We, too, are academia: Demanding a seat at the table

This personal, reflexive, ethnographic essay is written in the tradition of Black feminist anthropological and sociological women thinkers who call‐to‐the‐table 1 educational systems and academic disciplines to name experiences and harms, center marginalized voices, and offer visions for transformation. I share two tales about having, or not, a seat at the table in the figurative and literal sense. I incorporate Langston Hughes's poem, I, Too , an exposé about the irony of Black erasure in the America, to emphasize my statement about Black women's (in)visibility in academia. 2 Throughout my essay, I offer endnotes to substantiate claims about Black women's rightful, yet oftentimes undervalued and sometimes abused, place in academia. 3 I argue that we must demand a seat at academia's decision‐making tables until a transformed space is actualized—because we, too, are academia.