Teaching Decolonial Research Methodology from a Student-Centered Radical Black Feminist Orientation

Abstract

In this chapter I analyze my experiences of centering women and Black and Brown communities over a 25-year career as a professor teaching decolonial research methodologies from a student-centered radical Black feminist orientation. Here, I seek to examine ways to bridge the gap created by the disciplinary exclusions of the voices and contributions of the communities our students come from, and namely the exclusion of African and Africana women scholars. I argue for and provide examples of a culturally responsive pedagogy that inspires Black students, and Black women students in particular. Whereas western scholarship and teaching have often worked to disempower marginalized populations and have been an integral part of colonizing strategies, my career-long project seeks to decolonize research and teaching by initiating a sea-change in how we engage our students’ scholarly imagination. Central to this change is the requirement to engage the work of women scholars from students’ communities. In my chapter, I address developing and sustaining students’ decolonial perspectives, and how teaching research methodologies in culturally responsive ways can help our students understand our social worlds and work toward creating a new liberating one. Drawing from my previous work, I identify epistemological differences to distinguish mainstream and decolonial approaches (Zerai and Banks, 2002; Zerai et al., 2016) and explain how a Black feminist orientation has guided my teaching practice and helped my students to discover and value their unique academic voice.