Customer Reviews

African American Men in College

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This book is concerned that far fewer black men attend and complete college compared to black women. It asks what factors may help alleviate this and then gives examples of college organizations that try to address this disparity. This is not an anti-feminist text. In no way does it diminish the success of black women by focusing upon the lack of success of some black male students. This book has a nice diversity of topics.

The book is divided into two parts: academic studies and descriptions of organizations for black men. I think the two parts are intended to satisfy hardcore academics and laypeople just generally concerned about black males, separately. It may be a way to include both theory and practice. The chapter "Helping African-American Men Matriculate" is just a summary of part one by the editor. Part Two has no summary and thus the text seems asymmetrical. Further, the book should have really been divided into three chapters: academic dynamics, subpopulations of black male students, and then organizations. To be honest, the book is a bit longer than it had to be, but maybe that emphasizes the seriousness of the issue.

I was both excited and disappointed by the chapter "African American Gay Men: Another Challenge for the Academy." On the one hand, it is great that the book is not heterosexist. It doesn't assume that black men need to be educated because they are ALL going to have wives and children to support one day. However, the chapter is more sociological than political. At one point, it says "Black gay men may not feel comfortable with the flamboyant white gay men on campus." True, but let's not forgot that some black gay men can be flamboyant too. It says, "Black gay men may be shocked by the lack of religiosity among other gays." Yes, but there are black gay male students that are not religious or embrace atheism. The book never mentions that some black gay men may flee to college campuses to come out away from their parents compared to straight black men that may be romantically satisfied with their home environments and thus see no need to go somewhere else like college. Keith Boykin, a black, gay activists, and many others have anecdotally said that colleges seem to have huge numbers of gay men and athletes in their black male populations. When Oprah Winfrey covered "the down low" phenomenon on her show, she included a black female college student who said the dynamic is trendy among her male counterparts. So little of this gets addressed. As a black gay man, I was frustrated by this chapter. Hence, I wonder if black athletes will be frustrated by the athlete chapter or black students leaders on the leadership chapter, etc. I also wonder why the book lacked chapters on black male immigrant students and black males who are Muslim.

This is a nice book, generally. I just wasn't as blown away by it as I thought I would be.

dr kevin rome of morehouse contributed to this volume