About the Book
A 2021 AESA Critics' Choice Award Winner
A 2021 SPE Outstanding Book Award Winner This volume brings together leading scholars and practitioners to address the theory and practice of African-centered education. The contributors provide (1) perspectives on the history, methods, successes and challenges of African-centered education, (2) discussions of the efforts that are being made to counter the miseducation of Black children, and (3) prescriptions for--and analyses of--the way forward for Black children and Black communities.
The authors argue that Black children need an education that moves them toward leading and taking agency within their own communities. They address several areas that capture the essence of what African-centered education is, how it works, and why it is a critical imperative at this moment. Those areas include historical analyses of African-centered education; parental perspectives; strategies for working with Black children; African-centered culture, science and STEM; culturally responsive curriculum and instruction; and culturally responsive resources for teachers and school leaders.
Perfect for courses such as: Black Education Multicultural Education Urban Education Blacks in Higher Education Achievement Gap Culture and Education Racism in Education Critical Race Theory
About the Author :
Kmt G. Shockley is Associate Professor in the Howard University School of Education. His research interests include transformative African-Centered Education and Educational Policy and Leadership. He is known for having been featured in the film Hidden Colors and for his film on the Maroons, which is entitled For Humanity: Culture Community & Maroonage. For more than 40 years--as a scholar and as a practitioner--Kofi Lomotey has focused on the education of black people. At the higher education level, he has been a university professor, department chair, provost, president and chancellor. He has been a founder, teacher and administrator at three independent African-centered schools. Kofi's research interests include urban schools, African American students in higher education, African American principals in elementary schools and independent African-centered schools. He has published several books, articles in professional journals and book chapters. Gloria Ladson-Billings is Professor Emerita from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, President of the National Academy of Education, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Joyce Elaine King holds the Benjamin E. Mays Endowed Chair for Urban Teaching, Learning and Leadership at Georgia State University and affiliated faculty status in the African American Studies Department. Her publications focus on Black Studies curriculum theorizing and Black education research and policy. She is a past president of the American Educational Research Association.
Review :
"The critical work of educating African children is layered. It is spiritual, intellectual, emotional, cultural and revolutionary. This book addresses each layer. It is revolutionary; providing children of African descent with an excellent education that teaches them that who they are and what they must commit to requires the complete change of the current educational system. It requires our very best work. Asante sana, thank you to the editors and the authors. My spirit has been fed!"--Aminata Umoja, Founder, Kilombo Academic and Cultural Institute in Decatur, Georgia, Creator, "The Culturally Relevant Classroom," Umoja Education and Cultural Services, Consultant, Research for Better Teaching
"...African-centered scholars Kmt G. Shockley and Kofi Lomotey have assembled in African-Centered Education: Theory and Practice an impressive roster of contributors to levy fresh interrogations into the theoretical and practical underpinnings of contemporary African-centered education (ACE). The authors offer nuanced, grounded perspectives on the history, methods, successes, and challenges of ACE and situate it as a critical and viable educational imperative for Black children and communities... This critical text is a fresh reminder of what has been accomplished and the work yet remaining." (Read the full review HERE.)
"This is an essential work for those committed to creating, modeling and transmitting Liberatory teaching and learning in classrooms and communities. A core foundation of beliefs and values that are grounded in African cosmologies afford us to do more than just mimic our Ancestors. The practices and ways of being "teacher and learner, parent and community" become who we are. We are our Ancestors. This exemplary publication of African excellence affords the reader a comprehensive and holistic framework for study and practice."
Ancestral Blessings--Itihari Toure, Ed.D., Sankofa Center for Data Evaluation and Quality Enhancement, Interdenominational Theological Center, Atlanta, Georgia
"African-Centered Education: Theory and Practice continues the discourse on the protractive struggle to build and maintain an educational foundation that serves the needs of Black children. This book gives both historical analysis and practical theory on the critical components of curriculum, values and independence of African-centered pedagogy. This body of work is a tool for researchers, educators, and especially those aspiring to homeschool and seeking to adopt an African-centered model. At this critical time, African-Centered Education: Theory and Practice is the necessary guide into this new educational reality."--Baye Kemit, Ed.M, Founder, The Garvey School/Egun Omode Shule (Trenton, NJ), National Facilitator of CIBI (Council of Independent Black Institutions)
"Excellence, insights, ideas, and inspiration abound in this volume! This is the book you've been waiting for whether you are a researcher or a builder, a frontline teacher or a student of education, one who wants to know the theory or one who wants the implementation blueprint. African-Centered Education teaches us with a flow and with connections that deepen our reading experience with this volume. Newbies and veterans alike will be fulfilled and inspired to begin, or continue, the work of educating the African community for liberation."--Madge Gill Willis, Ph.D., Co-Founder & Director, Nsoromma School
"The essays in this important volume reflect the rich and generative variousness of African-centered pedagogy. The diversity of methodologies and practices presented, while understandably not including all the variations in the corpus of Afrocentric educational initiatives, nevertheless delineate in useful and insightful ways some of its most essential contours and content. The authors' varied modes of engagement and interpretations provide, not only ample ground for critical dialogue and debate about educational theory and practice from an African-centered vantage point, but also open and widen the way for further research in this vital area. These assets make African-Centered Education: Theory and Practice useful, not only as a reader, but also as a textbook for those seeking a critical and comprehensive treatment of the subject."--Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor and Chair, Department of Africana Studies, California State University, Long Beach Senior Fellow, Molefi Kete Asante Institute
