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.
Dear Higher Education: Letters from the Social Justice Mountain invites submissions for a special issue exploring the experiences, contributions, and aspirations of women of the African diaspora whose lives and work intersect with higher education across the globe.
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:
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.
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.
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 Deadline: September 30, 2026
Publication: Spring 2027
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.
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