The Power of Identity You Cannot See: How Black Women Principals Negotiate Micropolitics in “Relationship Discourses”

• In Event: BIPOC Women in Leadership: Pathways, Politics, and Power

Abstract

In this paper, I challenge how the term “relationships” is conceptualized in frameworks and literature that inform Black women principals’ professional identities and argue for an acknowledgement of micropolitics as a necessary component for understanding how principals decode “relationship discourses”. Using a narrative life history approach and Crenshaw’s (1991) tenets of intersectionality, this paper examines the narratives of seven Black women principals in Ontario Canada. Further, it reveals key insights for advancing leadership frameworks used in school leader preparation programs and ELA discourse to meet the race-and-gendered needs of Black women principals as they construct their professional identities and lead schools.

Author

• Nyasha Nyereyemhuka, University of Calgary