Fall 2008

Voices

 

 

In This Issue:

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Dr. Melbourne S. Cummings,

Howard University

 

In Her Own Words:

Melbourne Cummings

Talks about NCA, her Career,

& Mentoring

Professor Cummings is the 2008 Francine Merritt Award recipient for outstanding contributions to the lives of women in communication. Below, Voices shares her remarks from an electronic interview conducted after she learned she won the award.

 

First NCA experience

My first NCA meeting was in 1973. I was anxious to get into my role as a college professor of speech communications: attending national meetings, presenting papers, publishing articles, etc.

 

I had finished my Ph.D. the year before but chose to go with my husband to spend a year in Kenya where he did his research on the Akamba people of East Africa (and I had the chance to learn more deeply about my own cultural heritage).

 

Before earning my Ph.D. in communications, I previously had been an instructor of English in two small colleges, but I had never been given the opportunity to do anything else but teach.

 

So I was completely lost at my first SCA conference the first day. I went to sessions that seemed interesting, but I saw no one of color, initially, and not a single white person spoke to me or smiled in my direction. I was rather shy, maybe even a bit intimidated, so I spoke to no one, either.

 

At breakfast the next morning, I met my dissertation advisor from UCLA, Molefi Asante, who, of course, greeted me and invited me to a meeting that afternoon. I went, and there I met, in addition to Molefi, other people who have become my dear friends:  Jack Daniel, Lyndrey Niles, Orlando Taylor, Caroline Calloway Thomas, Dorothy Pennington, the late Lucia Hawthorne, and others.

 

Origins of the Black Caucus

This 1973 meeting was a gathering of disenfranchised black people who were poised to change the face and attitude of the Speech Communication Association of America forever. I learned that they had begun to meet together in 1969 after some of them were called racial slurs and actually physically threatened. It was at this 1973 meeting that we began a loosely organized caucus to ensure that our research always would be presented in appropriate forums.

 

We decided on a newsletter to get the word out about our existence, inviting people to do panel presentations on their research at conferences (local, regional, and national). I became the newsletter editor.

 

We used a Black College Speech and Drama organization as one of our springboards. Lucia Hawthorne of Morgan State invited us to meet at their conference, and for those of us who had never made presentations at national meetings, this venue was perfect to get our feet wet. The audience was critical, but supportive, friendly, and encouraging.

 

Over the years, as I have attended our meetings, I have seen the Black Caucus grow exponentially. I have come to know many people, and I have formed many good solid relationships across the membership of NCA. I have developed genuine friendships among some of my colleagues.

 

NCA Today

My most recent NCA meeting was last year (2007).  I mentioned that at my first meeting I went a full day without seeing one black person or speaking to even one white person. Now the number of our black members has grown large enough to have not only a caucus but also a division.

 

I see people here now whom I have known for half my life. Where we once had to call colleagues across the United States to ask if they would write papers on certain topics to present at the meetings, we now have the luxury of having so many submissions that papers and panels are selected competitively.

 

Where initially I knew no one, with the exception of my advisor and long-time friend, I now cannot count the number of people I know in our discipline.

 

Where no white person dared speak to me at my first conference, I now have solid relationships with most of the members of the Black Caucus and with people from other areas of the membership, including Anita Taylor, Jim Chesebro, Don Boileau, Sherry Morreale, and Sandra Herndon, among many others. We go out of our way to find each other at the conferences or make prior arrangements to see each other.

 

NCA looks and feels a lot different in 2008 than it did in 1973.

 

Proud Professional Moments

It is very difficult to decide on a “proudest professional moment.” I’ve tried to think of how I felt when my first Ph.D. student successfully completed her dissertation, but the same feeling comes over me each time one of our students finishes.

 

I even thought of when I received the association’s Kibler Award or the association’s Mentor Award, but I know how deeply touched and honored I am when one of my students, after an especially insightful learning moment, pens a note of thanks to me. 

 

In thinking about this “proudest moment” question, I asked a friend and Black Caucus colleague who happened to be visiting me this summer about how to respond. Dr. Debbie Atwater, who served on the Legislative Council when I was the Director of Affirmative Action for the association, said that for her it was the time I had to address the Council on how we assessed the progress of the Speech Communication Association in its treatment of “affected groups”: African Americans, Lesbians/Gays/Bisexuals, and Women. It was after the meeting when I was put on the spot because I had told the Council about its racist practices toward the black members of the organization. One very brave and outspoken (white) member dared to ask if I were saying that NCA had openly practiced racism toward its black members, and I answered, “Yes” and went on to give examples.

 

This immediately resulted in being asked to find two “qualified” candidates that the Council could choose between to run for vice president. The caveat was that I had one hour to select them and get their approvals and curriculum vitae to the Council before it reconvened.

 

This resulted in Carolyn Calloway Thomas being our first black nominee for vice president. She did not win, but she had an excellently run campaign.

 

For me, this example was a bitter/sweet moment, for it proved that even among our intellectual and social peers we still had to “prove” our worth, our ability, and our qualifications to serve in our own discipline’s organization.

 

I was happy that I had an impact, but for me, it was not a “proud moment in my professional career.”

 

Since that time, Orlando Taylor of Howard University served as president of the organization.

 

What I do remember most about that time was that the Affirmative Action Council, especially Anita Taylor, physically went with me and stood in support.

 

My answer to the question about my proudest professional moment has to be that I have been blessed to have many proud moments, and among them are the times that I see my students leave the university with their Ph.D. degrees in hand, ready to conquer a waiting academic life.

 

Relations between the Black Caucus & the Women’s Caucus

The Black Caucus and Women’s Caucus actually started out supporting each other. Even though our foci were different, we had similar issues dealing with discrimination and lack of recognition.

 

Initially, as we officially formed our caucuses (the Black Caucus was formed first), we supported each other by adding our names to each other’s rosters to make sure we had the appropriate numbers to achieve our goals.

 

As we both began our unique ways of conducting research, tensions grew from definitions, theories, and methods.

 

Though there was never a real coalition, there was also never a true separation. Each caucus had a few active members/researchers who were part of both groups.

 

I certainly think we benefit from working more with each other than continuing to think in separatist ways. I think discussions on the differences and similarities in the theories of feminism and Womanism can only instruct and help us grow in understanding who and what each of us values.

 

Cooperative exchange of ideas always enhances who we are as people and as educators, and we should, of course, work toward reducing any tensions that exist in our disciplines and in our lives.

 

We’ve had a few joint panels over the years. I think it would be a good idea to make concerted efforts to revive our interactions for our mutual benefit.

 

Important Influences on

Teaching & Scholarship

Off the top of my head, I would say the colleagues who have most influenced my teaching and scholarship are my late husband Robert J. Cummings as well as Molefi Asante, Jack Daniel, Judi Moore Latta, Alice Walker, and Bernice Reagan.

 

Students include Brenda Allen, Ronald Jackson, Felicia Walker, Sharnine Herbert, Rachel Droogsma, and Cerise Glenn, along with so many others, each because of her or his unique ways of discovering how and what we communicate.

 

About Mentoring

I come from very humble Southern beginnings where to survive everyone was responsible for someone else. I know no other way to live but by helping others reach their full potential.

 

As a child, all my role models were teachers. What I liked about those in my life who were not teachers by profession was what and how they taught me.

 

I never wanted to be anything other than a college professor. I chose that profession early on because I discovered that I was only interested in teaching those who were genuinely interested in learning.

 

What I noticed about people in my hometown is that when people showed potential to succeed, they were nurtured in such a way that they always succeeded.  In most instances, when they set their sights on what to do with their lives, then the community seemed to come together to make it a reality.

 

People in my church, school, and community raised funds to help me go to contests, exhibitions, etc.  They encouraged and helped me in everything I did.  I was mentored throughout my childhood and young adulthood. I came to mentoring naturally.

 

I do what my small community did for me and for countless others. I know no other way to conduct myself than to help a student, female or male, to reach her or his potential.

 

I am proud to say that most of the graduate students who enter our program at Howard University graduate. Mentoring has a lot to do with it.  Mentoring, I think, has to do with consistency, with being available to students, with encouraging them, with offering support, with showing interest and concern in not only their academic lives but also their personal lives. We must support students academically, financially, and personally. Though they are adults, sometimes they feel vulnerable and need someone to listen to them, to allow them to vent, to cry, to help them work through frustrations.

 

They need us to expect the best from them and tell them when they’re falling short, as well as when they are excelling. We need to recommend them for awards when they deserve it and refuse to do so when they do not, always letting them know, however, why they don’t qualify and what they must do to begin to measure up.

 

Winning the Merritt Award

When I heard that my former student Brenda Allen nominated me, I was very pleasantly surprised and felt extremely privileged and honored!

 

I think of Brenda more as a colleague than a former student, since it has been more than 20 years since she graduated. Even when she was a student, she was teaching us how to use the computer, efficiently and effectively. She was a staff member on our campus in the Learning Center and was an extremely bright young woman. We all wanted Brenda to get a Ph.D., and I certainly did what I could to make it happen. She has turned out to be all that we thought she would be and more. I am so proud of her.

 

I am also grateful to have been supported for such a prestigious award by my students Cerise Glenn and Rachel Droogsma (whose groundbreaking research on women you will hear about very soon) as well as my colleagues Carolyn Byerly and Anita Taylor. I thank all of them for this singular honor.

 

Melbourne S. Cummings

July 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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