Transformative Learning and Black Spirituality

The braid of transformative learning, spirituality, and creativity: The impetus to create as well as critique

“…This is because such perspectives foreground race, where TL is more general. Perhaps the recent discussions of Black spirituality and TL (Miller & Watkins, 2022) along with the insights of scholars such as hooks, Dillard, Tolliver, Johnson‐Bailey, Alfred, and Byrd might serve to “endarken” TL.…”

“…Johnson‐Bailey and Alfred (2006) make similar arguments about courage and hope and standing up in the face of oppression to facilitate transformative learning, though they do not explicitly talk about spirituality. Miller and Watkins (2022) also recently discussed how this sense of Black spirituality, again grounded in culturally relevant models of spirituality, is central to the lives of many who are informed particularly by the Black church which was central to the Civil Rights Movement…”

“…Johnson-Bailey and Alfred (2006) make similar arguments about courage and hope and standing up in the face of oppression to facilitate transformative learning, though they do not explicitly talk about spirituality. Miller and Watkins (2022) also recently discussed how this sense of Black spirituality, again grounded in culturally relevant models of spirituality, is central to the lives of many who are informed particularly by the Black church which was central to the Civil Rights Movement Transformative learning has generally been critiqued as being grounded in the experiences and theories of those who are white. While Taylor (2008) did discuss a race centric perspective of TL, and Johnson-Bailey and Alfred (2006) took up discussion on this.…”