Sister Circles: Why We Choose to Write Together

by Josie Gabi, Parise Carmichael-Murphy, Rianna Raymond-Williams, Michaela Campbell, Sabina Moyo, Eve Doran, and Amira Samatar

‘Why we choose to write together’, this piece is authored by a collective of seven Black women who engage in academic spaces. All our voices are present and our contributions are weaved together to share a collective message. Our writing does not symbolise one voice, but many voices that are interrelated and interconnected through mutual solidarity. 

We write authentically through solidarity; we come as we are and intend to bring our full selves into this space by writing our truths. We unpack, challenge and counteract discriminatory, harmful and violent narratives and discourses one sentence, story, action and conversation at a time.

We choose to author our own stories as part of our contribution to ‘knowledge’. We write ourselves into existence and author our stories as we (re)imagine and (re)claim them, refusing to accept that our ideas can only be legitimised once absorbed into the mainstream. We write together, resisting self-censorship and (re)claiming our stories and voices. Our stories frame our worldview and sharing them encourages us to meaningfully connect with others, form supportive relationships, and create a sense of community, whilst understanding how we think about ourselves and the world we inhabit. Writing together, we are strengthened and supported collectively as we foster a sense of security through belonging and mutual care. We need to move beyond binaries of insiders/outsiders; instead, we choose to actively participate in the creation of spaces where inclusion, representation, solidarity and compassion are centred. Appreciating our many differences, we recognise familiarity in our struggles to resist and exist in spaces that tell us we do not belong.

We look to interrupt the cycle of erasure and are firmly committed to dismantling systems that subjugate our own and others’ humanity. This includes, but of course is not limited to, academia and its practices that continue to disenfranchise those already marginalised within and beyond. As Black women in academia, we meet cultures of silencing and censorship, particularly when we share words, thoughts and speech. Embedded within the systems we are resisting, our location and positionality matter in knowledge production, particularly given that these systems have historically attempted to silence and erase our lived experience. We draw upon our abilities, resources and expertise by experience to explore ideas and concepts from multiple positionings, through a shared lens of togetherness. This is underpinned by an appreciation that each of our lived experiences are valuable.

We are afforded an opportunity to develop an understanding and awareness of how our voice(s) co-exist, critically interact, contradict and reinforce one another. When we write together, we move from the margins, willing to meet each other at the intersection of our identities. We expect to meet contradictions and welcome divergent ideas, but we try to approach these encounters with an ethic of care and respect for one another, which we seldom experience across academia. We recognise the many attempts to marginalise and minoritise Black women’s contributions and claims to knowledge in a system designed to oppress us. Still, we aspire to a culture of multivocality and plurality and recognise that this requires an openness to explore contradictions and a willingness to be contradicted. We try to be present along a shared journey of production, sharing and valuing knowledge(s) together.

For us, the assumption that we should separate our lived realities from the knowledge(s) we produce, would mean removing parts of ourselves - something we are not willing to do. The delegitimising and undervaluing of Black women’s epistemologies, histories, experiences have long been established in an ethnocentric society. This further perpetuates images and stereotypes of Black women that paint us as a monolith and attempt to deny us the right to embody the full spectrum of our humanity. We arrive in all shades of complexity and nuance and will continue to reject hegemonic narratives that try to box in our intellect and bodies, as well as our ways of knowing and being. We are willing to speak, listen, write, and read to and with each other, respecting that our truth(s) look, sound, and feel different.

We recognise agency in our collective voice as a tool of disruption. We will be transparent and honest about our strategies and will always acknowledge why we look to produce academic publications, blogs, and community resources. We hope to generate and cultivate spaces where we can do this authentically and to subvert attempts to gatekeep our thoughts, intentions, actions and impact. However, we do accept that a certain ‘weight’ is afforded to putting thoughts and words onto paper and refuse for our silence to be taken as a sign of acceptance to the value placed on our language and knowledge(s) in academic spaces. Still, we want to do more than sharing only our experiences but to make conscious efforts toward progressive change.

For us, writing together is a form of social activism; we refuse to be complicit in our own oppression, but work from a radical liberatory praxis and regard our writing together as a deliberate act to subvert attempts to make Black women invisible and inaudible. We connect as Black women who occupy some of the same physical and symbolic spaces across the academy, our localities, and wider society; recognising our shared experiences and celebrating our differences. Although we may share similar experiences with Black women in academia and wider society, we seek not to speak for all. In academia, a hegemonic culture tries to push us to take solo credit for ‘our’ work, but we appreciate our collective contributions as a community. A culture of individuality tries to tell us that if we want to go far, we must go alone, but this is an untruth - together, we go further. We write collectively and intentionally as a means of care, our contributions, both verbal and written, are underpinned by a spirit of resistance that allows us to take up space in space(s) so that we can and will be seen, heard and valued. 

Biographies:

- Dr Josie Gabi is a senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, you find her on Twitter @DrJosieGabi

- Parise Carmichael-Murphy is a PhD Education student at the University of Manchester, you can find her on Twitter @Parise_CM

- Rianna is a writer, researcher and social entrepreneur from East London. She is currently in the first year of her PhD at Glasgow Caledonian University in London where she intends to explore how Black women make sense of their sexual identity in the UK. She occasionally tweets via @Ree_Speaks2.

- Michaela Campbel is an optimistic soul and a part-time doctoral researcher, exploring the lived experience of Black and Mixed race children living in domestic abuse refuges. Her research is a form of social activism and aims to make a substantive contribution in an area which is under researched, you can find her on Twitter @serendiptysoul

- Eve Doran is an educator, researcher, writer and activist, you can find her on twitter @evedoran_

- Amira Samatar is a postgraduate researcher in Education and an associate at MA Education consultancy, you can find her on Twitter @AmiraEd1

Sabina Moyo is PhD student at Manchester Metropolitan University researching Black women in higher education. Sabina is also a psychology teacher, EDI lead and antiracist activist.

Twitter: essmoyo_pgr

IMAGE CREDIT:

Artwork by Zoe and Eve Doran