of respectable race leadership and the transformation of coeducation at Fisk University between the 1924 and 1970. Throughout, a major focus of this dissertation is to trace how ideologies of race leadership were transformed by student dissent at Fisk. As a result, this research is concerned with analyzing students’ redefinition and negotiation of race leadership at the college. Throughout, the author asserts that Fisk students used self-determination in order to transform models of race leadership at the college. Specifically, this manuscript provides a critical interrogation of the influence of New Negro, civil rights and Black Power philosophies on the self-determination of students and their notion of what constituted respectable race leadership between 1924 and 1970. This research is more than just a history of student dissent. “Re/Making Men and Women for the Race: Coeducation, Respectability and Black Student Leadership at Fisk University, 1924-1970,” in addition, highlights the complicated and contested meaning given to the historic and contemporary role played by Black colleges in preparing students for race leadership in the African American community. Student dissent at Fisk posed a major challenge to the organization and governance of academic and student affairs at the college. The Fisk student strike of 1924, the Civil Rights and Black Power protests of the 1960’s and other examples of student self-determination created an alternative model of race leadership espoused by Fisk men and women. Throughout the history of the institution, students adopted a model of race leadership that stressed autonomy and a belief in Black people’s ability as professionals and as race leaders to advocate social equality on behalf of their community.

Graduation Semester

2012-08

Permalink

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/34584

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2012 Perzavia Praylow

Owning Collections