Call for Proposals

2015 – 2017

Guidelines & Instructions

The African & African-American Studies program invites proposals from any full-time, Elon University faculty for new courses that focus on African, African-American, and or other Africana experiences from specific disciplinary perspectives. Priority consideration will be given to courses emerging from schools, departments, and programs not traditionally represented in African & African-American Studies here at Elon. Faculty in the Schools of Business and Communications, and those in Business, Communications, Fine Arts, Philosophy, World Languages & Cultures, Religious Studies, Psychology, and the sciences are especially encouraged to apply. However, all proposals will be considered and evaluated by the selection committee.

*Successful applications will:

  • include a description of the course, the course objectives, a discussion of the kinds of students who would benefit from the course, and suggest a timeline for teaching the course during the next two academic years, 2015-2017;
  • demonstrate how the proposed course relates to the faculty member’s scholarly, pedagogical, and or research interests;
  • follow the Committee’s directions and suggestions;
  • bear evidence of careful editing and preparation;
  • *If this information is known, applicants may suggest other Elon faculty members in the same program, department, or discipline, who are qualified to teach the course.

In submitting the application, faculty must commit to teaching the course for two consecutive years, with the approval of their department chair and the dean of their school, and must participate in a series of four course development workshops sponsored by the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning and the African & African-American Studies program in Spring semesters of the award year. The successful applicants will each be awarded a stipend following the successful development of the course and for fulfilling the requirements of the award.

The deadline for proposals is 5:00 pm on the third Friday of September. Please submit one original, signed hard-copy of the application and accompanying materials to the AAASE Program Coordinator, 2338 Campus Box, or deliver to Alamance 302. Notifications will be made by the middle of October.

Conditions of Eligibility

Faculty must be full-time in order to meet the two-year teaching commitment.

Please download a copy of the application here.

Previous Grant Recipients and Courses:

Sandra ReidSandra Reid ‘85 is Lecturer in the Department of Human Service Studies. She spent 21 years working as a professional in the juvenile justice system.  This work with African-American families fueled her scholarly and research interest and led her back to her alma mater–Elon. Her familiarity with some of the supports and stresses that affect the Black family unit in the United States, as well as the social and political issues important to its well-being, will provide an invaluable resource to the course she has created for African & African-American Studies, “This Ain’t the Cosbys or Is It?”  The 300-level Human Service Studies course examines the cultural and social dynamics of the African American family from both a historical and current perspective.  The primary focus will be the role of the African American family in today’s society with a special emphasis placed on issues such as education, spirituality, politics, health, crime and poverty.

Students at the end of the course will be able to:

  • Describe the history of the African American family in the United States.
  • Describe and understand the impact of a variety of American institutions on the African American family (education, the church, government, etc.)
  • Be familiar with contemporary debates regarding the well-being of the African American family (e.g., “culture victim hood”, the impact of hip hop culture, “acting white” ad it relates to academic success, etc.)
  • Understand the unique strengths and coping skills of the African American family.

Frances Ward-JohnsonFrances Ward-Johnson is Associate Professor in the School of Communications. The JCM course she has developed for African & African-American Studies is designed to introduce students to some of the complexities of the relationships between race, culture, popular culture and mass media. Students will also be introduced to basic tools and techniques for evaluating, analyzing and understanding these relationships as they are communicated through mass media. Though emphasis will be on the portrayal of African Americans, who were trailblazers in breaking barriers in mass media, the course will also look at the depiction of other people of color, including Native-Americans, Hispanics, and Asian-Americans. The course focuses primarily on the news media, including newspapers, television, radio, magazines, and the Internet, but discussions will also include media portrayals in entertainment, such as film and music.

This course will help students:.

  • Develop more awareness and sensitive to multicultural issues in mass media
  • Expand students’ understanding of efforts to diversify the mass media’s ranks and the impact this has had and will continue to have on the media’s portrayals of minority groups
  • Increase students’ knowledge of the historical significance of the minority press
  • Build research and critical evaluation skills thorough analysis of differences