Racial Battle Fatigue is described as the physical and psychological toll taken due to constant and unceasing discrimination, microagressions, and stereotype threat. The literature notes that individuals who work in environments with chronic exposure to discrimination and microaggressions are more likely to suffer from forms of generalized anxiety manifested by both physical and emotional syptoms. This edited volume looks at RBF from the perspectives of graduate students, middle level academics, and chief diversity officers at major institutions of learning. RBF takes up William A. Smith’s idea and extends it as a means of understanding how the “academy” or higher education operates. Through microagressions, stereotype threat, underfunding and defunding of initiatives/offices, expansive commitments to diversity related strategic plans with restrictive power and action, and departmental climates of exclusivity and inequity; diversity workers (faculty, staff, and administration of color along with white allies in like positions) find themselves in a badlands where identity difference is used to promote institutional values while at the same time creating unimaginable work spaces for these workers.

Covering equity issues of sex, race, class, age, sexual orientation, and disability, this work presents creative, nontraditional narratives about performing social justice work, acknowledging the contributions of previous generations, describing current challenges, and appealing to readers to join the struggle toward a better world. Many would like to believe we are living as "post-racial" America, long past the days of discrimination and marginalization of people simply due to their race and minority status. However, editor Jennifer L. Martin and a breadth of expert contributors show that prejudice and discrimination are still very much alive in the United States. Sharing personal stories of challenges, aggressions, retaliations, and finally racial battle fatigue, these activists, practitioners, and scholars explain how they have been attacked—in subtle, shrouded, and sometimes outright ways—simply for whom and what they advocate: social justice. The stories within consist of discussions on the interconnections among equity issues: sex, race, class, age, sexual orientation, and disability. Furthermore, the work relates current events such as the banning of ethnic studies in Arizona and the shooting of Trayvon Martin to the battle for social justice. Other topics addressed include the ongoing problems of white supremacist beliefs, the challenges of teaching about the racist thinking that permeates our media and popular culture, and the harms of aggressions faced by minorities and those possessing multiple minority status. The unique narratives presented in this single-volume work combine the various approaches to answering questions about not only the necessity of fighting for social justice but also the impact of the struggle on its champions.

"Racial Battle Fatigue in Faculty examines the challenges faced by diverse faculty members in colleges and universities. Highlighting the experiences of faculty of color-including African American, Asian American, Hispanic American, and Indigenous populations-in higher education across a range of institutional types, chapter authors employ an autoethnographic approach to the telling of their stories. Chapters illustrate on-the-ground experiences, elucidating the struggles and triumphs of faculty of color as they navigate the historically White setting of higher education, and provide actionable strategies to help faculty and administrators combat these issues. This book gives voice to faculty struggles and arms graduate students, faculty, and administrators committed to diversity in higher education with the specific tools needed to reduce racial battle fatigue and make lasting and impactful change"--

This is the first book to define and explore Black fatigue, the intergenerational impact of systemic racism on the physical and psychological health of Black people—and explain why and how society needs to collectively do more to combat its pernicious effects. Black people, young and old, are fatigued, says award-winning diversity and inclusion leader Mary-Frances Winters. It is physically, mentally, and emotionally draining to continue to experience inequities and even atrocities, day after day, when justice is a God-given and legislated right. And it is exhausting to have to constantly explain this to white people, even—and especially—well-meaning white people, who fall prey to white fragility and too often are unwittingly complicit in upholding the very systems they say they want dismantled. This book, designed to illuminate the myriad dire consequences of “living while Black,” came at the urging of Winters's Black friends and colleagues. Winters describes how in every aspect of life—from economics to education, work, criminal justice, and, very importantly, health outcomes—for the most part, the trajectory for Black people is not improving. It is paradoxical that, with all the attention focused over the last fifty years on social justice and diversity and inclusion, little progress has been made in actualizing the vision of an equitable society. Black people are quite literally sickand tired of being sick and tired. Winters writes that “my hope for this book is that it will provide a comprehensive summary of the consequences of Black fatigue, and awaken activism in those who care about equity and justice—those who care that intergenerational fatigue is tearing at the very core of a whole race of people who are simply asking for what they deserve.”

Racial Battle Fatigue in Faculty examines the challenges faced by diverse faculty members in colleges and universities. Highlighting the experiences of faculty of color—including African American, Asian American, Hispanic American, and Indigenous populations—in higher education across a range of institutional types, chapter authors employ an autoethnographic approach to the telling of their stories. Chapters illustrate on-the-ground experiences, elucidating the struggles and triumphs of faculty of color as they navigate the historically White setting of higher education, and provide actionable strategies to help faculty and administrators combat these issues. This book gives voice to faculty struggles and arms graduate students, faculty, and administrators committed to diversity in higher education with the specific tools needed to reduce Racial Battle Fatigue (RBF) and make lasting and impactful change.

"Why is it that as we enter the twenty-first century, the nation's predominantly white colleges and universities continue to be settings where people of color feel unwelcome and marginalized? The contributors to this volume dissect a variety of structural and attitudinal factors that are prevalent in the higher education community, organizational constructs and value orientations which seem to hark more to the past than to the future. They comment on the political, social, and economic factors that have shaped academic culture, and buttressed its quietly efficient maintenance of racially discriminatory practices. "The American system of higher education is often regarded as the best in the world. Smith, Altbach, and Lomotey have edited a volume that implicitly asks how much better still it could be if it embraced people of color and provided them with a supportive and nurturing environment, one which encouraged them to reach their fullest creative and intellectual potential. Indeed, this will probably be the most significant challenge that the academy faces in the twenty-first century." — William B. Harvey, Vice President and Director, Office of Minorities in Higher Education American Council on Education, Washington, D.C.

A Long Way to Go: Conversations about Race by African American Faculty and Graduate Students highlights the experiences and coping strategies of faculty members and graduate students pursuing Ph.D.s who have successfully navigated the academy despite hostile environments and hurdles that cause many to avoid or leave the academy. African American students and faculty often face problems such as isolation within a white environment, the misinterpretation of confidence as aggressiveness, and the need to work twice as hard as white peers in order to be taken seriously in their chosen careers. This book will assist both doctoral students and junior faculty in successfully completing the graduate school experience and transitioning into tenure-track positions, and will be of great interest to all higher education faculty and administrators who must address the complex issues of diversity in recruiting and retaining graduate students and faculty.