Shirley J. Allen

Shirley J. Allen (born 1941) is an American academic. A longtime professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology, in 1992 she became the first black and deaf woman to earn a doctoral degree.

Biography Shirley Jeanne Allen was born in Nacogdoches, Texas, United States, in 1941. She graduated from E.J. Campbell High School in 1959, a decade before desegregation came to Nacogdoches.

She then moved with her family for a period to La Marque, before enrolling in the music program at Jarvis Christian College.

Despite her deafness, she continued to perform piano, including for her senior recital at Jarvis.

Allen worked as an instructor at Gallaudet from 1968 to 1973. Then, beginning in 1973, she was a professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology for 28 years, teaching at the university's National Technical Institute for the Deaf. She was also involved in advocacy for deaf and black students, and served as a visiting board member at Jarvis Christian College. She retired from academia in 2001.

In 1992, Allen was named to Jarvis Christian College's Pioneer Hall of Fame.