Women's Studies and Sexuality Studies at HBCUs: The Audre Lorde Project at Spelman College

Abstract

Women'sStudies and Sexuality Studies at HBCUs: The Audre Lorde Projectat Spelman College Erica Lorraine Williams A NATIONAL DISCUSSION ON INSTITUTIONAL CHANGES in Women's studies and sexuality studies would be remiss if it did not consider the specificities of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the United States. Here, I highlight the efforts that the Women's Research and Resource Center and its Audre Lorde Project at Spelman College have made to foster critical discussions about LGBTQ schol arship, activism, and history at HBCUs. In particular, I reflect on the Audre Lorde Project's finding that in order for critical conversations around sexuality and queer studies to happen on HBCU campuses, there must first be an institutional and curricular commitment to black feminisms and black women's studies. Over the last seven years, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, M. jacqui Alexan der, and their team have spearheaded the Audre Lorde Project, whose objective was to "increase public awareness and understanding about African American LGBTQ. experiences; to explore the marginaliza tion of racial issues in the LGBTQ movement and in gay and lesbian studies; and to create climates that acknowledge, value, and respect difference, especially within HBCUs, where profound silences con tinue to exist around gender and sexuality."1 Named after the firstout lesbian woman to speak at Spelman College, the Audre Lorde Project involved visits to eleven HBCU campuses to investigate the social climates for LGBTQ students, faculty, and staff. Their visits helped FeministStudies39, no. 2. © 2013 by Erica Lorraine Williams 520 Forum:W/G/SStudies 521 document homophobia on campuses: LGBTQ students experienced discrimination in the classroom, lived in fear of being ostracized, struggled with coming out on campus, and sometimes dropped out or transferred to other institutions. Simultaneously, Guy-Sheftall and Alexander made a fascinating, although perhaps unsurprising discov ery: the HBCUs that had women's studies programs were more open and receptive than other institutions to having candid discussions about sexuality. They noticed that students who had enrolled in women's studies courses ... were more likely to be conscious of the politics and history of their campuses in relation to matters of gender and sexuality and as a result were more likely to view these matters not as private, individual concerns but as public, culturally constructed, and ultimately amenable to intervention.2 In other words, women's studies paved, and continues to pave, the way for sexuality studies. And given the reality that women's studies has not been widely institutionalized at HBCUs, LGBTQ studies as a result appears virtually non-existent.3 In the Audre Lorde Summit Resource Guide, Roderick Ferguson, Howard University alumnus and American studies scholar, argues that "a curricular interest in black feminism" must be institutionalized in order to transform HBCUs into spaces with an intellectual climate that could engage members of the black LGBTQ community. Black women's studies, Ferguson maintains, "was the first to incorporate examinations of queer sexuality into Black Studies," and "black femi nism has had the longest engagement with the issue of black sexuality." If HBCUs are to embark on a project of institutional transformation to become more open and inclusive spaces for LGBTQ students, faculty, and staff,they must firstcommit to "the insights of black feminism."4 Understanding the historical context of HBCUs can shed light on the resistance that many of these institutions have to both wom en's studies and LGBTQ studies. HBCUs have long been invested in producing ideal black intellectuals and educated women and men who could engage in what was commonly termed "racial uplift." For black women, this too readily meant adopting a politics of silence and respectability in order to counter wider prevailing racist discourses about black women's "excessive" sexuality. As Marybeth Gasman 522 Forum: W¡G¡S Studies points out, "during the early years of black colleges, black temale stu dents were sheltered by the administration; their lives were shaped by institutional policies designed to control their behavior."5 This polic ing of black women's sexuality had significant implications for black queer people. As Matt Richardson argues, the tradition of representing Black people as decent and moral histor ical agents has meant the erasure of the broad array...