Extract

The Evolution of a Dual Identity as an Emerging Black Female and Scholar

TUWANA T. WINGFIELD

As an emerging Black female scholar, I feel that it is important to reflect on how my identity evolved and what factors contributed to the woman that I have become. Cynthia Dillard’s work on honoring the cultural ontological and epistemological research of people of color through the lens of Black feminism is essential to unpack how I view myself within the context of social, historical, and political oppressions that African Americans have experienced in this country (Dillard, 2000, 2008a, 2008b). Dillard (2000) introduces a new theoretical framework, called an endarkened feminist epistemology, to counter the hegemonic dominant research paradigms of White Europeans. Simply put, an endarkened feminist epistemology, rooted in Black feminism, is a way of honoring the historical and cultural contributions of African American women at the intersection of the construction of race/class/gender (Dillard, 2000). In this chapter, I will use the works of feminist writers such as Patricia Hill-Collins (1991), Cynthia Dillard (2000, 2008a, 2008b), bell hooks (2000), Deborah King (1988), Audre Lorde (1984), and Venus Evans-Winters (2011) to reflect on my lived experience and how those experiences shaped who I once was, who I am, and who I have yet to become (Dillard, 2008a). Telling my story will hopefully help other young African American women understand their lived experience and also contribute to the ongoing discussion of Black feminism and its use in educational research to explain...