Exploring Persistent Racial and Ethnic Representation Disparity in U.S. Geography Doctoral Programs: The Disciplinary
Demetrice R Jordan1, Ashton Shortridge2, Joe T Darden2
1Harvard Medical School, USA.
The Professional Geographer : the Journal of the Association of American Geographers
|April 20, 2023
Summary
Racial and ethnic minorities remain underrepresented in geography doctoral programs, a gap that has widened recently. Key drivers include funding, limited exposure, passive recruitment, and departmental culture.
Area of Science:
- Geography
- Higher Education
- Sociology of Science
Background:
- The field of geography has a documented history of underrepresentation of U.S. citizen racial and ethnic minorities.
- Doctoral degree conferral records serve as a measurable indicator of this persistent disparity.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine historical efforts to address minority underrepresentation in geography since the 1960s.
- To analyze current underrepresentation and its persistence within geography doctoral programs and departments.
- To identify specific drivers contributing to the racial and ethnic representation disparity.
Main Methods:
- Comparative analysis of doctoral degree conferral rates for domestic underrepresented minorities (URM) versus White recipients.
- Data spanned 23 years (1997-2019) across geography, social sciences, and the entire academy.
- Identification of four key drivers exacerbating the disparity.
Main Results:
- Geography consistently lagged behind the social sciences and the broader academy in URM doctoral degree conferrals over the study period.
- The underrepresentation gap in geography has notably widened in the last decade.
- Identified drivers include insufficient dedicated funding, limited prior exposure to geography, passive recruitment, and predominantly White departmental environments.
Conclusions:
- The discipline of geography exhibits persistent demographic underperformance regarding racial and ethnic minority representation in doctoral programs.
- Addressing this disparity requires proactive and measurable changes within academic geography.
- A call to action is issued for geographers to actively promote representational equity.
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