Toward an ethical Black men’s feminism

Abstract

Rejecting the objectivity that is privileged in contemporary education and social science research, analyses of subjectivity and the self are central to Black feminist research. I take up this attention to subjectivity in an effort to consider men’s engagement with feminisms. Specifically, I am interested in how Black men responsibly and ethically participate in the work of Black feminisms. To do so, I interrogate readings of Black masculinity through Black feminist auto/ethnography. I expound on a methodological intervention that I term limbos in the wake with respect to the gendered privileges inherited by Black cisgender men.

Keywords:

• Black feminism
• masculinity
• ethics
• autoethnography

Notes

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The flier from the public forum read as follows: In the wake of the killing of Michael Brown and the continued uprisings in Ferguson as well as others unpublicized, the purpose of this town hall is to examine the creative potential of this moment. Structured as a working session, this event intends to offer insights into this particular moment in the United States, while brainstorming what we (as individuals within higher education) can do to actively engage in and shape this moment.

2 Deep sightings and rescue missions: Fiction, essays and conversations, is a collection of Toni Cade Bambara’s writings organized by Toni Morrison.

3 The use of limbo in this title references Joy James' (1999) notion of limbos in her text Shadowboxing: Representations of Black feminist politics. The use of wake in this title borrows from Christina Sharpe's (2016) text: In the wake: On blackness and being.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Wilson Kwamogi Okello

Wilson Kwamogi Okello, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Leadership at the University of North Carolina Wilmington where he teaches in the Higher Education program. Bridging the scholar-artist divide, his research draws on Black feminist theories to think about the relationship between history, the body, and epistemology; racial violence and stress in educational contexts; and anti-deficit curriculum and pedagogical praxis. His work is published in venues such as the Journal of College Student Development, the Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy, and the Review of Higher Education.