Theorizing Intersectional Multimodal Analysis

• In Event: Toward Critical Multimodal Methodologies: Analytical Tools for Disrupting Hegemonic Structures in Educational Research

Abstract

Scholars have recently argued that multimodal educational research “has shied away from directly addressing issues of race and legacies of colonialism in the lives and learning of youth” (Campano et al., 2020, p. 138), highlighting the need for culturally-responsive theoretical and methodological approaches. Towards that end, this paper explores a theoretical and methodological framework for examining Black girls’ multimodal imagery (e.g, drawings, collage, photography) called Intersectional Multimodal Analysis (IMA). The goals of IMA are: (a) dismantle the controlling imagery [Collins, 1991] in U.S. media and society that misportray Black girls as illiterate, aggressive, and sexually promiscuous while upholding white feminine normativity; (b) illuminate and amplify the self-defined epistemologies, creativities, resistances, and desires of Black girls.

Theoretical Grounding & Methods
IMA is an interpretive framework that attunes to the endarkened, embodied, and engendered meanings of Black girls’ multimodal imagery by integrating intersectional theories (Collins, 2015; Crenshaw, 1991); Black Girls’ Literacies (Muhammad & Haddix, 2016); social semiotics and multimodal theories (New London Group, 1996; Serafini, 2022); and intersectional racial literacy theories (Green et al., 2021). Intersectionality explains how Black girls have identity markers within three socially subjugated groups (i.e. race, gender and age) and therefore experience interlocking and intermeshing systems of oppression (Brown, 2013; Price-Dennis et al., 2017). Through the IMA framework, we understand how Black girls, as members of multiple intersecting subordinated groups (i.e. race, gender and age), creatively leverage expansive communicative modes (e.g., pictures, sound, words, gestures, spatiality) in their visual imagery to represent their raced-gendered identities and literacies; express their creativities, stories, and memories; critique and resist structural oppressions; and dream of new, socially-just worlds.

I developed the IMA framework through two qualitative methodological approaches. First, I worked with two Black woman scholars to conduct an extensive thematic synthesis (Thomas & Harden, 2008) of the research literature on Black girls multimodal practices (Author 3, in press). Second, I augmented this thematic synthesis with findings from my multimodal research alongside Black girls (e.g., Author 3, 2020, 2022, 2023a, 2023b) and insights from my own epistemologies, histories, and identities as a Black woman multimodal scholar.

Findings: Explicating the IMA Framework
The IMA framework comprises four interrelated dimensions that examine the content (e.g., characters, objects, settings, actions) of Black girls’ imagery:
(1) Intersectional Identities: Black girls’/women’s depictions of endarkened femininity through their Bodies (e.g., hair, skin color); Gaze; Gestures; Clothing.
(2) Intersectional Spatialities: Black girl/women in relation to other people and objects in lived or imagined sociopolitical Contexts;
(3) Intersectional Agency: Black girls’/women’s portrayals of power through Affect, Advocacy, and/or Resistance.
(4) Intersectional Voice: Black girls’ Reflective Meanings about their imagery and/or Memories or Stories that are evoked; visual counterstorytelling.

This paper amplifies the AERA conference theme by describing how the IMA framework promotes racial justice and new possibilities in multimodal research as an analytic lens that illuminates the full humanity of Black girls; affirms the intersectional meanings of their multimodal imagery; and highlights their resistance and resilience in a white patriarchal society (Collins, 2015).

Author

• Jennifer Danridge Turner, University of Maryland