Black Brilliance and Creative Problem Solving in Fugitive Spaces: Advancing the BlackCreate Framework Through a Systematic Review

Abstract

Traditional definitions and assessments of creativity often neglect to identify the complexity surrounding Black students’ brilliance, leading to lack of access and funding. Further, even when recognized, Black students are often funneled into programs that do not facilitate positive development of their racial-ethnic identity. Through our systematic review of 155 publications, we developed the BlackCreate Framework to illustrate how effective Black creative educational experiences (BCEEs) create fugitive spaces for creative expression and education. Within these spaces, both societal oppression and community assets are explicitly discussed as a part of the creative process, providing students methods for adaptive coping and for addressing systemic inequities. Given these findings, we advocate for consistent funding and support for fugitive spaces to promote Black students’ creativity.

“I rewrote their story and you can, too”: Black girls’ artistic freedom dreams to create new worlds

“…Art and storytelling should be used in the classroom to invent new futures and take action toward ensuring those futures, as they are critical elements of abolitionist teaching. As Mims et al (2022) warned, when using art, we cannot constrict Black art-making practices in rigid ways. Rather, we must invite them to engage in art-making practices that they gravitate toward.…”

“…As an example of this work in practice, Dando et al ( 2019) studied the ReMixing Wakanda Project, where students engaged in design practices to create medallions as an artifact that detailed their personal histories and then were put together to make a collective artifact. Additionally, in a systematic review of 155 publications, Mims et al (2022) found that research and practice often confines Black creativity and neglects Black brilliance. Thus, they call for more support for fugitive spaces that center creative expression and education, particularly because many of the spaces where Black children engaged in effective creative educational experiences were outside of traditional schooling spaces (Mims et al, 2022).…”

“…Additionally, in a systematic review of 155 publications, Mims et al (2022) found that research and practice often confines Black creativity and neglects Black brilliance. Thus, they call for more support for fugitive spaces that center creative expression and education, particularly because many of the spaces where Black children engaged in effective creative educational experiences were outside of traditional schooling spaces (Mims et al, 2022). To carry forth their framing of Black creative educational experiences and to explicitly be more inclusive of the many ways that Black girls express themselves, I use the term arts-based practices, rather than art.…”

(Re)setting the racial narrative: Antiblackness and educational censorship

“…Therefore, we amplify existing scholarship on Black fugitivity in education (Givens, 2021;Mims et al, 2022;Warren & Coles, 2020), specifically soliciting future researchers to be coconspirators working in partnership with Black people (Love, 2020) to develop fugitive spaces where the rich legacy of Black people and Black resistance are celebrated rather than denigrated. Stovall and Moseley (2023) remind us that Black fugitive spaces are about more than the absence of White people or anti-Black structures.…”

“Coming Together Educationally Creates a Bond Like No Other”: Exploring How Families Engage in Black History Home Learning

“…Named “Brilliant Joy in a Box,” the program was based on our previous research on joy (i.e., an emotion to support positive relationship development with the purpose of sustaining bonds and preparing children to face adversity; (Belsky et al, 1991; Fredrickson, 2004) and positive parenting practices, as well as ethnic-racial identity development among Black youth. We previously demonstrated that Black mothers taught their children to cope with frustrating situations in the future through joy and “freedom dreaming” (Mims et al, 2022), and that the messages parents conveyed about race in addition to how the child interpreted those messages in relation to their own identities were an important avenue for learning (Bocknek et al, 2020; Duane et al, 2020; Mims et al, 2022). We also found that positive parenting processes were not distinctly altered by systemic and external stress such as economic adversity or maternal psychopathology (Bocknek et al, 2020).…”