Racial Microaggressions: The Narratives of African American Faculty at a Predominantly White University

Abstract

What role does race play in the lives of fourteen African American (7 women, 7 men) faculty on a predominantly White campus? This case study focuses on their narratives which revealed that racial microaggressions were a common and negative facet of their lives on campus. Specifically, their narratives suggest interactions of microinvalidations with White colleagues and microinsults with White students. This faculty responded to racial microaggressions by creating campus change and safe space for students of color. Given the potential negative outcomes of racial microaggression, these findings suggest that work is needed to improve the campus climate for African American faculty. Keywords: racial microaggressions, African American faculty, higher education Racial oppression continues to be a problem in U.S. society. Oppression includes institutional and interpersonal actions that block access and resources for oppressed groups (Bankston, 2000; Jaggar & Young 2000; Johnson, 2000; Roth, 2005). Oppression may occur as discrete or chronic events; however, its effects are cumulative and widespread (Frye, 1983). In higher education, one illustration of racial oppression is the underrepresentation and distribution of African American faculty. African American faculty makes up only 4.9% of full-time, tenuretrack faculty in the United States (National Center for Education Statistics, 2009). Beyond being underrepresented, African American faculty are concentrated in lower faculty ranks (i.e., 6.2% of assistant professors, 5.4% of associate professors, and 3.2% of full professors) and in community colleges (Agathangelou & Ling, 2002; Gregory, 2001). Their departments confine African American faculty to race-specific roles and expectations (Aguirre, 2000; Benjamin, 1997; Martinez Aleman & Renn, 2002; Moses, 1997). For example, department chairs often expected African American faculty to only teach and research, often marginalized, racial scholarship (Moses, 1997). Furthermore, African American faculty were often assigned high numbers of African American advisees, diversity-related committee work on top of other required service obligations, and teaching loads higher than those of their White peers (Agathangelou & Ling, 2002; Balderrama, Teixeira, & Valdez, 2004; Aguirre, 2000; Allen et al., 2002; Johnson, Kuykendall, & Laird, 2006). On teaching evaluations used for retention and promotion purposes, students rated African American faculty teaching unfavorably compared to White faculty (DiPietro & Paye, 2005; Hamermesh & Parker, 2005; Rubin, 2001; Vargas, 2002). Students also rated African American faculty as less intelligent than White faculty (Hendrix, 1998; Rubin, 2001; Williams et al., 1999). These factors take time away from research and, therefore, have been posited as contributing to the unsuccessful tenure and promotion of African American faculty (Fields, 2000; Turner, 2003). While understanding institutional racial oppression is important, one must also attend to interpersonal racial oppression. Several scholars have noted the importance of interpersonal interactions. For example, a body of research demonstrates negative mental and physical health consequences of interpersonal racial oppression for African Americans (Dole et al., 2004; Pittman, forthcoming; Watkins et al., 2006; Williams, Neighbors, & Jackson, 2003). In higher education contexts in particular, Gurin and colleagues (2002) noted that interpersonal racial interactions must have particular features (e.g. quality and quantity) to produce positive outcomes for college students. Other works have illustrated that interpersonal racial oppression has harmed the mental well-being and academic performance of African American students (Chesler, Wilson, & Malani, 1993; Rovai, Gallien, & Wighting, 2005). Despite the potential negative impact of interpersonal racial oppression, it remains an under-researched topic in higher education (Yosso et al. …