Archibald Wickeramaraja Singham, also known as Archie Singham or A. W. Singham (1932-1991) was a Sri Lankan political scientist and historian, professor of political science at

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn in New York City, United States. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls nearly 14,000 students on a campus in the Midwood and Flatbush sections of Brooklyn as of fall ...

City University of New York The City University of New York (CUNY, pronounced , ) is the Public university, public university system of Education in New York City, New York City. It is the largest urban university system in the United States, comprising 25 campuses: eleven ...

. He was an authority on the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

and a participant in the

Non-Aligned Movement The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) is a forum of 121 countries that Non-belligerent, are not formally aligned with or against any major power bloc. It was founded with the view to advancing interests of developing countries in the context of Cold W ...

Life

Archie Singham was born in

British Burma British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and cultur ...

to Sri Lankan parents. He was educated in Sri Lanka before doing his bachelors at

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a Private university, private liberal arts college, liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut, United States. It was founded in 1831 as a Men's colleges in the United States, men's college under the Methodi ...

. He married Shirley Hune, who later became the associate provost of

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City, United States. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools ...

. Singham became one of the founding members of the Department of Government at the

University of the West Indies – Mona The University of the West Indies (UWI), originally University College of the West Indies, is a public university system established to serve the Tertiary education, higher education needs of the residents of 18 English-speaking Country, cou ...

, and taught there from 1960 to 1970. He also gained a master's from the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

, and in 1967 completed his Ph.D. there. Singham taught briefly at the University of Michigan before being recruited as one of the 'black scholars' (despite his Asian heritage) by

Andrew Billingsley Andrew Billingsley (born March 20, 1926) is an American sociologist, author, lecturer, and college professor who served as the eighth president of Morgan State University from 1975 to 1984. Biography Billingsley was born on March 20, 1926, in M ...

Howard University Howard University is a private, historically black, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C., United States. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and accredited by the Mid ...

at the end of the 1960s. He also taught at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

in England before moving to Brooklyn College in 1978. In testimony to the US Congress, Singham criticized the 1983

United States invasion of Grenada The United States and a coalition of Caribbean countries invaded the small island nation of Grenada, north of Venezuela, at dawn on 25 October 1983. Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury by the U.S. military, it resulted in military occupation with ...

, and called for the US to withdraw its troops. Singham died on 13 March 1991. Two books on peace were dedicated to Singham's memory."To the memory of Archie Singham (1932-1991): ardent, impassioned, much missed struggler for Peace." His son is the software entrepreneur

Neville Roy Singham Neville Roy Singham (born May 13, 1954) is an American businessman and social activist. He is the founder and former chairman of Thoughtworks, an IT consulting company that provides custom software, software tools, and consulting services, which ...

Works

* * ''Readings in government and politics of the West Indies''. Kingston, Jamaica: Printed by Instant Letter Service Co., 1967. * ''The hero and the crowd in a colonial polity''. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968. * * (with N. L. Singham) * (ed.) ''The Commonwealth Caribbean into the seventies : proceedings of a conference held on 28–30 September 1973 at Howard University, Washington, D.C.'' Montreal: Center for Developing-Area Studies, McGill University, 1975. * (ed. with

Tran Van Dinh Tran may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Tran'' (novel), a novel in the ''Janissaries'' series named for a fictional planet * '' Dr. Tran'', an animated miniseries People * Trần (陳), a Vietnamese surname, including a list of people nam ...

) ''From Bandung to Colombo : conferences of the non-aligned countries, 1955-75''. New York: Third Press Review Books, 1976. * * (ed.) ''The Nonaligned movement in world politics: a symposium held at Howard University. Includes proceedings of the Sri Lanka Nonalignment conference''. Westport, Conn.: Lawrence Hill, 1977. * (with Shirley Hune) ''The non-aligned movement and the Namibian question''. Chandigarh, India: Centre for Research in Rural & Industrial Development, 1985. * (with Shirley Hune) ''Non-alignment in an age of alignments''. Westport, Conn.: L. Hill; London: Zed Books, 1986.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Singham, Archie 1932 births 1991 deaths Wesleyan University alumni University of Michigan alumni Academic staff of the University of the West Indies University of Michigan faculty Howard University faculty Brooklyn College faculty Sri Lankan political scientists 20th-century Sri Lankan historians People from British Ceylon American people of Sri Lankan Tamil descent 20th-century political scientists