From With�In The Black Diamond: The Intersections of Masculinity, Ethnicity, and Identity�An Epistolary Autoethnographic Exploration into the Lived Experiences of a Black Male Graduate Student

Abstract

From With-In The Black Diamond: (Black Diamond) autoethnographically explores the lived experiences of a Black male who navigates his way through a predominately white higher education institutions while existing within marginalized spaces related to his gender, ethnicity, and identity. Black Diamond uses epistolary writing techniques to explore question research question: 1. How has a Black Gay male graduate student studying Higher Education negotiated his way to and through predominately white higher education institutions? In order to support the answering of this question I will argue that the most influential reasons higher education literature rarely addresses controversial topics related to GLBTQ college students’ are due to: (a) gender norms and masculine ideals; (b) ethnicity and cultural phenomena; (c) and the politics of identity and sexual orientation, as they are expressed at a PWI in the South. Higher education literature avoids studies that marvel the lived experiences of BGMCS in the South. These students’ truths, my own momentary truths, as it relates to achieving what success means to me which exploring my own interactions with other straight Black males are rare if not nonexistent. This avoidance is largely a result of homophobia in the Black community, which seeps into the campus culture at a PWI in the South.