Finding My Voice:An African-American Female Professor at a Predominantly White University

Drawing from her personal experience, the author shares concrete examples from her promotion and tenure review, including the experience of social integration issues and the ramifications that the higher education environment had on her personal and professional attitudes as an African-American female faculty member. Included in the discussion is her feeling isolated, devalued, and unwelcomed. She discusses how her value systems, culture, ethnicity, and behavior patterns often conflict with those held by the university and white faculty members and students, and finally, how these conditions disempowered and suppressed her voice as a female faculty and faculty member of color. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]