The Truth About Black Girls' Sexualities: Literacies, Love, and Sexualities Through an Endarkened Feminist Framework

• In Event: Fairmont Roundtable Session Seventeen
  In Roundtable Session: The Beauty of Black Diversity: Explorations of Language, Race, and Gender, Untold (Table 2)

Abstract

Narratives governing the sexualities of adolescent Black girls are pervasive with messages reminding them that they are objects to be desired and not girls deserving of love. In a year-long study with Black girls in a large Northeastern City, I found that they were redefining the narratives of their sexualities. Through an endarkened feminist lens—a way of understanding and engaging with the intersectional identities of Black women, I found that my participants were recipients and producers of knowledge. They used their literacies in the production of knowledge pushing back against ideals of Blackness that conflicted with their identities.

Author

• Donna-Marie Cole-Malott, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania
  Presenting Author