A Journal of Research in Africana Studies
Freedom: Volume 2
Twice as Hard: A Black Parable for Existing in Higher Education
By Frederick V. Engram Jr., Ed.D.
Assistant Professor of Higher Education, Fairleigh Dickinson University
Published in Freedom: Volume 2
Keywords
PWIs; campus stakeholders, twice as hard, Black parables, higher education, liberation, performative diversity, critical race theory
Abstract
“You have to work twice as hard to be seen as half as good” is a Black parable that many African Americans have been indoctrinated with. This belief is not new and has roots deriving from both the politics of respectability and anti-Black racism that exists in the American context. This ideology provides the rationale for the ever-thriving desire to be considered Black and excellent or, as Dr. Imani Perry calls it, Black exceptionalism, where all versions of Blackness are measured against it and either accepted or rejected with due course.2 This article highlights the lived experience of eight stakeholders at a predominantly white university (PWI), who are all Black, and who agreed to talk with me regarding the performance of diversity and the souls of Black folks in a larger study. This article specifically discusses one of the findings titled twice as hard.