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"Social justice is not a matter of money, but a matter of will."
~ Septima Clark, 1962
"Wisdom is the best of all treasures ."
~ Makeda, 10th century BCE
Professional BIo
Dr.
Stephanie Y. Evans is Director of African American Studies and Associate
Professor of African American Studies and Women’s Studies at the
University of
Florida in Gainesville. She is the author of the acclaimed book Black Women in the Ivory Tower, 1850-1954:
An Intellectual History (University Press of Florida, 2007). Her newest co-edited book, African Americans and Community Engagement in Higher Education (SUNY Press, 2009) considers how race impacts university-community partnerships. She has also co-edited Africana Studies at the Graduate Level: A Twenty-first Century Perspective, a special issue of the Western Journal of Black Studies with Dr. Mark Christian. Dr. Evans is a Colonel Allan R. and Margaret G. Crow Term Professor for the UF College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, 2010-11.
In
May 2003, Stephanie Evans received her Ph.D. in African American
Studies with a concentration in History and Politics from the University of
Massachusetts, Amherst and in May 2002 earned a Master’s Degree in the
same
field. Also in 2002, she completed the Graduate Certificate
Program in Advanced Feminist Studies.
Dr. Evans's
main research interest is Black
women’s
intellectual and educational history in the United States. In her
dissertation, Living
Legacies: Black Women, Educational Philosophies, and Community Service,
1865-1965, she considered the educational ideas of four African
American
women educators: Fanny Jackson Coppin, Anna Julia Cooper, Mary McLeod
Bethune,
and Septima Clark. She has since published foundational texts analyzing the past, present and future of graduate training in Africana Studies. In current research, she explores the foundations of Black women's connections of higher education to performance and social justice movements during the Jim Crow Era and the Jazz Age. Specifically, she investigates areas of Black women's studies and comparative humanism relating to higher education.
She
has conducted research at
University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Howard University’s
Moorland-Spingarn Research Center in Washington
D.C. and through the University of Florida’s Paris Research Center in
Paris,
France. She has presented her work in many locations, including
San Diego, Chicago, New York, St. Petersberg, Princeton, Atlanta, Boulder, Albuquerque, and Cambridge, England. She has attended every ASALH (Association for the
Study of
African American Life and History) Convention since 2000.
While
completing her
dissertation, Dr.
Evans worked as the Assistant Director for Youth Education Programs in
the
Swearer Center for Public Service at Brown University in Providence,
Rhode
Island. In the summer of 1999 she was a research intern at
Stanford University’s Haas Center for Public Service and worked on
issues of
cultural identity and community service.
In
May 1999 she earned an
Interdisciplinary Studies BA in Comparative Humanities--gender and
cross-cultural American studies--from California State University, Long
Beach. In
her undergraduate work, she earned high honors: Phi Beta Kappa, Cum
Laude,
and Outstanding Department Graduate and was a Kellogg Fellow for one
year and a
McNair Scholar for two years.
She
teaches "Women's Studies Senior Seminar/Capstone," “Research
Methods in African American History: Jazz Historiography,” "African Americans in Higher Education," "US Women of Color," "Black Gender," “Interdisciplinary
Perspectives
of Women,” "Mentoring At-Risk/Local Youth," and “Introduction to African
American Studies” at the
University of
Florida. She has taught service-learning courses in the Women’s Studies
Department and
for the
Honors College through the Office of Community Service Learning at the
University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She has also taught high
school
literature, grammar, SAT preparation, and college preparedness for the
Holyoke
Massachusetts Upward Bound program.
Research Philosophy: Intellectual Integrity & Growth (Dr. Player)
Teaching Philosophy: Humanization, Socialization, & Professionalization (Dr. Dunham)
Service Philosophy: To Improve the Quality of Life (Dr. Maathai)

Ultimately, she works to reflect and reclaim (Sankofa) the legacy of the scribe Seshat "Lady of the House of Books," Makeda of Ethiopia (Queen of Sheba), and the many women in world cultures who represent wisdom, freedom, and democracy for the posterity of the ancestors and the benefit of future ages. In many ways, she is a community gardener, cultivating ideas to make the academy an intellectual democracy because, as Dr. Anna Julia Cooper wrote, everyone deserves eduational opportunity and "this right to grow is sacred and inviolable."
***
Personal BIo
My motto is: AMANI MOTO
(May
you find a balance between peace and passion). I live by the values that I have learned from women in my research (like Drs. Cooper,
Bethune, Player, Dunham, and Maathai), as well as positive artists like Jill Scott,
India Arie, and Erykah Badu.
LOVE
BALANCE
CIVIL
RIGHTS
HUMAN
RIGHTS
HUMILITY--PEACE
SUSTAINABILITY
I
was born in Washington, D.C. at Howard University's hospital, but was
raised overseas (Air Force brat) and the Mid-west before spending most
of my
growing years on the West Coast. Though I have always been a bookworm,
I am
a first-generation and adult re-entry student who began college in earnest at the age of 25. I have benefited much from those who
took time
to mentor me and in my work, I pass on the guidance and encouragement that has been
offered. ~~[ View Page : SPECIAL THANKS TO MENTORS].
I am a proud member of Alpha
Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated -- Mu Upsilon Omega Chapter, Gainesville, Florida. The leadership, members, and (especially) my line sisters continually inspire me.
I am absolutely in love with and happily married to Mr. Curtis D. Byrd, head of McNair and Director of Undergraduate Research at the University of Florida. Though professionally I remain "Dr. Evans," I am now very blessed socially and spiritually to be Mrs. Byrd. ~~ DocandByrd.net ~
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