Nathan Hare Fights for Black Studies

1969

Nathan Hare is known as the “father of Black Studies.”

San Francisco State College (SFSC) professor Nathan Hare fought for Black Studies programs to be included at SFSC and other colleges and universities. At the time, SFSC interim president S. I. Hayakawa supported Black Studies but opposed Hare’s militant approach, believing he had created “a training ground for revolution.” Hayakawa fired Hare after he supported a 1968 student strike demanding a Black Studies department and a college of Ethnic Studies.

Hare continued his work by publishing The Black Scholar, an important intellectual journal that helped bring Black Studies to the mainstream.