Browsing by Author "Seniors, Paula"
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- Claudette Colvin, Mary Louise Smith: Excavating Black Girls HistorySeniors, Paula (The Association for the Study of African American Life and History, 2022-09-01)In Montgomery, Alabama in 1955 fifteen-year old Claudette Colvin and eighteen year old Mary Louise Smith on separate occasions refused to stand up so that a white supremacist women could take their bus seats. This lesson looks at how Colvin and Smith initiated the Montgomery Bus Boycott. I explore why these girls faced erasure from the historical record. I look at Montgomery’s Black Elite and the cities National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s role in their erasure. This lesson works to Excavate the Black Girls History of Claudette Colvin and Mary Louise Smith. This lesson is designed for eighth to 12th grade students.
- Developing White Teachers' Sociocultural Consciousness Through African American Children's Literature: A Case Study of Three Elementary EducatorsCatherwood, Lauren Elizabeth (Virginia Tech, 2015-12-08)Changing the existing framework for how schools operate and the "deficit frame of reference" for students of color begins with teacher awareness of differing social and cultural norms and values that privilege some and oppress others (Villegas and Lucas, 2002). These normalized cultural values are exacerbated by the fact that they are generally "invisible" to the white teacher majority. Quaye (2012) and Zuniga et al. (2002) use the term "consciousness-raising" to describe the process of developing an awareness of these norms and values. Using a Critical Race Theory lens, this study aimed to capture the process of "consciousness-raising" in a white teacher book club examining ten different African American children's picture books. The study design was supported by an Intergroup Dialogue model, developed by Zuniga et al. (2002) and adapted for white facilitators by Quaye (2012). Data Analysis was guided by a continuum of white racial identity developed by Helms (1990) and modified by Lawrence and Tatum (1998). Transcripts of participant narratives were analyzed for signs of status change along the continuum and each teacher demonstrated varying degrees of socio-cultural awareness. The researcher journal was analyzed to capture reflections on the Intergroup Dialogue Model for facilitation. Principal findings of the study include the replication of themes found in the existing whiteness literature as well as the value and limitations of the continuum of white racial identity as a tool for analysis.
- Examining Workplace Discrimination in a Discrimination-Free EnvironmentBraxton, Shawn Lamont (Virginia Tech, 2010-12-17)The purpose of this study is to explore how racial and gender discrimination is reproduced in concrete workplace settings even when anti-discrimination policies are present, and to understand the various reactions utilized by those who commonly experience it. I have selected a particular medical center, henceforth referred to by a pseudonym, “The Bliley Medical Center” as my case study. In order to examine the gaps between the normative component instituted to regulate human behavior and the behavioral component in a workplace setting, I will employ critical race theory and feminist theories of intersectionality. The works of critics such as Delgado and Stefancic, Patricia Williams, and Patricia Hill Collins, among others, foreground the utility of storytelling as a means to 1) understand the gaps between formal policies and organizational behavior, 2) call attention to the experiential knowledge and evidence that is traditionally excluded in discrimination cases, and (3) to explain how formal anti-discrimination policies can actually be used to legitimize discrimination. Based on the results of this case study, we can conclude that an alternative interactionist, critical race, and intersectional approach is especially needed in terms of calling attention to traditionally ignored social processes that aid in the reproduction of workplace inequality in concrete workplace settings, thus expanding the current workplace discrimination scholarship.
- The Experiences of African-American Males on Multiracial Student Teams in EngineeringCross, Kelly J. (Virginia Tech, 2015-06-15)Team projects in engineering are critical sites for professional and personal development as students interact with peers and faculty on projects designed to simulate engineering work. These projects allow students to try on professional roles and establish a sense of identity within their field, which in turn influences their retention through college and into engineering careers. However, team projects can present challenges specific to students from underrepresented populations. While research on women's team experiences is strong, few researchers have studied African-Americans. To fill this gap, the current study explores the experiences of African-American males on multiracial student teams and the impact of those teams on these students' identities. This qualitative study employed a phenomenological approach, using a three-interview sequence with eight African-American male engineering students as they worked on team projects at a predominantly white institution (PWI). The interviews gathered background information about each participant, explored the team functionality during the project, and enabled participants to reflect on the team experience. Two theoretical frameworks were considered during the study design: 1) intergroup contact theory provided a lens to explore interracial interactions, and 2) multiple identities provided a lens to analyze the impact of team dynamics on students' intersecting identities. The findings provide a rich understanding of the team experiences of African-American male students that can enhance project-based teaching within engineering to more explicitly attend to team dynamics, including interracial interactions for students of color. Both positive and negative impacts on African-American males in engineering emerged from the intergroup contact within the team environment. Specifically, the results indicate that these participants enjoyed their multiracial student teaming experiences, supported by informal social interactions among team members and generally positive professional interactions. However, the study participants also entered their team experiences fully aware of the negative stereotypes about African-Americans in engineering and proactively worked to dispel those stereotypes.
- Passing: Intersections of Race, Gender, Sexuality and ClassVolk, Dana Christine (Virginia Tech, 2017-07-26)African American Literature in the 20th century engaged many social and racial issues that mainstream white America marginalized during the pre-civil rights era through the use of rhetoric, setting, plot, narrative, and characterization. The use of passing fostered an outlet for many light-skinned men and women for inclusion. This trope also allowed for a closer investigation of the racial division in the United States during the 20th century. These issues included questions of the color line, or more specifically, how light-skinned men and women passed as white to obtain elevated economic and social status. Secondary issues in these earlier passing novels included gender and sexuality, raising questions as to whether these too existed as fixed identities in society. As such, the phenomenon of passing illustrates not just issues associated with the color line, but also social, economic, and gender structure within society. Human beings exist in a matrix, and as such, passing is not plausible if viewed solely as a process occurring within only one of these social constructs, but, rather, insists upon a viewpoint of an intersectional construct of social fluidity itself. This paper will re-theorize passing from a description solely concerning racial movements into a theory that explores passing as an intersectional understanding of gender, sexuality, race, and class. This paper will focus on contemporary cultural products (e.g., novels) of passing that challenge the traditional notion of passing and focus on an intersectional linkage between race, gender, sexuality, and class.
- Recovering Paul RobesonSeniors, Paula (ASALH Press, 2022-08-31)This lesson will recover the history of Paul Robeson and provide teachers with culturally responsive resources, activities, and innovative educational approaches to teaching. In teaching the life of Paul Robeson I use historical analysis and use his Here I Stand to teach his biographical background and his ideology concerning human rights. This lesson utilizes historical methods and texts including Nell Painter’s “Cold War, Civil Rights” to teach about the McCarthy Era/The Red Scare and Robeson’s historical milieu. I have students conduct a sociology of art analysis of Nikolas Muray’s “Nude Kneeling,” (1926) to discuss Robeson as a Hyper Masculine African American Übermensch. I also teach students music and textual analysis by listening to Robeson from Songs of Free Men. We also watch film clips from Song of Freedom (1936) and Big Fella (1937). These all work to illustrate Robeson’s career and stardom. This lesson also uses Lynn Nottage’s Crumbs from the Table of Joy, scene three which students stage and perform. The play teaches students U.S. governments conflation of civil rights activism with communism, the fear this era instilled in people and the era’s effect on everyday African Americans like the family in the play and Robeson.
- "You Can't Put People In One Category Without Any Shades of Gray:" A Study of Native American, Black, Asian, Latino/a and White Multiracial IdentityBurgess, Melissa Faye (Virginia Tech, 2011-05-02)This study seeks to explore variations in the development of racial identities for multiracial Virginians in the 21st century by focusing on the roles that physical appearance, group associations and social networks, family and region play in the process. Simultaneously, this study seeks to explore the presence of autonomy in the racial identity development process. Using Michael Omi and Howard Winant's racial formation theory as the framework, I argue that a racial project termed biracialism, defined as the increase in the levels of autonomy in self identification, holds the potential to contribute to transformations in racial understandings in U.S. society by opposing imposed racial categorization. Through the process of conducting and analyzing semistructured interviews with mixed-race Virginia Tech students I conclude that variations do exist in the identities they develop and that the process of identity development is significantly affected by the factors of physical appearance, group associations and social networks, family and region. Furthermore, I find that while some individuals display racial autonomy, others find themselves negotiating between their self-images and society's perceptions or do not display it at all. In addition to these conclusions, the issues of acknowledging racism, the prevalence of whiteness, assimilation and socialization also emerged as contributors to the identity development process for the multiracial population.