Intersections of Inattention: A Qualitative Inquiry Into the Experiences of Multiply Marginalized Students in Community College Settings

• In Event: Between the How and the What: Negotiating the Messy Middle of Arts-Based Methodologies for Social Justice

Abstract

Objectives
This presentation describes the process of creating and implementing methodology for a dissertation study that sought to be humanizing, accountable, collaborative, and transparent for both the researcher and study participants (Annamma, 2013; Annamma, 2016; Paris and Winn, 2013). In acknowledgement of their commitment to creating ways of conducting research that uphold social justice, the researcher emphasizes the importance of negotiating and prioritizing ethical, non-extractive, humanizing research methodology in their study in order to collect data and create findings that are authentic counter narratives to the narratives racist ableism embedded in higher education spaces that serve to marginalize multiply marginalized (dis/abled and non-White) community college students.

Framework
This paper primarily draws on a Dis/Crit theoretical framework to examine the lived experiences and resistance practices of multiply marginalized college students (Annamma, Connor, & Ferri, 2013) in a community college setting. Using a Dis/Crit methodology rooted in social and educational equity frameworks, the researcher aims to merge critical race and critical dis/ability theory in order to highlight the need to acknowledge and incorporate intersectional and multiply marginalized identities into research and practice in higher education to achieve educational equity (Annamma, 2013).

Methods
This study utilized methodological pluralism to explore the experiences and resistance strategies of multiply marginalized students that include Educational Journey Mapping (EJM) visual, interview, and observation techniques (Annamma, 2013; Annamma, 2016). This paper will delve into why methodological pluralism featuring the EJM method became the best method to use for amplifying the voices and expertise of multiply marginalized students to push back against marginalizing policies and practices in a community college space.

Data
Data includes EJM’s as visual artifacts, field notes, and interview transcripts centered on the EJM’s. The author also discusses the process of negotiating the radical non-disclosure of data in an effort to maintain transparent and equitable relationships with the participants in the study.

Results
By extending Dis/Crit theory and methodology into the realm of higher education dis/ablility research, this paper serves to inform and and empower higher ed researchers and student services practitioners to recognize and understand the purpose of prioritizing methodologies in arts based research that prioritize co-creative, non-extractive methods in efforts to create research that focuses on social justice and educational equity in higher education.

Significance
This study adds to the scholarship focused on understanding the importance of social justice and equity in the implementation of methods used to study the lived experiences of multiply marginalized students in higher education. By using a Dis/Crit methodology, this study highlights the prioritization methods of collecting data that are ethical, collaborative, and accountable to participants in order to amplify the experiences and resistance strategies of non-White dis/abled college students and place them at the center of creating educational equity in higher education (Stapleton & James, 2020).

Author

• Jana N. Knibb, University of Rhode Island/Rhode Island College