Biography

Darnell Hunt began serving as UCLA’s executive vice chancellor and provost — responsible for administering campus operations and the academic enterprise — in September of 2022. A celebrated scholar of race and media, he is also well known for his longstanding commitment to high-quality public education, support of interdisciplinary research for the common good and vision for inclusive excellence.

Since joining UCLA in 2001, EVCP Hunt has served as dean of the UCLA College’s Division of Social Sciences (2017–2022), chair of the Department of Sociology (2015–17) and director of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies (2001–17). He currently holds faculty appointments in UCLA’s departments of sociology and African American studies. 

EVCP Hunt has written extensively about issues related to race, media and culture, including four books and numerous articles for both scholarly journals and media outlets. For more than two decades, he has studied questions of access and diversity in the entertainment industry. From 2014 to 2022, he was the lead author of UCLA’s annual Hollywood Diversity Report, providing comprehensive analyses of the employment of women and people of color in front of and behind the camera in film and television. He also authored six installments of the Writers Guild of America’s Hollywood Writers Report between 2005 and 2016. 

A sought-after expert and commentator on subjects tied to race and media, EVCP Hunt has spoken at events sponsored by the Federal Communications Commission, the United Nations, the Congressional Black Caucus, numerous colleges and universities, and other organizations. He served as a member of the Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations Academic Advisory Board and as a staff researcher for the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights’ hearings on the 1992 Los Angeles civil disturbances.

EVCP Hunt’s service to UCLA has included membership on the Chancellor’s Council on the Arts, the Campus IT Steering Committee, the Civic Engagement Task Force (chair), and the Faculty Forward Initiative task force. He has also served on the Committee on Diversity and Equal Opportunity, Committee on Undergraduate Admissions and Relations with Schools (chair), Classroom Advisory Committee, the UC Board on Admissions and Relations with Schools, and the UC Press Board of Directors.

EVCP Hunt is a member of the American Sociological Association, the Association of Black Sociologists and the Council of Colleges of Arts and Sciences. Prior to joining the faculty at UCLA, he served as a sociology professor at the University of Southern California from 1994 to 2001. EVCP Hunt received his Ph.D. and M.A. in sociology from UCLA, an M.B.A. from Georgetown University and an A.B. in public relations from USC.