One area of identity that challenges dominant ideals of professional, neat, or appropriate appearance is Black hair. Although Black hair expression is frequent in media, politics, and pop culture, there still remains a perceived stigma surrounding its presence in positions and environments (e.g. tenure positions or predominantly White…

Tis paper examines the language, literacies, communicative, and rhetorical practices of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. The work pays attention to the communication practices of the BLM and Hip Hop generation in its extension of Black and African American language traditions and prior liberation movements in their unapologetic performance…

The influence of hip hop culture and music on African-American youth is profound and can be used as a tool to shape positive outcomes in education. Hip hop has been used effectively in the classroom to engage students and enhance their critical thinking (Gangloff-Bailey & Freeman, 2014). In addition, hip hop has been described as a socializer…

We explore the disconnect between education policy and culturally sustaining instruction, curriculum, discipline, and assessment for African American Language (AAL) Learners. Framing the omission of language policies as linguistic violence and anti-Black linguistic racism, we discuss antecedent and contemporary educational language policies and…

Contemporary African-American classical composers Cedric Adderley, John Lane, and Trevor Weston intertwine strands of culture and individual experience to produce musical works whose distinct designs offer cultural resources that music educators can use to integrate diversity into instructional settings. Of special interest is their ability to…

The Black kitchen table has long served as a meeting place for Black families to discuss, debate, and critique issues related to the Black struggle. In particular, it was common for Black kitchen table conversations to talk about the nuances of navigating systems of legalized segregation and oppression, as well--and more recently--navigating the…

The author explores the racial and cultural ideologies that inform what it means to be Black in the United States and how this mainstream framing of Blackness intersects with teacher preparedness to engage Black textual expressions in the classroom.

This article argues that multiculturalism, especially when it is led and controlled by Whites, and in the absence of collective anti-racist struggles, can reproduce the ontologies, epistemologies, and practices of white supremacy. I use a case study of a reenactment of Atlantic black slavery, produced by white teachers to investigate whether…

In this essay, Joyce King attempts to interrupt the calculus of human (un)worthiness and to repair the collective cultural amnesia that are legacies of slavery and that make it easy--hegemonically and dysconsciously--for the public to accept myths and media reports, such as those about the depravity of survivors of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans…

Past scholarship on immigrant racial and ethnic identity construction tends to ignore the processes by which social context influences identity at the individual level. In this qualitative study, Janet T. Awokoya presents a complex understanding of 1.5- and second-generation African immigrant youths' identities. Awokoya explores how three major…

Adults learn and develop in various contexts, which affect how they construct and reconstruct aspects of their identities. Such identity construction and reconstruction can occur through mediated or unmediated means. Within the context of this study, adult identity development through unmediated learning within digital spaces is analyzed. Specific…

This article explores how speculative civic literacies can support youth engagement in policy discourse in digital and analog contexts. We broaden the scope of civic literacies by emphasizing core principles of Afrofuturism and participatory culture. Articulating a specific framework for applying these principles to contemporary conceptions of…

Visionaries like W. E. B. Du Bois opened the door to possibility and opportunity for the next generations of African American artists. Among those who benefited from and contributed to this legacy are award-winning African American authors and illustrators who created works that celebrate Black children, equality, and diversity. These artists…

Background: African Americans have the highest age-adjusted rates of obesity at 48.1%. High rates of obesity contribute to the disproportionate share of chronic health conditions. In order to reduce these high rates and achieve health equity, intervention programs must address racial health disparities in culturally meaningful ways. Methods: The…

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ranks colorectal cancer (CRC) as the third most commonly diagnosed cancer among men in the United States; African American (AA) men are at even greater risk. The present study was from a larger study that investigates the church's role as a social marketer of CRC risk and prevention messages, and…