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Merze Tate and the Quest for Gender Equity at Howard University: 1942–1977
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 January 2017
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This study discusses Merze Tate, a black woman faculty member at Howard University from 1942 to 1977, and her efforts throughout her tenure at the institution to obtain gender equity for women faculty. This study also discusses Tate's decades-long battle with Rayford Logan, chair of the history department of Howard. Both Harvard PhDs, their difficulties reflect both gender differences as well as professional jealously. Tate was the first black woman to earn a degree from Oxford University (International Relations, 1935) and the first black woman to earn a PhD from Harvard in the fields of government and international relations (1941). She joined the faculty at Howard University in 1942, as one of two women ever hired in the history department. She remained on the faculty until her retirement in 1977. Tate is significant not only for her academic accomplishments and her advocacy on behalf of women but also as one of the earliest tenured women faculty members at Howard. In addition, she was a part of a very small group of highly accomplished black women academics who devoted their lives to the education of black youth. In a 1946 study of black doctorate and professional degree holders, Harry Washington Greene noted that of the three hundred eighty-one recipients, only forty-five were women. Black women were overwhelmingly enrolled and graduated from teacher training colleges that were unaccredited and/or did not provide the curriculum to attend graduate school without taking an additional year of undergraduate studies. The time and cost factor were prohibitive and many black women attended summer schools for years to take courses to prepare them for a graduate degree program.
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References
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