M(other)work as Radical Resurgence: Imagining Postcolonial Futures in Higher Education

• In Event: 63.019 - Radical Black Futurities: Ruminations and Echoes

Abstract

This paper highlights intergenerational relationships and survivance (Vizenor, 2008) as everyday acts of resurgence (Corntassel, 2018) for two sister scholars of color in education. We theorize the necessity of sisterhood and m(other)work as key to confronting the workings of academia in a time of neoliberal rule, where the bodies and labor of women of color faculty are tokenized by recruitment efforts that are fundamentally antithetical to the projects of redistribution and decolonization we seek. We employ testimonios to theorize from our lived experiences, while simultaneously speaking back to institutions of higher education.We frame our testimonio in three parts: 1) Our Sisterhood; 2) M(other)work as Radical Resurgence; and, 3) Intergenerational Dreams of the Postcolonial.

Authors

• Verónica Nelly Vélez, Western Washington University

• Anna Lees, Western Washington University