We strongly believe that our faculty searches yield strong applicants from underrepresented groups, and our recent searches have generated a diverse pool of well-qualified applicants. Our department has implemented a mentoring program which matches tenured faculty with tenure-track faculty and postdoctoral fellows.

Postdoctoral fellows and visiting faculty enrich our community. In 2018-2020 our department is participating in the University’s Presidential Diversity Postdoctoral Fellowship program. This allows us to hire and mentor outstanding young scholars who will be future leaders in the field. Our Visiting Faculty program enriches our department by bringing diverse perspectives to our department.

Undergraduate and graduate students from historically underrepresented groups remain under-enrolled in art history courses. The department has appointed a diversity advisor from among the faculty whose role is to streamline communications between the different constituencies in the department. We are developing strategies to open up the field, in order to have an early effect on the pipeline of students interested in art and architectural history.   

One of our strategies to increase diversity in our department is in the area of course development and curricular reform. The revised curriculum of the department’s introductory course Global History of Art and Architecture includes examples of art and architecture from across the world and engages critically with the contributions and valuations of art by diverse populations. Our partnership with Tougaloo College allows a faculty member from Tougaloo to teach a course on African-American Art, while students from Tougaloo are able to engage with Brown students in the Global History of Art and Architecture class.