African Studies Center

Boston University's African Studies program is one of the nation's oldest. For 52 years, it has been a leader in producing knowledge about Africa, and in training Africa specialists. The African Studies Center (ASC) is intellectually anchored by a core of well-known senior scholars engaged in stimulating and productive interaction with promising young Africanists. With 87 teaching and research faculty members, based in 20 departments and professional schools, the ASC has a wide range of expertise to draw upon in carrying out its academic, applied, and outreach missions. The ASC has successfully infused Africa into the curriculum campus-wide and has forged formal links that offer students and faculty unparalleled opportunities for professional development here and abroad.

The ASC has maintained a position of national leadership in developing African language pedagogy. It produced the first ACTFL-trained Swahili teacher in the nation; was twice selected to lead the AASP Group Projects Abroad in Africa; has served as the home base for the Niger-Congo Syntax and Semantics Colloquium; has played an active role on the National Council of the Less-Commonly Taught Languages; and has received the honor of hosting the 31st Annual International Conference on African Linguistics. In 2003, ASC hosted both the African Studies Association Annual Meeting and the international Igbo Studies Conference.

The ASC Outreach Program maintains an active schedule of teacher training and has successfully garnered federal, state, and local funds to conduct intensive Summer Institutes for K-12 teachers, advanced workshops on timely topics, and teacher conferences and public presentations on African issues. A full-time Outreach Director and support staff oversee a library and resource room with age-appropriate books, course guides, videos, slides, art, and artifacts available for loan to schools and community organizations. The Outreach Program is well known nationally as a primary source for up-to-date, accurate information on rapidly changing African contexts and events, useful to museums, print and broadcast media, and publishers.

The African Studies Library contains the most accessible Africana collection in the Northeast and serves the nation's densest concentration of research scholars and university students. 50% of library users are non-BU students and researchers. The library occupies an entire floor of the main campus library and has it own staff of five Africana specialists. It has long been at the forefront of using electronic retrieval systems and computer databases to increase the availability of Africana materials.

The ASC's Publications Program is the most active in the nation, producing "The International Journal of African Historical Studies," "Boston University Papers on Africa," and specialized thematic working paper series on an expansive array of African topics.