The Department of African & African-American Studies (AFAS) at Washington University is an interdisciplinary area of study, largely concentrated in the humanities and social sciences. It offers instruction in the cultural, intellectual, economic, religious, literary, social, and political life and history of Africans, African-Americans, and peoples of African descent around the world. While African-American Studies and African Studies are two distinct areas of research with faculty specialized in one area or the other, they are intimately related, and it is not unusual for students to become informed in one area because of the other.

The department offers a major and a minor for undergraduate students. AFAS challenges students to synthesize knowledge across diverse fields, theoretical approaches, and literature. Faculty and lecturers are drawn from a wide range of programs, departments, and professional schools, including American culture studies, English literature, sociology, the George Warren Brown School of Social Work, and the School of Law, among others.

Formally established in 1969, Washington University’s African and African-American Studies program was one of the first in the country, and became a full department in 2016. The program was originally born out of protests from the Association of Black Students in 1968, who drafted “The Black Manifesto,” which became a kind of bill of rights and expectations for black students at the university. One of the principal demands was the institution of a Black Studies Program to “radically reform our future education.”