Perpetual Adjustment and Cultural Abandonment: Black Womanhood Beyond Double Consciousness

• In Event: Student Forum Roundtables Session
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Roundtable 3: Gender and the Body

Abstract

This research examines how African American women experience the phenomena of Perpetual Adjustment and Cultural Abandonment within structural, interpersonal, and communal contexts. This work is shaped by Du Bois's theorization of double consciousness and its limitations. This paper introduces two new conceptual frameworks to theorize the emotional, psychological, and cultural labor required of Black women to navigate systems that both rely on and neglect them. Drawing on a mixed-methods approach and survey design grounded in Black feminist epistemology and methodology, it incorporates an online survey with both closed and open-ended questions. By naming and theorizing Perpetual Adjustment and Cultural Abandonment, this project contributes to Black feminist scholarship by expanding conceptual tools available for understanding Black women’s lived experiences today.

Author

• Ashlee Taylor Davis, California State University East Bay