Tu eres mi otro yo/You Are My Other Me: An In-The-Flesh Ethic of Care Centering Body and Emotionality as Speaking Subjects Fostering Dignity, Interconnection, and Racialized Healing

ABSTRACT

New Mexico is comprised predominantly of People(s) of Color: 23 sovereign Indigenous nations, diverse Mexicana/o and Black communities, and African, Middle Eastern, and Asian immigrant and refugee groups. Recently, Yazzi/Martinez v. New Mexico (2018) found the state failing its constitutional mandate to equitably educate socioeconomically disadvantaged children, English Language Learners, Native American and Mexicana/o students, and children with disabilities. This research highlights the pedagogy of three diverse high school Ethnic Studies educators who teach predominantly low income youth of color. Findings reveal a life-giving, political In-the-Flesh Ethic of Care (IEC) infusing critical, culturally relevant ethics of care with pedagogies and epistemologies situated in the Brown and Black body. These educators’ IEC engages knowledge emanating from the enfleshed body and its emotionality in order to academically prepare and intellectually nourish multiethnic, multiracial students. Herein, body and emotionality are teacher/healers forging critical consciousness regarding sexism, queerphobia, anti-Indigenous, anti-African racism, and communing students as one collective.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1. We interchange Mexican American, Chicana/o (also spelled Xicana/o to honor Mexico’s Indigenous Peoples), and the geographically relevant term Mexicana/o to name a Spanish speaking people(s) of Indigenous, Spanish, and African ancestry formed within Spain’s sixteenth century conquest of Mexico and present-day Southwest (Acuña, 1988). The broader terms Hispanic and Latinx refer to all Spanish-speaking People(s).

2. Although we interchange Black/African American in line with participants’ self-identification, we privilege Black as a unifying term which transcends the US (Akbar, 2017).

3. In line with Chicana feminist land/body epistemologies, we interchange these terms.

4. Participants recognize the history of skin color and skin tone as touchstones of racialized colorism (Akbar, 2017); we honor and share this consciousness. Through an IEC, we likewise theoretically expand upon skin to include the flesh that provides an intimate mind/body/spirit/land-infused landscape of knowing that transcends what can be seen or interpreted (Cruz, 2012; Hurtado, 2003; Ohito, 2019).

5. Lee, Lee, 1960

6. We use italics when participants quote themselves within their data and quotations when they cite students.

7. Azuela, 1916.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mia Sosa-Provencio

Mia Sosa-Provencio is an associate professor at the University of New Mexico. Her research interests include critical ethics of care, especially regarding Mexican/Mexican American teachers and students, and student-centered organic curriculum and pedagogy in teacher education.

Magdalena Vázquez Dathe

Magdalena Vázquez Dathe is a PhD candidate in Educational Thought and Sociocultural Studies at the University of New Mexico. Her scholarly focus is on antiracist and critical models in education and pedagogies of transformation in formal and informal teaching/learning settings.

Omkulthoom Qassem

Omkulthoom Qassem is a high school educator at Health Leadership High School in Albuquerque, NM. She holds a Masters of Arts in Educational Thought and Sociocultural Studies from the University of New Mexico. She is deeply interested in critical education, transformational pedagogies, and social movements.