Black Studies at Massasoit Community College

Black in Boston and Beyond

In this episode, Dr. Hettie V. Williams is in conversation with Drs. Rachel Jessica Daniel Director of the Center for Employee Enrichment and Development (CEED) at Massasoit Community College in Brockton, Massachusetts, and President of the Bay State National Council on Black American Affairs, and Carine Sauvignon Executive Dean for the Canton Campus at Massasoit Community College. Massasoit has one of the first Black Studies majors at a community college in the state of Massachusetts. This program came took a decade long struggle to get certified but given that Massasoit is one of the more diverse community colleges in the state the students helped to demand this change. The program is interdisciplinary in scope and includes courses on African American literature, history, music, and culture. Professors from several academic units teach for the program and Sauvignon is one of the architects of the curriculum along with a range of other faculty on the campus. Devlin and Sauvignon tell a detailed story of how the Black Studies program at their institution came into development. These women are lively and passionate about this two-year program in a time when Black Studies is under assault across the nation. Massachusetts has been a leader in this area with some of the earliest Black Studies programs in the nation appearing at schools such as Brandeis University in 1969. There are also plans to ensure that transfer agreements are in places with institutions such as the University of Massachusetts at Boston. For more information about this program at Massasoit click here Black Studies at Massasoit Community College