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Maya Darville is a new Teaching Fellow in the History and Social Sciences Department, and a house counselor in Stimson House. At Barnard College, Darville majored in Africana Studies and American Studies, and was the president of Barnard’s Organization of Soul and Solidarity (BOSS), Barnard’s main Black student organization. She was also a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow and winner of the Quandra Prettyman Prize for Africana Studies. Darville taught in Ghana as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant before joining Andover, and enjoys cooking, reading, and taking nature walks in her free time.
What attracted you to becoming both an Africana Studies professor and a civil rights lawyer?
My focus on these two professions started the same way. The idea of getting a Ph.D., the idea of being an academic, or the idea of being in the political academic world, was where the dream of being a professor was pretty much born. My other branch of it was to be a civil rights lawyer. I was born and raised in Chicago, and especially living in an area like where I live[d] in, I see the need for civil rights lawyers. I love being Southern. It’s something that I’m really proud of. There are definitely places within our lawmaking structures that still have the shadows of Jim Crow-era politics and legal decisions, so that’s something I’ve definitely been working on.
During college, how did you decide to major in Africana Studies and American Studies and minor in Anthropology?
I came into college thinking that I wanted to study political science. I took a couple of political science classes, and I didn’t feel like it was as good as I thought it would be. I found that I was more interested in the historical part of political science than the actual science part of it. So I majored in American Studies and minored in Africana Studies, and I finished my Africana Studies minor as a sophomore, and my major advisor was like, “If you’re not going to start taking the classes, you might as well double major.” So I did. I ended up double majoring, with a minor in Anthropology. I just started taking Anthropology classes in my first year of college, and I really enjoyed learning about them. I found that all of the disciplines I was interested in were really related to each other, and it was a good thing. I felt like I was going to be full-time when I finished college.
What was your experience like teaching English in Ghana as a Fulbright Teaching Assistant?
I taught English and taught in Ghana through Fulbright during the past school year. I loved the experience first and foremost because I studied abroad in Ghana in the fall of my senior year. After having the experience of all of that, I loved Ghana and wanted to go back. The students were incredibly receptive to English. I loved the experience, because it taught me to be adaptive. Certain things that I came prepared with weren’t necessarily the lessons that I had pre-prepared for, so I had to take it back to the drawing board and really think through how I was going to teach students English. I used a lot of pop-culture references and a lot of memes.
How do you approach teaching your freshman history class?
We’ve been working on some of the intrinsic skills that you’ll need to be a good historian, which is skimming texts. I’m teaching students how to skim and teaching them the idea of reading. I’m teaching students how to write, how to put together some of these statements, the importance of true introductory statements and topic sentences, and how to include some of the textbooks. I’m talking about the anatomy of a paragraph, how to read the difference between a historical paragraph and a paragraph in English. Those are all skills that we’re working on. For ninth graders, the most important thing right now is that students are reading. The classroom is where students are learning. Students are also sharing their perspectives and the feedback that they give in the way that I lecture, and we engage in conversations together, so it’s always a process of exchange.
Why was receiving Barnard’s Quandra Prettyman Prize in Africana Studies meaningful to you?
The Quandra Prettyman Prize in Africana Studies is awarded to someone that’s a senior in Africana Studies every year that exemplifies the values of Quandra Prettyman in academic inquiry, passion for Africana Studies, commitment to it, ability to share that passion with others, and a commitment to carrying the field forward. For me to be selected for that, was probably the most exciting award that I got during my senior spring. I love Africana Studies. I like to think of myself as someone who lives and breathes it. I’m so passionate about Quandra, so passionate about the field, and to have the opportunity to study Africana Studies, and to have the support of the department behind me, to have help in crafting my thesis, and that experience of being a part of that department was a life-changing experience. To be awarded for my contributions just made the whole experience that much easier.
The college campus protests of the past couple years occurred during your tenure as president of Barnard’s Organization of Soul and Solidarity (BOSS), Barnard’s Black student organization. What was it like to lead such an organization during such a time?
During my time as the president of Barnard’s Organization of Soul and Solidarity (BOSS), the on-campus protests broke out. Pretty much any statement that came out with the BOSS logo on it, was written by me. We did some shared statements with some other organizations on campus, and our organization was just a safe place for students. Especially with the way that administration was moving, a lot of students who were participating in student activism on campus were then kicked out of their dorms and suspended for the time of the semester. We coordinated with our alumni to ensure that the students would have housing, that they would have legal representation. We really mobilized our alumni and our current students to ensure that we would take care of each other and take care of our students. That experience taught me the importance of community and of reaching out, and also the importance of leadership and holding strong. If I had panicked during that time, then my board would panic and then our student body would panic.
In college, how was the experience of being inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society?
Being inducted into Phi Beta Kappa was one of probably the coolest things that ever happened to me in college… It is really very STEM-focused. A lot of the students that I was inducted with majored in chemistry and in science. To be recognized for my academic achievement, and to be able to represent my department in that particular way was really important for me. That experience taught me that hard work does pay off, because I really did study and work really hard. I worked incredibly hard for my four years at Barnard. I studied hard. I was definitely a student who was always in the conference period, always talking to my classmates, trying to figure out what I could do to be better. I really strived for greatness, and being inducted into Phi Beta Kappa was one of the things that I loved about it.
As a program tutor for Freedom and Citizenship, you guided high school seniors through the college application process. What advice have you often found yourself giving?
I find myself telling students often that your writing samples matter. Your recommendation letters, they also matter. Your resume, it also matters. Those are the things that you can change and you can work on. When I applied to college, I wanted some of my numericals to be at a higher level, and I struggled with that and worried that all those things would not get me into college… Another thing that I also have been telling, especially to the students in my dorm, is that prestige is amazing, but it is not everything. I went to a relatively prestigious college. Every institution has its negatives and its positives, it just depends on what your priorities are. Do you want to go to a liberal arts college? Are you more tailored towards a university? I encourage my students to think more about what a good fit means for them as opposed to what they think a good fit means in the context of their family or what their parents want, or what the adults around them want.
What is one book you’d recommend?
“Memphis” by Tara M. Stringfellow. I picked that book up because I liked the cover, and I just started reading it. I love it. It is such a good book. It is a story about three generations of a small Black family. One daughter discovered her superpower to change her family’s trajectory. It was an excellent book, and I enjoy reading books about the South that were written by Africans [from the American South]. It just [gives] a nostalgic feeling. It’s one of those books that I read sometimes when I’m homesick, because it reminds me of home.
What dishes do you like to bake and cook?
I would say chocolate chip cookies, because they’re relatively easy to bake, and a little messy. They taste good. I love baking cookies. As far as cooking, I love chili. It’s a hearty meal, but it’s relatively easy to prepare. You need either ground turkey or ground beef, and then the rest of it is just canned, just some diced tomatoes or stewed tomatoes. Corn, beans of your choice, and seasoning.
