"The Teacher Thinks We Are Loose?" Black Girls Reclaim Their Sexuality Through Literacies

• In Event: 63.030 - "Not Broken, but...Bent": Agency, Adversity, and the Educational Plights of Women and Girls of Color

Abstract

This paper delves in one of the most intimate aspects of the lives of Black girls—their sexuality. The insight my participants provided me with unmasked a literate landscape from which I was able to map the varied places where their perceptions of self were being shaped. From the texts in their ELA classrooms to love letters, poems, stories, discussions/theorizing, memory work focus groups, and digital and non-digital performances, these girls used their literacies to strategically answer questions, ask questions, and to challenge dominant perceptions of who they are.

Author

• Donna-Marie Cole-Malott, Lebanon Valley College