02 January 2023

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JADA: 110 years of Black dentists in the U.S.

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In a guest editorial published on Dec. 22 in the Journal of the American Dental Association, Drs. Eleanor Fleming and Dennis Mitchell discuss the 110-year founding of the Official Bulletin of the National Dental Association. The publication was renamed The Journal of the National Dental Association in 1915 and, subsequently, the Journal of the American Dental Association in 1922. 

The authors and dentists note that name changes of the journal are significant, since the National Dental Association, which was organized as a professional group for Negro dentists, was formed in 1905. 

According to the editorial, the details of the name changes of the journal and the degree to which its leaders were aware of the National Association of Negro Dentists are unclear, what is clear is that the experiences of then Negro and now Black dentists have followed a unique trajectory in comparison with White dentists. 

Fleming and Mitchell write that as the American Dental Association celebrates this important anniversary of its journal, it is important to reflect on the experiences of Black dentists during this time frame. The editorial focuses on the experiences of Black dentists not to the exclusion of other historically and contemporarily minoritized dentists, but to elevate a legacy of dentists that is rooted in the 1869 graduation of Robert Tanner Freeman, the first known person of African descent to graduate from a dental school in the U.S. 

Read more on the JADA site: https://jada.ada.org/article/S0002-8177(22)00733-4/fulltext#%20