BY Paul Junor
Black female educators have historically played a critical role in shaping the education system in the United States and right here in Canada. Despite facing systemic obstacles such as racism, sexism, and discrimination, Black female educators have persisted in advocating for equitable and accessible education for all students.
Our Woman Empowered has made significant contributions in areas such as: curriculum development, teaching practices, and educational leadership. She has helped to challenge traditional models of education and promote culturally responsive teaching that values and incorporates the diverse experiences of all students.
Dr. Andrea Davis has excelled on many levels in the academic world of one of Canada’s largest universities, most notably as a Professor in the Department of Humanities, Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies at York University where she has tenured since July 2022.
Prior to that, she was an Associate Professor, and played an active role in the development of the Faculty Anti-Black Racism Strategy where she provided leadership in an advisory role. Her ground-breaking and revolutionary scholarly work is grounded within an anti-racist feminist framework that seeks answers to questions of race and gender through an analysis of the literary and cultural production of Black women.
Professor Davis is the author of two books. The first book, “Horizon, Sea. Sound: Caribbean and Africa Women’s Cultural Critiques of Nation,” was launched on April 21st, 2022, at Wychwood Barnes and published by Northwestern University Press.
The second provocative book imagines new reciprocal relationships among Black, Indigenous, and other racialized women, and offers new reflections on the relationships between the Caribbean and Canada.
Dr. Davis has received widespread accolades and praise for the Black Canadian Studies Certificate, which she established and coordinated. She describes it as “A stand-alone,direct entry option for anyone wishing to come back to university for a year.”
She serves as co-editor of the Journal of Canadian Studies and was the former Chair of the Department of Humanities and academic colleague on the Council of Ontario Universities. In addition, she was the former interim director of the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean ( CERLAC). She earned her doctorate in English Language and Literature at York University, her thesis was, “Hegemony of the Spirit: Black Women’s Diasporic “Counterculture of Modernity in Selected African Caribbean and African American Writing.”
In an article for the online York University magazine that describes the upcoming Congress 2023 she reflects on the importance of the theme, “Reckonings and Re-imaginings” with respect to how it forces us to think deeply, especially after George Floyd’s death in 2021. The announcement of York University hosting Congress 2023 and Dr Davis’s role was issued in a press release on November 9th, 2021, by Rhonda Lenton, President and Vice-Chancellor of the university.
She states, “We cannot simply pretend that our world has not been shaken – if not altered – in some fundamental way by the events of the last three years. I don’t think York could host a Congress that didn’t attempt to address some of these questions. Universities, their students and graduates, writers and thinkers have a responsibility to attend these lessons, to decipher what they have taught us, and to offer our societies a language, a grammar, for thinking through and beyond the crises of our times.”
Congress 2023 will take place between May 27th, 2023 to June 2nd, 2023 at York’s Keele and Glendon campuses, and will have more than 10,000 scholars, graduate students and practitioners in the humanities and social science, and participants from 67 academic disciplines.
She would like each attendee at Congress 2023 to think deeply about what has been learned since that fateful event in 2021 and what it means in a social, political and historical sense.
She emphasizes, “What might it mean for us to commit to knowing and caring for each other across our differences, understanding that the world we want to live in tomorrow is dependent on the action we take together.”
It is hoped that the congress will help to amplify York University Academic Plan 2020- 2025 with six priorities that focus on an aspect of positive change.
This is a blueprint for action that will reflect the university’s involvement in incorporating the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Great days are ahead for York University, and our world is brighter because of great minds like that of Dr. Andrea Davis.
