Like other blockbuster media moments, Shonda Rhimes’ television show Scandal proves that there is a massive audience for American political dramas, especially those featuring a sidelong glance toward largely repressed national and cultural debates about the role and meaning of black women in political life. Scandal’s thinly veiled illusions and obsessions with “fixers” of every sort and dimension obscure the fact that black women have “out‐protested, out‐participated, out‐organized, out‐mobilized, out‐registered and out‐voted African American males,” as political scientist Hanes Walton recognized (2014). Thus, this national conference features scholars from the Association for the Study of Black Women in Politics, and those in allied interdisciplinary fields, that have done the most sustained analysis of the political lives black women inhabit, envision, and theorize. Additionally, during one afternoon session, graduate students will conduct oral histories with the conference presenters to gather a new data set on the experiences/epistemologies/ methodologies/ publishing experiences/ and impact of scholarship on black women in politics.
Co-Sponsors Include: UC Consortium for Black Studies in California; 2nd Century Fund-American Political Science Association Centennial Center for Political Science and Public Affairs; Department of Women’s and Gender Studies Rutgers University; Mississippi State Valley University, Francille Wilson; Nikol Alexander-Floyd; Kathie Stromile Golden; Tamara Austin; X: Black Women Daily; UCI Black Student Union; National Conference of Black Political Scientists; UCLA African Studies Center and International Institute; UCI’s School of Humanities Dean; School of Social Sciences Dean; Dean of Graduate Division; School of Social Ecology Dean; School of Education Dean; School of Law Dean; School of Nursing Dean; School of Medicine Dean; Graduate Division Dean; School of the Arts Dean; Associate Dean of the School of Law; UCI Libraries’ 50th Anniversary Project Historian; Archivist for the Southeast Asian Archive and Regional History; Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity; Office of the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs; Women’s Caucus for Political Science (an APSA Caucus); New Narratives Initiative; International Excellence Programs; Office of Undergraduate Research Opportunities; Career Center; Cross-Cultural Center, Humanities Commons; Vice-Provost for Academic Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion; African American Student Experience (a workgroup for campus climate); Associated Students UCI; Anteater TV; Humanities Research Institute, Digital Media and Learning Research Hub Director; Center for the Study of Democracy; Political Science; Gender and Sexuality Studies; Criminology, Law and Society; History; Sociology; African American Studies; Culture and Theory; Political Science; Illuminations: The Chancellor’s Arts and Culture Initiative, the Cross-Cultural Center, and many others whose work and wisdom is deeply valued.
