HBCUs as Sites of Resistance: The Malignity of Materialism, Western Masculinity, and Spiritual Malefaction

Abstract

In this paper, the author challenges stakeholders (i.e., administrators, educators, students) of historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) to examine how HBCUs can continue to serve as sites of resistance against the prevailing cultural norms of materialism, Western masculinity, and spiritual malefaction. The author traces his evaluation back to the crucible of the civil rights movement and the ‘iconization’ of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., asserting that HBCUs must be intentional about accounting for the cultural and generational shifts in the Black community in order to continue to effectively produce students who are committed to service and social justice. Drawing on the narratives of personal resistance from six current students and graduates of an HBCU, the author contends that HBCUs can not only prepare a new generation of agents for what Bonilla-Silva (2006) describes as a “new civil rights movement,” but these vital institutions must account for the effects of the idolatrous, media-driven worship of civil rights icons, lest they indoctrinate the same individualistic ethos into a new generation that is already spellbound by the consumerist commodification of Barak Obama.