Panel 19: Racial Identity, Healing, and Critical Conversations

Panel 19: Racial Identity and Healing, Critical Conversations, and Family Histories
Moderator: Mr. Cary Goodman
Gabrielle Kubi, ““Growing With Each Other”: Cultivating Reciprocations of Care through a Critical Conversation Space Curriculum” (Eden G. Harrison, Mara Johnson, Saron Fantahun, Jamaal S. Matthews also contributed to this project.)
Education literature has called for critical conversation spaces (CCSs; affinity groups facilitated by and for Black girls with scaffolding from Black woman educators) to be embedded within the school day. However, school misogynoir intensifies and sustains personnel constraints that prevent the realization of this need. To address this issue, we piloted a within-school CCS curriculum. Upon its success, we expanded the CCS by including additional facilitators, six Black woman undergraduate/master’s students enrolled in a community-engaged course centering Black girls’ and women’s psychoeducational experiences. This course, led by the first author, provided students the epistemological and practical training necessary to facilitate CCSs, helping to ameliorate the constraints schools may have in finding available, willing, and trained personnel to lead these spaces. The present study documents their semester-long training and fieldwork. We ask: How and what do student facilitators learn about care during the facilitation of a CCS curriculum? To investigate this question, we analyzed students’ post-fieldwork video reflections using Listening Guide approaches and developed themes pertaining to trust, respect, support, self-esteem, and accountability. This work aims to privilege Black girls’ and women’s communal healing and care, particularly as a form of resistance to misogynoir.
Sosna Marshet; Kenna D. Yadeta MPH; Shawn Jones, PhD, “Racial Experiences and Racial Identity: Experiences of “New” African Americans in the United States”
This research investigates how experiences of racism are related to the development of racial identity among Black immigrants, shedding light on a critical yet often overlooked aspect of identity formation. Using the Multidimensional Inventory of Black Identity (MIBI) and the Racism and Life Experience Scale (RaLES), the study uncovers significant correlations between encounters with racism, centrality, and nationalist ideology within the MIBI. Generational disparities in these correlations are also explored, offering valuable insights into the complexities of racial identity across different immigrant generations. This research advances our understanding of the intricate dynamics at play in racial identity development and lays a crucial foundation for future studies in this domain. This study resonates with the symposium's theme, "Taking Our Time: Healing Through Black History, Family, and Communities," by acknowledging the resilience and struggles of "new" African Americans. By examining how racial experiences shape their identity, this research calls for a more inclusive and empathetic society. One that recognizes and values the experiences of all members, regardless of their immigration background. This study implores us to continue the conversation and research on the experiences of "New" African Americans.
Dr. Janise Parker, “Reflections from a Community-Centered Racial Healing Course”
Key tenets of healing-centered practices include, (a) targeting oppression at both the structural and individual levels; (b) recognizing the historical nature of oppression and racism; (c) building upon the cultural knowledge and historical wisdom of people of color; (d) providing participants new tools/strategies to organize change and move toward freedom; (e) making information accessible to community members; and (f) involving community members in the process of knowledge creation. Much of this work has focused on efforts in K-12 settings or at the individual level through mental health therapy. However, public health officials and scholars alike emphasize the need for population- and community-based efforts that target large groups in society, given the pervasive and widespread effects of racism and oppression. The goal of this presentation is share findings from the pilot phase of an online microcourse developed in partnership with the Bray School Lab, W&M School of Education (SOE), and Office of Strategic Cultural Partnerships (SCP). Overall, the course is designed to foster critical reflection and motivation for civic action to help mitigate contributors to systemic oppression in educational contexts and youth serving institutions, while promoting racial healing among people of color.