Black Female Academics’ Existence as forms of Resistance and Protest: Intersectionality and Coloniality in UK and Caribbean Higher Education

• In Event: Highlighted Session: Black Feminist and Decolonial Practices of Resistance in Education

Proposal

Black women faculty often experience social, cultural, and intellectual isolation are often overworked, underappreciated, and underpaid within the academy (Sue et al., 2011). The very existence and persistence of Black women academics in the UK and the former British Caribbean can be described as acts of resistance and embodied protests. Where there has been seminal research on Black women experiences in the US, the UK, the Caribbean and other parts of the world (Croom, 2017; Rollock, 2019; Stewart, 2019), there have been little to no comparative studies of Black women’s experiences between ex-colonial states and former colonies. The complex nature of comparative research offers a depth of critical analysis within and between country-contexts to better understand Black women academics' resistance, grit and perseverance within an underlying state of coloniality.

The literature points to continuous challenges within the UK and Anglophone Caribbean whereby Black female academics are forced to navigate several social, historical, economic, political and emotional challenges (Rollock, 2019; Shepherd, 2019; Stewart, 2019). The purpose of this study is to better understand Black women academics’ lived experiences at the intersections of their race, gender, and state of coloniality in the UK versus the Caribbean. This article provides data from a larger comparative study and answers the following research question: What do the intersectional experiences of Black women academics illustrate about colonial systems of oppression in higher education in the UK versus Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados?

This study employs a hybrid framework from Collins (2000) Matrix of Domination and Four Domains of Power as well as Quijano (2000) Colonial Matrix of Power. This study expounds and adapts Collins(2000) framework by applying its concepts to transnational contexts outside the U.S. Collins (2000) seminal text on Black Feminist Thought provided a critical examination of Black women's struggles within the US at the intersections of multiple forms of oppression such as race, gender, sexuality and the nation as “a wider struggle for human dignity and social justice” (p. 276). The Domains of Power are identified as structural, hegemonic or cultural, disciplinary and interpersonal, and illustrate how “intersecting oppressions are actually organized” (p. 18).
Quijano (2000) is credited with attributing the modern day racist, neoliberal, global hegemony of power and control to the colonial matrix of power. Further to, the colonial matrix of power operates within four interrelated spheres: economy, authority, gender and sexuality, and knowledge/subjectivity. By using both frameworks, there is both an interpersonal/ micro level and intrapersonal/ macro level analysis of how coloniality impacts Black women within academia. Quijano’s colonial matrix of power is able to analyze and deconstruct the larger systemic colonial structures that contribute to the legacy of coloniality in academia. Whereas, Collin’s Matrix of Domination allows for the micro level/ interpersonal analysis of Black women’s experiences within academia.

This study employs intersectionality methodology (Haynes, et al., 2020) which enables qualitative researchers to generate sophisticated intersectional analysis that shows how Black women experience: 1) intersectional erasure, 2) intersectional failure and 3) use their study findings to pinpoint intersectional interventions to undo the intersectional subordination that Black women endure (Haynes, Stewart & Patton, 2023).

Prior to data collection, the study was reviewed and received IRB approval. Using snowball sampling, the study included 14 Black women academics who currently work at a public higher education institution in the UK, Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados. There were three phases for data collection procedures: phase 1 included a 90 minute, semi-structured interview; phase 2 included a 60 minute semi-structured interview and phase three included an artistic rendering of participants’ images to reflect their lived experiences. There were a total of 28 interviews completed and 17 artistic renderings.

Each recording was reviewed along with member-checking of transcriptions. Within country/ region and across country/ region comparative analysis was completed for this study. First cycle coding methods include descriptive, in-vivo, initial and theory-based coding (Saldana, 2009). Pattern coding for second-cycle coding methods for the development of major themes were then applied.

Preliminary and comparative findings across the former colonies and previous colonialist states suggest that Black women academics experience a kaleidoscope of colonial rearing, colonial humiliation, persistence through cis-white patriarchal supremacy and an unrelenting grit and perseverance to survive whole. Below represent excerpts of the cross-comparative analysis of the interview data for what is understood as colonial humiliation.

Colonial humiliation is the mobilization of tools of oppression such as shaming, disposability, and stealing of intellectual property by persons in positions of power and/or seniority to embarrass and reinforce a false sense of control. Colonial humiliation closely reflects the various weaponized tools that the elite used during the period of enslavement to reinforce their power and control of status in the colony.

A senior lecturer in Jamaica expressed that being perceived as a young woman meant that she was seen first as the “academic help”, incompetent and unqualified as an academic. In these scenarios, youthfulness was equated with presumed inexperience. Similarly, an Assistant Professor in the UK stated,
"You know, people will argue that colonialism no longer exists and so on and so forth. The legacy is always doing exactly what it should. The legacy is still there and apparent and that's where it is… There is nobody that looks like me, sounds like me, has similar experiences or cultural background as me. So I'm like, okay, here we go again, trying to be the first, and trying to break down some ceilings…Of 50 academic staff members and I'm the only black female and [it's] 2022".

Another lecturer in Barbados described that the university can create “trajectories for upward mobility [but is] rigid and not responsive,” while a full professor in the UK echoed sentiments of feeling rejected by the very system that educated her and explained how it felt to navigate a constant tension of feeling that you do not belong. This comparative research study provides strategies to address colonial humiliation of Black women academics, and build a cadre of policies and practices to support their success.

Authors

• Saran Stewart, University of Connecticut

• Yasmin Elgoharry, University of Connecticut