Muxerista Educational Journeys: A Mapping Portrait of Young Women of Color Across Los Angeles

• In Event: Conceptualizing Spatial Justice in Education: Creating, Navigating, and Surviving Racialized Space through Qualitative Inquiry

Abstract

Objectives
Students of color encounter hegemonic violence in their lives, in schooling sites, and also as they travel to and from school. Chicana and Black feminist scholars have noted how women of all ages move through the world with the awareness that our gendered position is unsafe and with the terrorism that comes with street harassment from men and agents of the state. (Anzaldua, 1987; Crenshaw, 1989; Collins, 1998; hooks, 2003; Lorde, 2007). Nevertheless, students cross from one country to the next or from one neighborhood to the next in order to access what are perceived as improved educational opportunities. The focus of this study is to identify how journeys across urban landscapes support the critical race consciousness development of young women of color. In addition, this paper explores how geospatial youth participatory action research (YPAR), which incorporates the use of geographic information systems (GIS) and mapmaking, shapes the educational experiences of young women of color.

Theoretical Framework
This layered study focuses on the Critical Race Spatial Analysis (Velez & Solórzano, 2017) framework to document the intersectional experiences of young women of color and determine how trajectories across urban landscapes are related to critical consciousness development (Freire, 2013) and the use of geospatial youth participatory action research. This study also builds from Chicana and Black feminist thought to situate women within a critical geography context and determine how women problematize their community conditions, understand the color line and take transformative action (Pulido, 2015; Solórzano & Delgado Bernal, 2001; Tuck, 2008; Vélez, 2017).

Methods
Methodologically, this study presents muxerista geospatial portraits of three young women of color collaborators who journeyed to high school from South-Central Los Angeles to Boyle Heights and completed a geospatial YPAR project. To recreate this journey, this paper merges muxerista portraiture (Flores, 2017) methodology and critical race spatial analysis (Velez & Solórzano, 2017) using document collection from the collaborators YPAR projects, and drive-along pláticas (Fierros & Delgado-Bernal, 2016). Ultimately, the mapping portraits in this study depict the critical consciousness development of the young women collaborators using methodologies developed by women of color.

Findings
As collaborators reflected on their experiences with YPAR and GIS and their urban journey, their reflections were visually displayed on a map to tell the story of how their critical race consciousness is problem-situated (Freire, 2013; Souto-Manning, 2010) and color line informed (Velez, 2017). This process contributed to transformative resistance (Solórzano & Delgado Bernal, 2001). Having a gendered racial spatial understanding of the ways in which white supremacy is layered onto the landscape, supports educators and students in the creation of knowledge that leads to liberatory change (Pulido, 2015).

Scholarly Significance
This study offers insight to practitioners and scholars interested in engaging in geospatial pedagogies towards racial justice curriculum development. Ultimately, the mapping portraits can be useful for critical educators, interested in engaging with their youth and pre-service teachers, how the spaces and lands we inhabit and traverse allow us to problematize our realities and work towards critical consciousness development.

Author

• Mariana E. Ramirez