Faculty Senate President

Biography

Dr. Finnie Coleman is President of the Faculty Senate at the University of New Mexico where he teaches courses in African American literature and culture.  An American Council on Education Fellow (ACE), Dr. Coleman has served UNM as Interim Dean of University College, Director of American Literary Studies, and Director of Africana Studies. In the community, Dr. Coleman is a Founding Member and Board Chairman of the ACES Tech Charter School, served for many years on the Governing Board of Amy Biehl High School in Albuquerque, and is Special Advisor to the New Mexico Black History Month Organizing Committee.   For 20 years, Dr. Coleman has served as a higher education consultant specializing in diversity, equity, and inclusion on college campuses.  He is a Co-Founder of the Dellsly Group, a non-profit organization that houses Conexiónes Africanas, Conexiónes Indigenas, and Visible Education Solutions. 

Prior to his career in academia, Dr. Coleman served as an Army Intelligence Officer during the Persian Gulf War in Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait.  He earned his MA and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia and his BA from the Virginia Military Institute.  He is married to fellow UNM faculty member Dr. Doris Careaga Coleman.  They have two children, Anelé and Finnie, both students at Bosque School.  Dr. Coleman also coaches soccer teams for Bosque’s lower school. 

Why Africana Studies

My choice to affiliate with Africana Studies was an easy one. I fell in love with the Africana Studies Department before it was Africana Studies and long before the program became an academic department. I joined UNM to direct the African American Studies Program nearly 20 years ago. I remain committed personally and professionally to Africana Studies’ vision for academic and inclusive excellence here at UNM. My research interests, teaching, and service interests all align with the Department’s mission, and I am super excited about the department’s direction. Perhaps most important in my decision to affiliate with Africana Studies is that I am impressed with the department’s visionary leadership.

Under the current Chair, the program has taken important foundational steps that have been decades in the making. Because of this outstanding leadership, an unflinching commitment to student success, a renewed and fruitful relationship with African American Student Services, the continuation of a dedicated and experienced faculty, and the addition of an amazing coterie of promising emerging scholars, the future is bright for the department and bodes well for the College of Arts and Sciences and the University of New Mexico. This is truly a great moment to be affiliated with a department that is not just one of the newest in the nation but one that promises to model what African American, Black Studies, African, and Africana studies departments and programs may accomplish in this watershed moment in academia. Africana Studies is poised and uniquely prepared to contribute to UNM’s efforts to demonstrate today what inclusivity and academic excellence will look like for other colleges and universities in the decades to come.