Visible at the Intersections: Digital Illustrations of Black Women Academics’ Race, Gender, and Coloniality through Intersectional Renderings

• In Event: Gender (in)equality and norms in digital spaces

Proposal

Black women academics in the United Kingdom (UK) and the former British Caribbean colonies have made significant contributions to the field of academia, yet they often experience social, cultural, and intellectual isolation, and are often overworked, underappreciated, and underpaid within the academy (Gabriel & Tate, 2017; Stewart, 2019). They often experience multiple forms of sexism, ageism and racism leading to their intellectual disposability, increased time to promotion and intersectional erasure (Patton & Njoku, 2019; Rollock, 2019). Crenshaw’s (1991) intersectional erasure underscores the extreme invisibility of Black women and girls in “triple” jeopardy in a white capitalist society, which is the enduring legacy of all colonized countries. In the UK, Showunmi (2023) discusses how Black women in higher education are frequently positioned as tokens within their institutions—highly visible in roles related to diversity and inclusion, yet marginalized when it comes to broader institutional recognition and decision-making. Despite their hyper-visibility in certain aspects, Showunmi highlights the pervasive invisibility of Black women in academic positions and in the recognition of their scholarly contributions. Given the historical exclusion, underrepresentation, and scholarly neglect of Black women academics in the literature, the purpose of this study is highlight digital illustrations of how these academics would like to be seen. Using portraiture and intersectional renderings, a form of qualitative research, we answer the following research question: How do Black women academics use intersectional renderings to articulate and navigate their visibility at the intersections of race, gender, and coloniality within British and post-British colonial academic institutions?
This comparative study employs a hybrid framework conceptualizing the movement Black British Feminism and using Afro-Caribbean Feminist Thought (Stewart 2019) to center the lived experiences of Black women academics at the intersections of race, gender and state of coloniality in the United Kingdom and Anglo-phone Caribbean. Black British feminism is a branch of feminism that centers the experiences, struggles, and contributions of Black women in Britain, shaped by the unique socio-political context of race, gender, and class within the UK (Mirza, 1997). Drawing from critical Black feminist scholars, Black British feminism emphasizes the intersections of oppression that Black women face and seeks to challenge both racism within mainstream feminist movements and sexism within anti-racist struggles. It also explores the legacies of colonialism, immigration, and the role of the diaspora in shaping Black British identity (Brah, 1996; Mirza, 1997; Tate, 2015).
Afro-Caribbean Feminist Thought extends from Patricia Hill Collins (2000) Black Feminist Thought as well as Caribbean Feminist scholars, Reddock (2007) and Barriteau’s (2003) earlier writings by reclaiming and recognizing the experiential knowledge and intersecting identities of Black Caribbean women as powerful and critical embodiments of consciousness and confronts the oppressed legacies of colonial definitions of womanhood and femininity (Stewart 2019, 154).
This study employs portraiture and intersectional renderings as methods of qualitative inquiry. Portraiture is a form of qualitative inquiry method designed to intricately capture the complexity, dynamics, and subtleties of human experience and organizational life. Lawrence-Lightfoot and Davis (1997) explain that portraiture is framed by the phenomenological paradigm and goals of ethnography. The artistic expressions shared in this study serve as designs to “capture the richness, complexity, and dimensionality of human experience” (Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis, 1997, p.3). The methodology takes into consideration the narratives which either sustain or conceal the glaring inequities that often shape the lived experiences of Black women academics in higher education.
In particular, participants were asked to submit images that reflected the intersections of race, gender and state of coloniality. These images were rendered as digital illustrations by a professional Black Caribbean artist in the likeness of each Black woman academic. Participants were sent the digital illustrations to review, edit and approve before being invited for a semi-structured interview which centered on the images they selected.
The comparative study is part of an overall larger study. For this specific research, participants included thirteen Black women academics who currently work at a public higher education institution in the United Kingdom, Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad. The criteria for inclusion in the sample included persons who work full-time at the lecturer role or higher rank in the professoriate and identify as both woman and Black, (i.e., Afro-Caribbean, Black African, Black Caribbean, Black British or other Black background).
Each intersectional rendering was reviewed along with the transcriptions as interview questions directly correlated to the images participants submitted. Thematic analysis of the images was analyzed during and after data collection. Data was analyzed in response to the research question using a combination of first-cycle and second-cycle coding methods. 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. The data is held on UConn SharePoint drive as a centrally protected database. In the UConn SharePoint drive, the researchers developed the codebook, input the field notes, all interview recordings, transcriptions and images, and all analytical memos. Data sources for this paper derived from thirteen interviews across the UK and Anglophone Caribbean (Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados) and thirteen portraits to date. Each interview lasted between 45 and 60 minutes. Approximately twelve hours of data were collected across six months via online and face-to-face interviews.
Preliminary analysis of the digital illustrations and the corresponding interviews suggest several themes such as Hypervisibility of Race through Immigrant Diasporic Origin, Exceptionalism and Exoticism as well as Misogynoir and the Disposability of Black Femininity in the Academy. These intersectional renderings presented in this study are the artistic expressions of the participants to reflect the intersections of their race, gender and state of coloniality in the academy. Not only do these digital illustrations serve as a reflection of the participants, they illustrate strategies for support, mentorship, and self-care as resistance. This study centers Black women academic experiences providing a scholarly account for higher education institutions to better retain and support Black women academics. This comparative research study shares implications for retention strategies to address the intersectional erasure of Black women academics.

Authors

• Saran Stewart, University of Connecticut

• Stephanie Simpson, University of Connecticut