In Between the Lines: Creating a Homeplace in Education

• In Event: Engagement of Black Youth and Families in Emergent Social and Educational Spaces

Abstract

Purpose
This paper examines how oppressive systems and injustice present issues for students of color in regards to their ability to combat racism in school. A risk of racial stress and trauma for racially minoritized identities in predominantly white educational spaces, thus a need to support students in various ways. Therefore, how students navigate across settings and what affords the identity and practice-linked resources for students to engage in conversations to further support our understanding to design intersectional learning environments that promote belonging. Guiding research question are presented as such:
How do brown and black high school football student-athletes navigate situations of race, racism and identity across settings?
And experience belonging?

Theoretical Framework
I pull from Critical Race Theory (Bell, 1995) and Intersectionality Theory (Crenshaw, 1989) to frame the context of the work. Critical Race Theory sets the stage for why and how oppressive systems undermine black and brown experience, while Intersectionality Theory justifies the need for recognition of multiple identities in and across space. To situate the co-creation of a Radical Listening space I use bell hooks (1990) concept of a homeplace as the mechanism between identity, belonging, learning promotes positive development. As a method for framing data collection, in Racialized Identities Nasir (2006; 2009; 2011), and the resources detailed are directly linked to a sense of identity through learning, and therefore it is necessary to identify the resources available for identity development across settings.

Methodology
This is a case study, collecting multiple forms of data to validate experiences of the 12 brown and black student-athletes in the study. The following methods were conducted to identify the resources: participant observations, natural conversations and radical listening focus groups.

Data sources
Data collected included artifacts in the form of illustrated identity maps, transcribed interviews and focus groups, as well as participant observations.

Findings
Identity resources can be both positive and negative: affording the students positive and negative situations to navigate, the resources themselves aid in the navigation process towards belonging within a socially constructed space of discrimination (Crenshaw, 1989; Bell, 1995) towards spaces that don’t discriminate.
How to better design learning environments: detailed by identity resources, the football team affords students the time and space to take risks while simultaneously understanding various identities and intersections as they matter to the coaches and people associated with the program.

Scholarly Significance
In the context of this study, it is clear which spaces students would rather learn in, one that is interwoven with the football team, rather than their classrooms that do not reflect that space. Student-athletes want to learn in spaces that honor their intersectional identities of race, class, gender and belonging. This study ensures resources used by students in places of belonging can be employed elsewhere by focusing on supporting identities as we design learning environments.

Author

• Kaleb Germinaro, University of Washington - Seattle