Speaking While Silenced: Reflections of Black Sistahs Within Colonial Spaces of Education: A Black Feminist Critique of Inclusion in Global Disability Discourse

• In Event: Feminist Critique, Praxis and Relationality in Education

Abstract

This critical qualitative study examines how Black women of intersectional identities (BWII) experienced and resisted marginalization at a 2025 international disability conference in a postcolonial African country. Though framed as inclusive, the event reproduced whiteness, coloniality, and academic gatekeeping. Using Black feminist thought, Critical Race Theory, and postcolonial theory—and grounded in a collaborative Black feminist methodology—the study employed reflexive journaling and Critical Discourse Analysis to surface four themes: intersectional absence, whiteness as expertise, emotional labor, and inclusion as performance. Findings reveal how equity is often aestheticized rather than actualized. This paper contributes to urgent conversations on epistemic exclusion and academic imperialism, calling for a reimagining of inclusion in global academic spaces that centers Black women’s epistemologies.

Authors

• Jocelyn Belden, Georgia State University

• Krystal Anderson, University of California - Berkeley

• Danica T. Moise, University of Central Florida

• Tranika Jefferson, Black Association of Behavior Analysis

• Alia Bonnerel, Charter Behavior Management

• Sharde Theodore, OSEP