Demystifying Myths: The Cultural Wealth of Latina Single Motherscholars

• In Event: Roundtable Session 38
  In Roundtable Session: Beyond Knowing the Motherscholar: Motherscholars Engaging in Self-Defining Motherscholarship

Abstract

Purpose

National statistics show that 16% of all undergraduate women are single mothers (American Council on Education, 2005); however, single mothers remain an unacknowledged student population in higher education. Nationally, nearly half of all parenting students enter college aspiring to earn a bachelors degree, yet only 7% succeed at the end of six years (NCES, 2002). The disparities in postsecondary attainment are further confounded for single parents when disaggregating by race. In the U.S., slightly more than half of all Latinas will have her first child before age 20 and 69% of Latina mothers leave high school (Manlove, 1998). The limited research on single parents in higher education has primarily sought to identify reasons for low persistence and attainment rates from deficit frameworks. This study takes an additive approach by focusing on the lived experiences of Latinas who successfully navigated their way to college. How does a Community Cultural Wealth framing inform us about how their established presence and voice contributes to educational settings and the advancement of knowledge?

Theoretical Perspectives

Delgado Bernal (1998) articulates a Chicana Feminist Epistemology as a way to honor our stories and introduces the concept of cultural intuition to inform our research process. As motherscholars, our cultural intuition is intimately shaped by our lived experiences as single, young, Chicana mothers/teachers/students in the midst of our doctoral program. We use our cultural intuition as a source of strength to produce research that speaks directly to our comadres/research participants. Utilizing a Community Cultural Wealth (Yosso, 2005) framework provides us with a lens to view the lived experiences of young Latina mothers as a resource in an effort to challenge dominant deficit narratives and create counter-narratives of resistance.

Methods & Data Sources

Testimonio offers a method that will allow las comadres to tell parts of their story through engaging processes of transformation, decolonization, and healing (Smith, 2001). Stories are how we make theories (Brayboy, 2006) and are a significant feature of a CRT methodology (Solórzano & Yosso, 2002). Holding race and its intersection with gender and class central to each phase of the research process is an attempt to conceptualize and realize a decolonizing approach to research. Eight comadres will share their testimonios as women who self identify as Latina, had their first child before age 24, and attended at least one year of higher education as a single parent.

Preliminary Results

We will analyze the testimonios through critical race grounded theory (Malagon, et al., 2009). This approach allows us to isolate thematic categories as they relate to a Community Cultural Wealth framework. Preliminary findings suggest the importance of navigational capital, resistant capital, and familial capital in the lives of las comadres.

Significance

The trajectory analyses provides insights into las comadres’ initial motivations; salient experiences that solidified their aspirations; the influence of significant individuals; and reveals a culminating outlook on the enablers of Latina single mothers educational success and how their perspective contributes to the redefinition and depth of knowledge production in higher education.

Authors

• Elexia Reyes McGovern, University of California - Los Angeles

• Felisha Herrera, University of California - Los Angeles