Dear Higher Education: Letters from the Social Justice Mountain has opened its
call for submissions for a Special Issue on WOMEN OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA
Women of the African diaspora have shaped higher education across the globe through scholarship, leadership, teaching, and community engagement. This special issue of Dear Higher Education invites reflective letters that explore the experiences of women of the African diaspora working within higher education systems outside the United States and across transnational contexts.
Across Africa, the Caribbean, the United Kingdom, Europe, Canada, Latin America, and other regions of the world, women of the African diaspora contribute to teaching, research, leadership, mentoring, and community engagement in ways that shape institutions and transform lives. Yet their experiences, perspectives, and contributions are often underrepresented in conversations about the future of higher education. This special issue seeks letters that document, celebrate, challenge, and reimagine the role of women of the African diaspora in higher education. Through personal reflection, critical insight, storytelling, and scholarly engagement, contributors are invited to write directly to higher education about the realities they have experienced, the contributions they have made, and the futures they envision.
We invite letters that engage one or more of the following themes:
OUR JOURNEYS: HOW WE ARRIVED
How have your experiences as a woman of the African diaspora shaped your path through higher education? What moments, relationships, opportunities, challenges, or turning points have influenced your development as a scholar, educator, leader, or practitioner? Letters in this category may explore identity, belonging, mentorship, migration, leadership journeys, career transitions, resilience, and personal transformation.
OUR CONTRIBUTIONS: WHAT WE BRING
How have women of the African diaspora shaped higher education through scholarship, teaching, leadership, creativity, advocacy, and community engagement? What perspectives, forms of knowledge, and ways of leading do we contribute that are often overlooked, undervalued, or insufficiently recognized?
Letters in this category may explore intellectual contributions, research, innovation, cultural knowledge, institutional leadership, community impact, and the significance of representation across global contexts.
OUR FUTURES: WHERE WE ARE GOING
What possibilities do you envision for higher education? What must institutions do to better support women of the African diaspora? What opportunities and challenges lie ahead for future generations of scholars, leaders, and learners?
Letters in this category may imagine new approaches to leadership, scholarship, collaboration, belonging, well-being, and institutional transformation.
Submission Guidelines
- Letters should be written in the style of Dear Higher Education.
- We welcome personal narratives, reflective essays, scholarly reflections, and letters grounded in lived experience.
- Contributors may include faculty members, academic leaders, researchers, practitioners, graduate students, and others whose work intersects with higher education.
- Suggested length: 1,500–3,000 words.
Important Dates
Submission Deadline: September 30, 2026
Publication: Spring 2027
About Dear Higher Education
Dear Higher Education: Letters from the Social Justice Mountain is an open-access publication hosted by the University of Minnesota Libraries. Through letters and reflective scholarship, the journal creates space for thoughtful conversations about identity, leadership, justice, belonging, and transformation in higher education.
