"This Place Is a Hellhole": After-School and Out-of-Class Support Spaces for Black Girls in Predominantly White, Suburban Middle Schools

• In Event: 28.090 - MTCC Roundtable Session Nine
  In Roundtable Session: 28.090-2 - Black and Latinx Youth Identities in Action: Activism, Affirmation, and Exclusion Within Community-Based Spaces

Abstract

Incidents have shown that Black girls as young as five and six-years old have also been detained, arrested, and removed from schools for what teachers described as temper tantrums (Hines-Datiri & Carter Andrews, 2017; Morris, 2016). Additionally, during ages 5-14, Black girls are perceived by adults to be less innocent and more adult-like in comparison to their white peers, and therefore increasingly experience unfair punishment (Epstein, Blake, & Gonzalez, 2017).

While there is consensus that something specific about Black girl’s schooling experiences that warrants necessary attention exists, scholars have not adequately explored the ways anti-Black violence facing young Black girls should be addressed in theory and in practice. Although a few recent studies consider the disparities Black girls face in schools, they focus predominantly on high school-aged Black girls, overshadowing earlier ages experiences of school violence. As the general public becomes more aware of the harm done to Black girls in schools, it is critical that scholars examine how this discrimination against young Black girls comes to be and persists.

Theories/Methods: Drawing from theories about anti-blackness, violence, intersectionality, Black feminism and Black girlhood studies, this study examines young Black girls’ educational experiences in light of the current trends of violence, punishment, and exclusion they face in schools across the nation. While Black girl’s experiences with discipline are similar across diverse urban schools and predominantly white suburban schools, their experiences with anti-Black violence and isolation is heightened in predominantly white suburban schools, therefore making these spaces physically, psychologically, and symbolically violent (Fordham, 2016; Wun, 2014; 2015; 2016). In the study, I will offer an analysis of the stories Black girls share about their experiences drawing from in-depth interviews and ethnographic data collected in support groups created for Black girls in two Midwestern, predominantly white, suburban middle schools.

Findings/Implications: This study’s findings and implications highlight and suggest that young Black girls are aware of the violent and unfair treatment they are subjected to in schools, and therefore scholars and educators need to simply take their voices, ideas and suggestions into consideration to make their day-to-day schooling experiences better. In this study, self-created Black girls groups became the educational space that participants needed to become socially and politically aware of the ways in which anti-blackness and white supremacy impacted and shaped their negative experiences, to engage in resistance to the violence and attacks they faced daily, and most importantly, to heal and become proud of their black identity while working alongside Black women in the community. The findings from the groups continue to show that Black girls are not the ones who need to be ‘fixed,’ but instead it is the structure of schools and programs created, without their control, that need to be abolished.

Author

• Ashley L Smith, University of Wisconsin - Madison