This study examined the perceptions of African American faculty on their socialization to the academic professional culture, and is based on the premise that the process of such socialization is circumscribed by the organizational culture. Taking a qualitative research approach, the study used a three-part interview process. The focus of the first interview was on establishing the context of interviewees' experience; the second part was structured to foster participants' reconstruction of experiential details; and the final interview encouraged participants to reflect on the meaning of their experiences. The study involved 19 African American faculty; 11 held tenure-track appointments, 2 were adjunct or non-tenure track assistant professors, 4 were associate professors, and 2 held administrative as well as faculty positions. Analysis of the data defined three processes socialization, adaptation, and devaluation by which organizations socialize members and impart values and goals. Following a focus group interview, a fourth category, guarding the gate, emerged. While the study confirmed the notion that academic freedom was a unifying core value, some participants felt that white colleagues discredited or devalued their scholarly contributions and reported that they felt pressured by the academic environment to compromise their research interests to conform to values associated with Eurocentric mainstream research. (Contains 47 references.) (CH)