'Friends' Co-Creator Donates $4 Million for Professorship in African and African American Studies, Is 'Embarrassed' By Show's Lack of Diversity
justjared.comThe co-creator of Friends, Marta Kauffman, is addressing the show’s lack of diversity and is now making a large donation.
If you don’t know, Friends ran from 1994-2004 and featured very little diversity on the show. Now, Marta has announced a $4 million donation to her alma mater, Brandeis University, in the school’s African and African-American studies department. Click inside to read about the endowment as well as what Marta said about her realization… The Marta F.
Kauffman ’78 Professorship in African and African American Studies “will support a distinguished scholar with a concentration in the study of the peoples and cultures of Africa and the African diaspora” and “assist the department to recruit more expert scholars and teachers, map long-term academic and research priorities and provide new opportunities for students to engage in interdisciplinary scholarship.” First, Marta said the criticism about the show was “difficult and frustrating.” “I’ve learned a lot in the last 20 years,” Marta said about her revelation. “Admitting and accepting guilt is not easy.
It’s painful looking at yourself in the mirror. I’m embarrassed that I didn’t know better 25 years ago. ” “It was after what happened to George Floyd that I began to wrestle with my having bought into systemic racism in ways I was never aware of,” she added. “That was really the moment that I began to examine the ways I had participated.
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