“I can’t just keep talking about the men”: Black girl resistance in a history classroom

ABSTRACT

Drawing from Black Feminist Thought and Black Girl Cartography the author uses the domain-of-power framework to analyze the Black Girl Charting practices of Cierra, a Black girl student navigating racial history in a secondary classroom in the United States. She encounters the physical space as a site of interpersonal oppression and the U.S. history curriculum as a space of cultural, hegemonic domination. Most importantly, she resists those constraints with her reframing of Blackness, women, and youth through her coursework. After examining Cierra’s essay, presentation, exchange with the principal, and responses to interview questions, the author reimagines the focal conversation as a pathway to empowering learning. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of the study for Black feminist pedagogy and abolitionist teaching in K-12 education, teacher education, and education research.

KEYWORDS:

• Black feminist thought
• black girl cartography
• Black girl
• racial history
• history education
• secondary classroom

Acknowledgments

My deepest gratitude to my sister-scholar Dr. Kristen Duncan for her encouragement and insights about the earliest drafts of this manuscript. Many thanks to the anonymous reviewers whose feedback helped me refine my writing. Most importantly, my greatest appreciation and admiration goes to “Cierra,” without whom this piece would not exist.

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1. I recognize that for readers outside the United States, these terms may not be immediately understood. Kindergarten marks the beginning of primary schooling and precedes first grade. Students typically begin kindergarten when they are five years old. Grade 12 typically marks the end of secondary schooling.

2. All actual names of people, places, and institutions are masked with pseudonyms.