PROFILE: Celia Naylor
TEACHING EXPERIENCE: Naylor, 38, began her career teaching in the University of New Mexico's women's studies program, 1999-2000. Before coming to Dartmouth as an assistant professor of history in 2002, she was visiting assistant professor of American studies at Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg /Capital College, 2001-2002.
EDUCATION: B.A. in Africana studies, summa cum laude, Cornell, 1988; M.A. in African-American studies, UCLA, 1990; M.A. (1993) and Ph.D. (2001) in history, Duke.
PIONEERING NEW TERRITORY: After immigrating to the United States from Jamaica as a young girl, Naylor dreamed of becoming the first African-American woman astronaut. She matriculated at Cornell as a mechanical and aeronautical engineering major but lost interest in her grand vision upon hearing that such a trailblazer, Mae Jemison, already existed. "I simply could not be the second African-American woman astronaut," she laughs. Naylor discovered other passions at Cornell. Scholars including Henry Louis Gates Jr. stoked her interest in African-American history and literature, and the Africana studies department introduced her to campus activism and the anti-apartheid movement.
TEACHING PHILOSOPHY: "My favorite professors were those who believed that college classrooms should be sites where perspectives and ideas are articulated and contested by students and faculty," says Naylor. She lighted upon her own subspecialty in just this way, after reading interviews with blacks who described their enslavement under Native Americans in the antebellum era. Shocked by her discovery, Naylor turned it into her dissertation. "Students should analyze their ideas and the ideas of others," says Naylor, who considers her openness to alternate perspectives her greatest strength as a professor. "Students are often stunned that I'm interested in their opinions— and often surprised by the various ways I encourage the interrogation of history; how I challenge the traditional stories and storytellers of the past."
CLAIMS: TO FAME: Naylor is interested in African-American, Caribbean, Native American and women's history, women's literature in the African Diaspora, and colonialism and slavery in the Americas. Her fascination with the experiences of black Native Americans inspired her research on the way racism has affected black members of the Cherokee and Seminole tribes in Oklahoma. She is completing her dissertation, Black Blood: Blood Quantum and the Politics of Exclusion: The Dilemma of Black-Native Citizens and Native American Sovereignty, while on leave this winter term. She has taught "Black America to the Civil War," "Black America since the Civil War," "Remembering Slavery," "Slave Resistance in the United States" and "Bondage and Freedom in the Narratives of Slaves."
THOUGHTS ON DARTMOUTH; The College attracted Naylor with its commitment to African-American, Native-American and women's studies. She is "particularly impressed by the long-standing dedication of faculty members associated with these programs," she says. She's pleased with the collegiality of Dartmouth's academic community but thinks one facet of College life needs improvement: "Due to the housing market and salaries, it's difficult for many faculty membersespecially assistant professors—to even entertain the thought of livingwi thin the boundaries1 of Hanover," she says.
OFF-CAMPUS: Single. Mother of 4-year-old daughter Ayanbi Naylor-Ojurongbe. Resides in West Lebanon and enjoys music, walking and yoga, which, she says, "helps to engender balance in my life!"
