The Development of Black Girl Critical Literacies of Race, Gender, and Class in Independent Schools: Awareness, Agency, & Emotion
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University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2017 The Development Of Black Girl Critical Literacies Of Race, Gender, And Class In Independent Schools: Awareness, Agency, & Emotion Charlotte E. Jacobs University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Education Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, and the Psychology Commons Recommended Citation Jacobs, Charlotte E., "The Development Of Black Girl Critical Literacies Of Race, Gender, And Class In Independent Schools: Awareness, Agency, & Emotion" (2017). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 2356. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2356 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2356 For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Development Of Black Girl Critical Literacies Of Race, Gender, And Class In Independent Schools: Awareness, Agency, & Emotion Abstract This dissertation analyzes the agency that adolescent Black girls in independent schools use to craft their identities, and describes the particular competencies that they enact as they navigate encounters of race/ ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status within their daily school lives. Through the adoption of developmental, feminist, and critical pedagogy frameworks, this phenomenological study employs a grounded theory methodology and presents an emergent theory that describes the phenomenon of “Black girl critical literacies” when situated in the context of elite, predominantly White independent schools. I define Black girl critical literacies as the phenomenon in which Black girls use particular competencies to recognize, process, and respond to messages that they receive connected to their status as Black adolescent females in U.S. society while simultaneously crafting their own sense of their Black girl identities. Using weekly discussion groups grounded in critical feminist pedagogy and one-on-one interviews as the main sources of data, this dissertation serves two purposes: 1) it identifies and explores four different components that contribute to the development of Black girl critical literacies in independent schools: school culture, a developing critical consciousness, emotional literacy, and agency and activism; and 2) it analyzes how Black girls communicate the components of Black girl critical literacies to each other. The findings from this study contribute to the fields of education and gender studies and the disciplines of psychology, and sociology by offering a perspective on adolescent development, identity formation, and curriculum development that is infused with feminist and critical pedagogy frameworks. Specific ot education, the dissertation findings contribute ot the literature on how to support students of color in independent schools, and point to how affinity oupgr spaces can function as places for the critical consciousness development of adolescents. From a psychological perspective, the findings from this project deepen the literature on adolescent development and particularly highlight the identity development and construction of Black girls. In the sociological tradition and connected to the field of gender studies, my research contributes to the emerging field of Black girlhood studies by presenting how social structures of race, gender, and class function within particular sociocultural contexts. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Education First Advisor Howard C. Stevenson Keywords Adolescent Development, Black Girls, Identity Development, Independent Schools Subject Categories Education | Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies | Psychology This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2356 THE DEVELOPMENT OF BLACK GIRL CRITICAL LITERACIES OF RACE, GENDER, AND CLASS IN INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS: AWARENESS, AGENCY, & EMOTION Charlotte Jacobs A DISSERTATION In Education Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2017 Supervisor of Dissertation: _______________________________________ Howard C. Stevenson, Constance Clayton Professor of Urban Education; Professor of Africana Studies Graduate Group Chairperson: ______________________________________ J. Matthew Hartley, Professor of Education Dissertation Committee: Howard C. Stevenson, Constance Clayton Professor of Urban Education; Professor of Africana Studies Shaun R. Harper, Professor of Education Michael J. Nakkula, Practice Professor of Education Venus Evans-Winters, Associate Professor of Education, Illinois State University THE DEVELOPMENT OF BLACK GIRL CRITICAL LITERACIES OF RACE, GENDER, AND CLASS IN INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS: AWARENESS, AGENCY, & EMOTION COPYRIGHT 2017 Charlotte Jacobs This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3. iii DEDICATION I dedicate this work to the girls who were a part of the Black Girl Project. I am forever grateful for the faith and trust you had in me to share your stories with the world, and for your unwavering dedication to supporting the Black girl and Black woman community. You are my sheroes. In memory of Beverly Faye Canzater Jacobs, a woman whose fierce love, unconditional support, and never ending cheerleading for me to pursue my passions and my dreams made me the woman that I am today. I love you, Mom. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I am so thankful for the girls who made this dissertation project what it is. Every week you came to the girls’ group with open hearts and minds. I am grateful for your candidness in sharing your stories, realizations, and recommendations connected to being Black girls navigating through the worlds you live in. I am in awe of your strength, your leadership, your care for each other and the Black girls who come after you, your sense of humor, your commitment to equity and justice, and most of all, your brilliance. Black girls rock! To my esteemed dissertation committee of Dr. Howard Stevenson, Dr. Venus Evans-Winters, Dr. Shaun Harper, and Dr. Michael Nakkula, my deepest thank you for your guidance not only through the dissertation process, but also, more importantly, the advice you gave, support you provided, and the faith you showed in me throughout my doctoral career at Penn GSE. Thank you for always having open doors, for always keeping an eye out for opportunities that would help me to grow as a scholar, and for providing the reassurance that I sometimes needed to hear that I was on the right track. I am also grateful to my CSBGL colleagues and humbled by the six years of learning and growing that I got to do alongside each of you as we strategized how to make independent schools more equitable and inclusive spaces. Mike, Peter, Sharon, Joseph, Nicole, and Shannon, thank you for being my champions right from the beginning of when I sat in on my first CSBGL meeting. To be honest (as the girls are fond of saying), this dissertation would have never happened without the community of support I found in my doctoral student family. v Kelsey, thank you for being my critical friend who always was there to provide the “real talk” when I needed to hear it most. Katie, my academic life partner, thank you for always being there as a thought partner to figure out how we can best use our work, minds, and hearts to support the girls we care so much about. Michael K., thank you for always checking in, and for reminding me that life is about connections, caring, and relationships above all else. To my writing group friends over the years, and particularly in the final crunch of dissertation writing, thank you for always holding me accountable to showing up, getting some writing done, and feeling good about what I accomplished that day, no matter how big or small the task. To Nora, Briana, Andrés, Lan, and Rhiannon, thank you for always reminding me that there’s more to life than the dissertation, and for giving me the nudges I needed to go on a run, get to a happy hour, or enjoy dinner with friends. Lastly, but certainly not least, I am forever grateful to my family, framily, and friends who served as my rock throughout my time in graduate school. Your phone calls, text messages, care packages, and open invitations for visits carried me through the highs and lows of life, school, and everything in between. Steph, I can’t even begin to list the ways that you have been invaluable to my growth as a human being and success as a student. Thank you for always keeping me grounded, for taking care of me when I needed it, and for having your trusty red pen at the ready. I truly feel blessed to be loved so well and by so many people. vi ABSTRACT THE DEVELOPMENT OF BLACK GIRL CRITICAL LITERACIES OF RACE, GENDER, AND CLASS IN INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS: AWARENESS, AGENCY, & EMOTION Charlotte Jacobs Howard C. Stevenson This dissertation analyzes the agency that adolescent Black girls in independent schools use to craft their identities, and describes the particular competencies that they enact as they navigate encounters of race/ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status within their daily school lives. Through the adoption of developmental, feminist, and critical pedagogy frameworks, this phenomenological study employs a grounded theory