Exposure, Interruption, Elimination, Reconstruction

#SayHerName: Making Visible the t/Terrors Experienced by Black and Brown Girls and Women in Schools by Jeanine Staples and Uma Jayakumar, (eds.)
Occasional Paper Series 38, Bank Street College of Education, October 1, 2017

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We know from the opening lines of this important collection of essays that, in the reading of them, we will be changed. The editors bring us inside immediately, sharing their process and the guiding, essential questions that became the call for contributors to this special issue of the Bank Street Occasional Papers series. They asked for stories.  And they chose those that made visible some answers to these questions: How are Black and Brown girls and women labeled (as unintelligent, poor, fat, loud, wild, or “fast"— or as smart, pretty, quiet, sweet, palatable, or exceptional)? How are schooling and the people inside schools violent toward Black and Brown girls and women? The brief, critical essays that make up this collection are written by Black and Brown women scholars, educators and activists. Their narratives are grounded and informed accounts of lived experiences of violences, micro-and macro-aggressions, and marginalizations.  Their voices foster what the collection hopes to provoke – exposure, interruption, elimination, and reconstruction of systems of injustice and oppression.  With unusual boldness and exceptional care, the editors take us toward their final question: How do we challenge and destabilize white, patriarchal norms and values so that the onus is not on Black and Brown girls to adapt to systems of oppression? How can we enlist white people and people who can claim white privilege into this project?  There is depth in their answers.