Constructing Livable Futures: An Analysis of the Possibilities of Black Community-Based Educational Spaces

• In Event: Thursday Roundtable Session 9:00 am
  In Roundtable Session: Centering Black Students' Agency Across Educational Spaces (Table 25)

Abstract

As the state of public education for Black youth in the U.S. is riddled with persistent inequalities, the question remains of: what prosperous learning spaces can exist that do not reproduce anti-Black suffering? In this paper, I draw on past Black radical traditions to explore the promise of community-based educational spaces (CBES). By utilizing an abolitionist framework of creating livable futures, I argue that CBES can exist as sites of radical possibilities for reimagining educational praxis. This paper offers the benefits and urgency of the redistribution of power and resources to Black communities to build educational spaces that serve as sites of fugitivity while also imparting youth with tools to develop critical consciousness, positive racial identity, and activism.

Author

• Imani C. Wilson, New York University