The Minority Scholars’ Committee functions to keep the Council and the association’s membership engaged with issues affecting minority scholars in the profession.

The Committee distributes travel grants to attend the Annual Meeting and also selects the recipient of the Richard Yarborough Mentoring Award. We award these prizes at the yearly Generational Gifts Brunch (formerly the Minority Scholars’ Committee Mentoring breakfast), an event dedicated to diversifying academic and public spaces. The Minority Scholars’ Committee is composed of six association members named by the Executive Committee and approved by the Council, following an open call to the membership for self-nominations and suggestions. Each of these six members serves three-year, non-renewable, staggered terms. The chair of the Minority Scholars’ Committee is be named from the committee’s membership by the Executive Committee with the approval of the Council and serves a single term not to exceed three years.

Past Richard Yarbourough Awards:

• 2019 Richard T. Rodríguez, University of California, Riverside
• 2018 Lisa Lowe, Yale University
• 2017 Ruth Wilson Gilmore, The Graduate Center of the City University of New York
• 2016 Martin F. Manalansan IV, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
• 2015 Mark Anthony Neal, Duke University
• 2014 José Esteban Muñoz, New York University
• 2013 Paul Spickard, University of California, Santa Barbara
• 2012 Richard Yarborough, University of California, Los Angeles