Abstract:

Abstract While a growing tendency among researchers has been for the examination of diverse forms of discrimination against Afro-Caribbean immigrants within the United States (US), the types of ambiguities that these create for framing the personal and professional identities of Afro-Caribbean women academics who operate within that space remain relatively absent. The literature is also devoid of substantive explorations that delve into the ways and extent to which the cultural scripts of Afro-Caribbean women both constrain and enable their professional success in academe. The call therefore is for critical examinations that deepen, while extending existing examinations of the lived realities for Afro-Caribbean immigrants within the US, and, the specific trepidations that they both confront and overcome in the quest for academic success while in their host societies.  Using intersectionality as the overarching framework for this work, we demonstrate, through the use of narrative inquiry, the extent to which cultural constructions of difference nuance the social axes of power, the politics of space and identity, and professional outcomes of Afro-Caribbean immigrant women who operate within a given context. These are captured within our interrogation of the structures of power that they confront and their use of culture to fight against and to break through institutional politics.

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