John Ogbu, 64; Said Some Black Teens Fear Success Means ‘White’

John Uzo Ogbu, 64, professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley and a scholar of minority education and identity, died Aug. 20 of a heart attack after undergoing back surgery.

Ogbu is known for work that attempted to understand how race and ethnic differences play out in educational and economic achievement. He stirred controversy in 1986 when he co-wrote a study concluding that some African American students in Washington, D.C., high schools didn’t live up to their academic potential because they feared they would be accused of “acting white.”

Born in Nigeria, Ogbu went to a teachers’ training college there and later taught Latin, math and geography at a missionary high school. But he became interested in the ministry and attended the theological seminary at Princeton.

While there, he turned to anthropology and transferred to UC Berkeley, where he earned his bachelor’s, master’s and PhD in anthropology. He began teaching there in 1971 and was promoted to full professor in 1980.

In the 1990s, he encouraged the teaching of ebonics -- African American vernacular English -- in the Oakland school system as a way to help African American students make the transition to traditional English.