AERA Annual Meeting: The Black Church Ain’t Dead! A Revival on the Educational Legacy of the Black Church

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The Black Church Ain’t Dead! A Revival on the Educational Legacy of the Black Church

Sun, April 12, 7:45 to 9:15am PDT (7:45 to 9:15am PDT), Los Angeles Convention Center, Floor: Level Two, Room 306B

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

This symposium reclaims the Black Church as a vital, yet underexamined, educational force within Black life and U.S. educational history. Moving beyond its identity as a religious institution, we frame the Black Church as a living tradition and diasporic reality where pedagogy, spirituality, resistance, and identity formation converge. Through six scholarly papers, we explore its multifaceted roles: from testimonies to boarding schools and public theology. Grounded in Black theological, historical, and aesthetic frameworks, the session highlights the Church’s enduring educational interventions across time. In response to Glaude’s (2010) provocation of its “death,” we offer a (re)turn to the Black Church as a site of radical possibility, communal imagination, and liberatory educational futures.

Sub Unit

SIG-Research Focus on Black Education

Chair

Amber Neal-Stanley, Purdue University

Papers

Session Organizer

Amber Neal-Stanley, Purdue University

Discussant

Amber Neal-Stanley, Purdue University