When Mentoring Is Method: Exploring Spirituality, Black/Endarkened Feminisms, and Relationship in Black Girls Lives

Session Submission Type: Symposium

Abstract

Black female researchers are mutually constituted by Black female participants: I am because we are. Thus, mentoring Black females is circular, unbound by time and place, and connected through “the fact of Blackness” (Fanon, 1967). Crucial to those traditionally underserved within education (namely Black girls/youth), this symposium redefines and characterizes mentoring as research method, using Black/endarkened feminist frameworks. Healing, spirituality, and relationship shift from margin to center in these studies. Further, mentoring as method for Black girls/youth involves consciousness development and activism for both the Black female researcher and the Black girls/youth. Thus, mentoring is not simply learning to be “competent,” but a space where both the identity and integrity of Black girls and Black female researchers are developed.

Sub Unit

• Committee on Scholars and Advocates for Gender Equity in Education

Cosponsor

• Committee on Scholars of Color in Education

Chair

• Valerie F. Kinloch, The Ohio State University

Papers

• Living Through Each Other: Exploring Endarkened Girl Consciousness and Reciprocal Mentoring as Research - Samatha Wahome, Kent State University

• Lessons in Love, Literacy, and Listening: Reflections on Learning With and From Black Female Youth - Erica Nicole Womack, The Ohio State University

• Shared Voice From Within: Exploring Ensemble Building as Mutual Mentoring for and by Black Girls - Heather Hill, The Ohio State University

• The Diploma Belongs to All of Us: Mentoring African Immigrant Girls Through/for the Community - Chinwe Linda Okpalaoka, The Ohio State University

Discussant

• Cynthia B. Dillard, University of Georgia