"SHE WILL TELL ME THE TRUTH": Listening to Black Girls Co-Organizing Liberatory Spaces
White, Maya
Citations
Abstract
The purpose of this study explores the process of co-organizing a youth program for and with Black and/or African-American identified girls age 11-14 years old in a program, Girls of Atlanta. In the light of the deficit silencing and stigmatizing of Black girls and their girlhood, youth development programs for Black girls are typically sought out by parents and girls to engage in a social, academic, and/or recreational space centering Black girls and their girlhood experience. The current thesis evaluates how Black girls in Girls of Atlanta responded to co-organizing the space. The study centers Black girl voices in the organizational process of youth programming, analyzes the barriers that arise in the implementation of the program, and also covers the intervention of COVID-19 pandemic on a Black girl after-school program. The thesis concludes with implications for community advocates establishing and designing programs for Black girls to cultivate agency and focus on liberation.