The Afro-Am students and faculty charged that the University had previously decided not to tenure an Africanist and to offer only joint appointments (Isaacs had requested a single appointment in Afro-Am). They pointed to the unusual time lapse between tenure recommendation and decision as further evidence of malice. But Rosovsky and Bok countered that the delays occurred because of jurisdictional problems created when one of the bewildering array of committees guiding Afro-Am was dissolved and replaced by an interdepartmental search committee. They denied charges of racism, but Isaacs filed a discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The results of his complaint remain unavailable to the community.

The department's growing pains persisted last year, as a student campaign mounted protesting what some viewed as deliberate administration attempts to weaken the department. Students held a number of demonstrations and rallies for the "strengthening of the Afro-American Studies Department," culminating in a day-long boycott of classes held last May. Student protestors claimed that Harvard has dawdled in its faculty recruitment, deprived the department of adequate funding and is planning to demote it to an interdisciplinary committee without power to tenure or to determine its own curriculum.

Rosovsky denies these charges today. He notes that the University has spent approximately $3 million on Afro-Am over the last ten years, an annual expense of $300,000. "Given the department's size and student enrollments, no one could suggest this was an inadequate resource base," Rosovsky says. Both Rosovsky and Ferguson say decidedly they know of no plans to make the department a committee, and add they do not think such a change possible now. "At this time, it would be practically impossible to change the department to an interdisciplinary committee. We are not writing on a blank slate," Ferguson notes.

But personnel problems still beleaguer the department--and the creation of the executive committee seems to have compounded some existing intradepartmental tensions. Southern resigned abruptly from her position has chairman last June, citing the creation of the executive committee as one of the reasons for her committee. "I told the dean that I did not understand how it could work having both a committee and a chairman. I didn't see how I could work under those conditions," Southern said this summer.

She said she was "bewildered" when she returned from sabbatical to confront the furor over the department. "I was not involved in the many decisions that took place during my absence and I did not have a clear understanding of the proper structures for governing the department. If anyone had sat me down and explained what was going on, I might have a better attitude," she added.

But Rosovsky says he is surprised that Southern thinks she was inadequately consulted. "President Bok and I had a long meeting with Professor Southern during which time we explained what conclusions we had reached, and she suggested names for the executive committee," he says.

"I asked her to remain as chairman of the department, but I wanted Professor Ferguson to chair the executive committee and that is what she didn't want. She felt a dual authority structure was confusing," he notes.

However, students in the department say Southern's resignation may also have stemmed from friction between Southern and department members, especially the junior faculty. "There is a great deal of animosity toward Southern among faculty and students in the department," one former concentrator notes. Some students are more blunt in their appraisal. "Professor Southern's resignation wasn't an accident or a disaster. She alienated students from the department and discouraged them from having any participation in the department. She wouldn't meet with students and wasn't responsive to them," Anthony Brutus '77-5, an Afro-Am concentrator, says.

Southern said this summer, "I am reluctant to make any more that would hurt the department." She could not be reached for comment last week on Brutus's complaints.

But junior faculty are reportedly even more dissatisfied. They met twice with Rosovsky last spring and "severely criticized her manner and style of dealing with them," Brutus says. Southern herself obliquely criticized some of her faculty for egging on student demonstrators this spring, saying that she thinks "students have been manipulated by some department faculty" to believe the department is weak.

Josephine Wright and Harrington Benjamin, assistant professors of Afro-American Studies, declined to comment on Southern's resignation last week.

In addition to Southern's disaffection and the discord within the department, the executive committee will also have to confront three traditional points of contention between Afro-Am and the administration--finding tenured professors, joint appointments and student suspicion of administrative motives.

In defense against charges of inadequate recruiting of tenured faculty, Rosovsky notes that since 1971, the University has considered seven candidates for tenure and offered five professorships, only to be turned down.

The McCree report pointed up one of the possible reasons for such rejection in its 1972 study--a perception on the part of tenure candidates that the department does not receive full support from the Harvard community. The report noted: "One of the problems of attracting eminent black and white scholars to the department is the fact that they have earned acceptance in 'conventional' disciplines at other institutions which they would not want to forsake by going to a department which appears to be 'on trial' and/of accorded second-class status at Harvard." Rosovsky notes that this attitude is still a problem and attributes some of the difficulties in attracting candidates to "the unsettled atmosphere that has prevailed in the department."

Rosovsky offers another explanation--many established scholars in such "conventional" disciplines want joint appointments so as not to lose touch with their special field. "In practical terms, the kind of people we wish to attract are established in a certain field and want to maintain a connection with that field," he notes. Because of this problem, the executive committee may offer candidates joint appointments. But some Afro-Am faculty say that desire for joint appointments indicates a disturbing lack of commitment to Afro-American Studies. Benjamin says, "A wholesale commitment to the department is necessary--many people seem to feel that being allied with another department gives them a legitimacy. There are many black scholars who have yet to come to terms with the legitimacy of Afro-American Studies as an intellectual discipline," he notes. Benjamin also says that a rapid turnover rate among junior faculty "has a tendency to turn senior people off." But Southern protests against charges of turnover, noting that all junior faculty members hired under her tenure have served or are serving their full terms.

Southern offers other explanations for the poor tenure performance. She says scholars refused tenure for a number of reasons--the lack of a graduate program, family ties or spouses with conflicting jobs, and Harvard's inability to top some of their salaries.

As well as trying to solve the tenure mystery, the committee will have to face a largely hostile and suspicious group of student concentrators, who point to the University's poor performance in strengthening Afro-Am over the last decade as proof of its intent to undermine the department. The creation of an executive committee doesn't assuage these students' fears. "I don't see anyone on the committee who is a real ally of Afro-American Studies," Brutus says. "These people have a mainstream perspective," he adds. And Daniel Robinson '79, a former concentrator, says, "I am skeptical--let me see the results. They've set up committees before."

Ferguson says his committee will certainly seek some form of student input, but adds he has not determined the best way to incorporate student opinion. He notes that because students have played a larger role in Afro-Am decision making in the past than most other Harvard students, their expectations are very high. "Disappointing expectations can be even more damaging than simply not making the right moves," he notes. But Robinson says, "Students don't want to make decisions--they just want input."

Neither Ferguson nor other committee members believe these problems of tenure and possible confrontation to be insurmountable. Committee members say that they believe in the legitimacy and intellectual excitement of Afro-American Studies, and want to make sure other Harvard community members think so, too. Although efforts to help Afro-Am have a long history of failure, they remain confident. "This really is a last ditch effort--if this doesn't work, nothing will," Patterson says. Rosovsky and the rest of the committee are laying cautious odds that it will, but this year should prove a crucial test of that optimism