Professors Need to Be Study Abroad Students Too

Judith Anderson, Ethnic and Race Studies

When I first saw the announcement for the Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC) Faculty Development Seminar to Senegal come across a listserv in the Fall 2022 semester, my initial reaction was to share the opportunity with my colleagues. However, upon reflection I realized that as someone born in the west African country of Liberia who describes herself as an Afro-Latin Americanist, I knew very little about the continent. Recognizing this gap, I understood that this program would be an important opportunity for my own academic growth as a mid-career faculty member. It could enhance my role as director and creator of the Black Studies Across the Americas (BSAA) undergraduate research program, and as co-chair of the CUNY-wide Blackness, Race, and Ethnic Studies Initiative (BRESI). I realized there were so many intersections between my academic work and Africa, and I began to understand where I could use the knowledge gained from the program to make meaningful interventions. It became evident to me that I could use the insights gained to inform my research, my teaching, and my personal growth. So I did the unthinkable and completed yet one more funding application amidst the chaos of the fall semester.

This would come to be the second faculty study abroad experience in which I participated. The first was the NYU Faculty Resource Network Seminar: Refugees and Migrants in the 21st Century in Athens, Greece during January 2017, which left me invigorated and inspired by the thought-provoking discussions. I eagerly yearned to have more such opportunities and was thus elated to learn that I had been selected to be part of a group of 14 educators in the January 2023 Senegal cohort of the CAORC Faculty Development Seminar which lasted two and a half weeks.

As an additional surprise, the program reunited me serendipitously with two colleagues I met during my years as a graduate student in Florida. We were now all grown-up professors serving historically marginalized students at our respective colleges. It was a sweet full-circle moment to get to be students again together. Ironically, although I have always loved school, I was filled with anxious dreams about again becoming a student. As participants we all tried our best to be good pupils and at least skim the readings and watch some of the suggested films beforehand only to have the in-class conversations quickly whisk us away from the assigned material and into the reality around us. Being simultaneously educators and full-time students did not come without its challenges. During the seminar, most of us were pulling a double shift: attending a full day of activities and then virtually teaching and participating in meetings until late at night due to the time zone difference. This experience allowed us to better empathize with the historically excluded groups of students we teach, as we shared parallels with the struggles they face.

Undeniably, it was the students that served as my main motivation for applying for my current position. When I excitedly joined BMCC in Fall 2015, little could I have predicted how positive my experiences at the college would be. The opportunity to make a difference in the lives of underprivileged students has been a constant source of motivation. However, my time at the college has not been without its challenges. Throughout my journey, I have consistently advocated for myself and pushed back against practices that did not align with my academic vision and teaching philosophy. I am grateful to the group of supportive and like-minded colleagues in the Department of Ethnic and Race Studies who helped create a nurturing bubble of understanding, even while allowing me a great deal of autonomy to pursue opportunities to improve my teaching, research, and service work like the CAORC fellowship.

After launching our new Ethnic Studies major in the Fall 2020, we gained status as a department in January 2021. Starting a new major at a community college during the pandemic had multiple challenges due to declining enrollment and shifting methods of engagement with students mostly through virtual modalities. We are the only Ethnic Studies major in CUNY’s 25-college system and one of the few across the country that combines the study of Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and their diasporas. As a recently tenured faculty member, I play an important role in encouraging the growth of the major. This includes creating new courses, which faculty like myself are responsible for presenting to the college for approval. We have the responsibility to fulfill student demand for more Black Studies courses in the context of the ever-increasing salience of these courses in a world where the repression of Black people is more visible than ever due to social media. 

As a scholar who specializes in the African Diaspora in Latin America, my expertise has historically been much stronger in Latin American Studies than in Black Studies despite my professional appointments having found a home in Black Studies. I describe myself as an Afro-Latin Americanist and I began my graduate studies in the early 2000s when the field was still emerging. I made the decision to focus on Africans and Afro-descendants in present-day Argentina, a country where people of African descent lacked visibility. I became one of an extremely small group of experts on the topic. Through my ethnographic research and professional projects, I have collaborated with immigrants from Senegal, Nigeria, Cape Verde, and Cameroon, among other groups. I am Liberian by birth but my older sister and I were adopted from there at a young age by a white American single mother who was serving as a missionary. Having only reconnected with the African side of my family in more recent decades as an adult, my personal life and research have converged in many unexpected and interesting ways.

I was hesitant to apply for the CAORC Senegal program because the idea of seriously venturing into African Studies, especially at this stage of my career, seemed overwhelming. My Afro-Latin Americanist friends joke that we focus on the Americas because it’s only a few hundred years of (colonial) history you have to know versus the millennia of documented history you have to be familiar with to be an expert on the African continent. The program provided me with a non-intimidating format in which to learn. It contributed to me developing a more balanced representation between Africa and the Americas in my courses while giving me the background to create new courses that incorporate more African Studies.

An important part of my professional development was learning from the other U.S. participants in the program as well as our hosts and collaborators in Senegal. The faculty chosen were a diverse representation of personal backgrounds, ages, and geographic locations ranging from a sleep specialist from Hawaii to a painter from rural Pennsylvania. There was a wealth of knowledge exchanged. We also laughed with each other, cried together, took care of each other, and even sang together on an especially long bus ride through rural Senegal. We all made ourselves available for new experiences, encounters, and individuals. The group attempted to learn Wolof phrases which our hosts patiently taught us each day. We were in constant awe of the grace and beauty of the Senegalese people. We learned the powerful history of the nation firsthand and on site in places like the slave dungeons of Gorée Island, the great mosque in Touba, and a traditional wrestling match in a village in Toubacouta.

With these experiences in mind, I knew I wanted to find a way to bring students to Senegal and other countries in Africa. While I had already created and led the successful Black Studies-focused study abroad programs: “The African Diaspora in Brazil” and “Race, Class, and Nation in Argentina,” at BMCC there is an urgent need to develop more study abroad programs on the African continent. We are a Hispanic Serving Institution with a very large representation of African and Afro-descendant students. Through visits at the West African Research Center (WARC) in Dakar, I was able to make important connections with institutions, organizations, and individuals to help revive our Study Abroad Senegal program in the near future. WARC also has connections for the entire region which allows the possibility of reviving Study Abroad Ghana and creating other new destinations. Our faculty at the college have the experience and resources to make this a reality, and I look forward to supporting them in that process.

I know the thought of creating a faculty-led study abroad program can be intriguing yet overwhelming to many of my colleagues. Fortunately, there are plenty of individuals and resources to help demystify that process. My first faculty-led study abroad experience was the result of an idea mentioned in a presentation I gave at a faculty conference at my previous institution after receiving a research grant. At the time there were no study abroad programs focusing on Africans and Afro-descendants in Argentina, so I told my colleagues I wanted to create one in the future. One of my mentors in graduate school told me, “Be careful what you say out loud because vocalizing plans is the first step to realizing them.” This has been surprisingly accurate.

There are so many educators, students, and institutions around the world who genuinely want to interact and exchange knowledge with us. They welcome the opportunity to do this in their home countries, and they will eagerly work with us to create study abroad programs. Because of the unequal political and economic structures of the world, it is usually easier and more feasible for us to travel to them. The key to successfully participating in and even leading a study abroad program isn’t knowing everything about the place you’re visiting. It’s about being willing to learn along with your students and being comfortable despite your own personal dearth of expertise. Rewarding study abroad experiences are built on collaboration, nurtured relationships, and mutual mentorship.    

I am a huge advocate of study abroad, and I often speak about how transformative it is for students, but I argue that it is equally as inspirational for faculty. It is crucial that we expand our own knowledge base outside of the usual borders of our research expertise and increase our cultural competency as this is an investment in our students. I’m a better educator because I’ve studied abroad as an undergraduate student, a graduate student, and a faculty member. I think more creatively and globally. I respect the fluidity in boundaries of knowledge and networks. I am a better community member and traveler. I’m a more conscious consumer and focus more on being in the moment than documenting it. At the end of every study abroad trip, I tell my students to “never be a tourist again.” By this I mean they should make sure that they’re contributing something beyond money to the places they visit. Look for opportunities to have sincere exchanges and interactions. Don’t let language or cultural differences be barriers to getting to know new people as these have always been a normal part of encountering unfamiliar groups. Study abroad has provided me with a new lens through which to see the world, one that is not centered on capitalism. Even at this stage in my career, it continues to change the way I interact with and understand others.

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