Voices of Santa Clara

Dr. Danielle Morgan is an assistant professor in the Department of English at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California who specializes in African American literature and culture in the 20th and 21st centuries. She is interested in the ways that literature, popular culture, and humor shape identity formation. In particular, her research and teaching reflect her interests in African American satire and comedy, literature and the arts as activism, and the continuing influence of history on contemporary articulations of Black selfhood. She has written a variety of both scholarly and popular articles and has been interviewed on topics as varied as Black Lives Matter, the dangers of the “Karen” figure, race and sexuality on the Broadway stage, and Beyoncé. Her book, Laughing to Keep from Dying: African American Satire in the Twenty-First Century, is forthcoming Fall 2020 with University of Illinois Press as a part of the New Black Studies Series and addresses the contemporary role of African American satire as a critical realm for social justice.In this conversation, Dr. Danielle Morgan elaborates on the significance of English literature in her adolescence, her introduction to African American satire, the writing and publishing of her upcoming and first book Laughing to Keep from Dying: African American Satire in the Twenty-First Century, the memory of her late Uncle Kevin, her experience as the Frank Sinatra Faculty Fellow with the Center for the Arts and Humanities, and the harassment she was subjected to by SCU Campus Safety on Aug 22nd.

In the second installment of Being Black At A P.W.I, we bring on Isaac Addai and Kaylen Chase to break down a couple of first-hand experiences of Black students at SCU. With differing perspectives as a senior and sophomore respectively, Isaac and Kaylen highlight the necessity of learning about politics, dealing with systemic racism in academia, the burden of being the “Black voice”, the significance of unity within the Black community, and the creation of the Black Excellence Scholarship.

As the first installment of our Black Student at a P.W.I series, we bring Brianna Mireku to discuss the lack of black representation in the medical field, the experience of a black woman attending a predominantly white institution, the necessity of cultural inclusion, the Black Lives Matter movement, goals for raising awareness about SCU’s black student union, and the black excellence scholarship fund.