Literacy 4 Brown Girls: Journal of Urban Teaching, Learning, and Research

• In Event: Illuminating Effective Practices, Approaches, and Strategies in Urban Education: Publishing With the Journal of Urban Teaching, Learning, and Research

Abstract

Creating spaces of representation for African-American girls is paramount to not only their academic success, but their feelings of worthiness, respectability, and value. Administrators, teachers, and other school personnel have a responsibility to explore the implementation of such spaces if they seek to truly understand, support, and aid in the cultivation of African-American girls’ intersecting identities. In a society that dehumanizes, brutalizes, and disproportionately penalizes the minds, bodies, and spirits of African-American girls, it is our responsibility as educators to stand on the front lines and protect them by any means necessary. By protecting and valuing their identities, we demand that the world #SayHerName and collectively work to prevent the neglect of African-American girls’ most important intersecting identities. To not do so further posits that their identities and lived experiences are unimportant and perpetuates their academic push-out, disengagement, and neglect.

Author

• Jendayi Mbalia
  Presenting Author