"Yes, I Understand": An Autoethnography on Black Womanhood, Research, and Pedagogy

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 14
  In Roundtable Session: Being and Becoming a Scholar

Abstract

This paper is a “talk to myself” (Ellis & Bochner, 2000) to understand how my Black womanhood has been critical to my pedagogy and research. Using autoethnography, I use bell hooks (1994) engaged pedagogy to explore how I am as a teacher in a course for first-year college students at a predominantly White institution. This paper is an extension of Author (2018), where I engaged with two Black women who discussed negotiations of their Black womanhood while teaching a course that encouraged students to think critically about politicized topics. I explore how I (re)claim my position as the researcher in Black feminist scholarship and use this space to reflect on my engagement with other Black women as the researched.

Author

• Kiara S. Summerville, The University of Alabama