Dr Deborah Gabriel: My Positionality Statement
Lived Experience
My positionality as a researcher is shaped by my personal, professional, and educational experiences as a Black British woman. From secondary to higher education, and within academia, my experiences have been characterised by a determination to overcome structural inequalities related to race, class, and gender that have manifested in my day-to-day experiences. I have endeavoured to develop critical understandings of these intersectional inequalities. In so doing, both the learning process and the knowledge gained through critical reflection and scholarship, have become routes to self-empowerment. These experiences also serve to create a strong motivation, not solely to improve my individual circumstances, but to contribute to meaningful change, especially for other Black women and women of colour. Thus, the raced and gendered inequalities I have experienced throughout my life motivate my research interests in equity and social justice.
Conceptual Framework
I first engaged in Black feminist scholarship in the final year of my bachelor’s degree in journalism studies in 2007, when I undertook a module titled Ethnicity, Women, and the Media. Through Black feminism, I found a sense of belonging and worth, and an ideological space where my experiences are centred, in contrast to being marginalised. Black feminism not only helps me make sense of my experiences but also provides the intellectual tools for critical analysis. Black feminism inspired my passion for research as an undergraduate student. In undertaking my dissertation on colourism, I engaged with the work of Black female scholars including (Golden, 2004; hooks, 1981; Hunter, 2005), inspiring an interest in wider reading. My engagement with Black feminist scholarship led to the realisation that it is not merely a standpoint through which to critically reflect and interpret the experiences of Black women, but also a conceptual framework for analysing the experiences of Black people more broadly, in a way that illuminates gender and other intersectional inequalities. Subsequently, when I undertook my doctoral thesis on Black bloggers and counterhegemonic practice in the UK (Gabriel, 2014), Black feminism was one of the key theoretical lenses I drew on.
Research Interests and Research Paradigms
My research interests are interdisciplinary and broadly focused on education and social justice, transformative pedagogies, the dynamics of race, gender and culture, and the relationships between race, power, privilege, and inequality. These interests are heavily influenced by my lived experience and the conceptual approaches I have adopted for undergraduate and postgraduate studies. As a Black feminist, I view the world through critical and interpretative paradigms that posit reality is subjective, socially constructed, and shaped by socio-cultural, political, economic, racial, and ethnic values (Collins, 1990). Black feminist intellectual thought is grounded in Black feminist epistemology, meaning that our subjective reality is our truth, since our knowledge is constructed through our interpretations of our lived experience as Black women. Moreover, a Black feminist ontology reflects our consciousness as Black women of our complex, intersectional experiences of oppression based on race, gender, class, and other facets of identity (Collins, 1990; hooks, 1981).
Professional Background
My teaching philosophy as an educator is grounded in my commitment to equity and social justice and the belief that higher education has an important role to play in creating fairer societies. Whether I am delivering a lecture, seminar, or workshop, I integrate critical perspectives at the intersection of race, ethnicity, culture, identity, and representation into the curriculum or training agenda. My educational practice is focused on shaping individuals’ critical thinking, intellectual knowledge, and social awareness. My primary aim is to facilitate deep learning and promote agency to inspire transformative actions.
In summarising, my positionality embodies my personal and professional interests and experiences, values, and beliefs, and it shapes my behaviours, decisions, and actions.
References Cited
Collins, P. H.1990. Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness and the Politics of Empowerment. New York: Unwin Hyman.
Gabriel, D. 2020. Transforming the Ivory Tower: Models for Gender Equality and Social Justice. London: UCL Press
Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds). 2017. Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour Surviving and Thriving in British Academia. London: Trentham Books.
Gabriel, D. 2014. Blogging While Black and British: An Exploratory Study on the Use of Blogs as Social, Cultural and Counterhegemonic Practice. (unpublished PhD Thesis), University of Salford, Salford.
Golden, M. 2004. Don’t Play in the Sun: One Woman’s Journey Through the Color Complex; USA: Doubleday.
Holmes, A.G.D., 2020. Researcher Positionality: A Consideration of Its Influence and Place in Qualitative Research-A New Researcher Guide. Shanlax International Journal of Education, 8(4), pp.1-10.
hooks, b .1981. Ain’t I A Woman: Black Women and Feminism; London: Pluto
Hunter M. 2005. Race, Gender & the Politics of Skin Tone; London: Routledge