"Alls My Life I Has to Fight": Single Black Mothers Using Cultural Capital in Schools

• In Event: 18.020 - A Mother Knows: Understanding Mothers as Pedagogical Agents

Abstract

Using semi-structured qualitative interviews, this paper explores the forms of cultural capital single Black mothers use to advocate for their children with autism in special education settings. Using a modified grounded theory approach interviews were coded for several domains of non-dominant cultural capital found in the literature, including aspirational, familial, social, linguistic, resistant, navigational, motherhood and black cultural capital (Carter, 2003; Lo, 2016; Yasso, 2005) . Black single mothers predominately provided examples of resistant and navigational capital. Additionally, mothers were more likely to use their capital to impact services for their child, when schools engaged in family-centered practice. Implications of these findings for future research are discussed.

Author

• Elizabeth Holliday Morgan, University of California - Davis