Andrew Jay Diamond (born 1 November 1967) is an American academic and professor of United States history at Sorbonne University, where he directs the research center Histoire et dynamique des espaces anglophones.

Early life and education

Diamond was born in Boston in 1967 and raised in Needham, Massachusetts. He attended Tufts University (1986-1990), where he majored in history and English. He obtained his PhD in history from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in 2004 with a doctoral dissertation entitled "Hoodlums, Rebels, and Vice lords: Street Gangs, Youth Subcultures, and Race in Chicago, 1919-1968." His doctoral research earned him a fellowship from the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation.

Career

Diamond began his academic career in France in 2002 as a lecturer in American civilization at the Université de Picardie – Jules Verne and then moved on to the Université de Lille 3 in 2005, where he worked as an Assistant Professor until 2010. Between 2010 and 2012, Diamond was a full research fellow at the Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI) at Sciences Po - Paris, where he also taught a number of classes between 2007 and 2012. In 2012, he obtained his current position at the Sorbonne.

Diamond has been a member of the editorial boards of the Revue française d'études américaines and The Sixties: A Journal of History, Politics and Culture, and served on the board of directors of the Urban History Association and the Fulbright Commission in France. He has been a featured speaker for the African Regional Services of the United States Department of State, the United States Embassy in Paris, and the Consulate General of France in Chicago. He worked with the Institut Français of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs as curator of "City/Cité: A Transatlantic Exchange," a program of international conferences that brings together researchers, artists, policymakers, and activists from the United States and France to engage in a dialogue about the current state of urban democracy and of the circumstances arrayed against the realization of democratic ideals.^[1] He has written extensively and appeared regularly in both the French and American mainstream media on issues of race and inequality in France and the United States.^[2][3][4][5]

Works

He is the author or co-author of a number of articles and books on the history of politics, race and political culture. His first monograph, Mean Streets: Chicago Youths and the Everyday Struggle for Empowerment in the Multiracial City, 1908-1969, provides a comprehensive history of Chicago's youth subcultures and street gangs and their connection to racial identity formation and grassroots racial politics. The book was reviewed favorably in numerous scholarly journals and by the Chicago press. Historian Perry Duis praised it as "an enormously important book for historians in several fields," and the Chicago Reader called it "a fascinating and revealing narrative."^[6][7] His most recent monograph, Chicago on the Make: Power and Inequality in a Modern City explores the "link between race and neoliberalization at Chicago's grassroots over the 20th century".^[8] The book was awarded the Jon Gjerde Prize for the best book in Midwestern history in 2017 and the Illinois State Historical Society's Award of Superior Achievement, and was featured in the New York Times.^[9][10] Chicago on the Make has been lauded by a number of commentators for its hard-hitting analysis of the Chicago success story and the politicians who have rallied around it. Longtime Chicago anti-racist punk band Race Traitor referred to it as a "full take down of the neoliberal politics of Chicago," and the Chicago Review asserted that "no one seems to come out unscathed from Diamond’ s historical overview, and finishing the book, regardless of political orientation or preference, leaves one with the feeling of having just unfurled a scroll coated in an uncomfortable film of grease."^[11][12]

Accusations of harassment at Sorbonne Université

An investigation by the independent investigation media Mediapart, published in spring 2019, echoed a doctoral student's complaint of sexual and moral harassment against Andrew Diamond, in a dossier compiled by the Clasches association (Collectif de lutte contre le harcèlement sexuel dans l'enseignement supérieur)^[13] with testimonies from seven people (six women and one man, the latter as a witness in support of his colleague).^[14] According to Mediapart, the report of the Sorbonne University commission of inquiry, convened after the complaint, "excludes sexual and moral harassment" but recognizes "problematic" aspects in "professional behavior". Five of the eight doctoral students then enrolled in a thesis under the supervision or co-supervision of Andrew Diamond chose to leave their supervisor; others continued their work under his direction.^[15] When contacted by Mediapart, Andrew Diamond rejected the accusations, which he claims are "unfounded ".^[16] On September 24, 2019, Sorbonne Université's joint disciplinary commission, made up of four university professors from the Academic Council, ruled unanimously by secret ballot that Andrew Diamond should be completely acquitted, after noting "obvious contradictions and inconsistencies in the accusing testimonies", and pointing out that the "material facts produced disproved certain accusations".^[17] However, the President of Sorbonne University immediately decided to appeal this decision to the relevant administrative jurisdiction, the Conseil national de l'enseignement supérieur et de la recherche (CNESER).^[18]

Major publications

Diamond, Andrew J. and Thomas J. Sugrue, eds., Neoliberal Cities: The Remaking of Postwar Urban America (New York: New York University Press, 2020)^[19]

Diamond, Andrew J., Chicago on the Make: Power and Inequality in a Modern City (Oakland: University of California Press, 2017)

Diamond, Andrew and Pap Ndiaye, Histoire de Chicago (Paris: Fayard, 2013)^[20]

Diamond, Andrew, J., Mean Streets: Chicago Youths and the Everyday Struggle for Empowerment in the Multiracial City, 1908-1969 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2009)^[21]