Research indicates that the experiences of Black women educators involve racist and sexist practices by colleagues and students, as well as feelings of isolation, discrimination, and tokenism. Scholars further caution that being marginalized in intersections of race, class, gender, sexuality, and/or citizenship places a variety of well-meaning intellectuals engaged in higher education in common border zones, or "outsider-within locations." While teaching and leading as an outsider, scholars also affirm the conscious effort by women of color to reject the status of victim that is an effect of multiple oppressions. Their resilience to continue to change people's understandings about themselves, others and the world, despite simultaneous and multiple oppressions is seen in their teaching practices, in their efforts as leaders, and in their active participation in the construction of enduring life stories.
This special issue includes a collection of articles about Black women educators who have fought oppressions through their experiences as leaders, pedagogues, and scholars. Articles are written in various perspectives and survey personal and professional lived experience, highlighting stories of the past as well as of the present.
Elizabeth Davenport's article, "Telling stories: Examining the views of an African-centered female minority leader" , explores the beliefs of an African-centered educator as she uses her own African-centered model to empower students in urban schools.
In their article, "Black women teacher educators: Creating enduring afriographies as leaders and change makers," Djanna Hill-Brisbane and Jeannine Dingus explore the perspectives, experiences, and practices of Black women teacher educators as leaders and change makers.
Karen Johnson examines Anna Julia Cooper's role as an educational leader as well as her philosophical views on education, in her article entitled: "The educational leadership of Anna Julia Haywood Cooper."
Tondra Loder, Michelle Sims, Angela Coker, Loucrecia Collins, Michael Brooks, Deborah Voltz, and Charles Calhoun draw attention to the experiences of African American women and men in the academy in their article, "On Becoming and Being Faculty-Leaders in Urban Education and Also Being African American...Seems Promising."
In her article entitled, "Finding my voice: An African-American female professor at a predominantly White university," Aretha Faye Marbley draws from her personal experience and shares concrete examples from her promotion and tenure review, including the experience of social integration issues and the ramifications that the higher education environment had on her personal and professional attitudes as an African American female faculty member.
Juanita Cleaver Simmons wrote from the experiential and theoretical perspectives that she encountered as a Black female public school educator who, after twenty-plus years of public school teaching and administrative experiences, became an assistant professor at a predominately White research university, in her article entitled, "Life notes about the dual careers of a Black female: Race and gender politics in public school administration and higher education professorship."
As we focus on Black women leaders, this special issue also includes those who may not have been university professors, yet made significant contributions in education. Mack Hine and Diane Reed's article, "Educating for Social Justice: The Life and Times of Septima Clark in Review," draws attention to Septima Clark's (1898-1987) endeavors of teaching for social justice.