About this Mixtape (Journal)
BE offers authors and producers a continuous-publication format and global online distribution for their tracks. All works are professionally copyedited and typeset to ensure quality.
Producers who submit to BE include: Producers who want their tracks to receive free, broad, and global distribution on a powerful, highly discoverable bepress publishing platform; Producers who want their tracks to exist alongside works that study education from a Black perspective, & Producers who want thier articles to be open access instead of behind a paywall.
The Black Educology Mixtape "Journal" (BE) publishes “tracks”; Bonus Tracks, Community Voices (community-based commentary), Youth Speaks, and artwork from across the diaspora of Black educational liberation.
Tracks (Articles): The Black Educology Mixtape accepts tracks that are between 3,000-8,000 words (inclusive of references) utilizing APA citation style. We seek tracks that work toward collective action rooted in building, fighting, and dreaming in ways that disrupt, subvert, and destroy antiblackness in education. Diverse methodological and theoretical perspectives are encouraged. Authors collecting data must have an Institutional Review Board for the Protection of Human Subjects (IRBPHS) or other approval for the ethical collection of data. Authors must attest to honoring ethical standards to the ownership and creation of the work they present; this mixtape will not tolerate plagiarism in any form.
Bonus Tracks: No work ever exists in isolation. Each idea AND action is a budding fruit that was brought to life by the seeds of another's tree. We are all part of this sacred continuum. We’ve decided to incorporate bonus tracks to each mixtape as a nod to the amount of work and voices that we want to make space for. Bonus tracks aren’t expected to align with the call but add to the overall mixtape ethos as they are rooted in Black voices. These bonus tracks honor the interdependent nature of the issues this specific call seeks to address.
We’ve taken up the task of lifting every voice and making space. Some of the submissions we received for the call were words of wisdom, words of wonder, so moving that we had to create space for them beyond the theme of “Punished For Dreaming'' because their vocal impact COULD NOT be denied. a bonus track is NOT a B-side, it is not an up-and-coming back-up singer but a track that plays homage to the notion of a mixtape creating cognitive spaces full of caveats and wonder. Bonus tracks are also NOT a participation prize, they are words and sounds that demand their own publication. They are beats that had us tapping our feet. They are hooks that ring bells and sing out Black experiences of education.
Bonus tracks add to the overall experience of the mixtape and exist on their own. Ultimately, our mixtape strives to create a home for intellectuals, activists, educators, young people, and artists who actively attempt to transgress the boundaries of academic discourse through their offerings.
Community Voices: We are rooted in community as we work to water the seeds of our people. Our community IS the voice and experience behind our offerings. Without the communities that raised us, there would be no mixtape. There would be no rebellion against the detached dictates of modernity and the scholarly erasure of “objective science.”
We offer notes from the community for people who feel that their title of mother, cousin, brother, activist, OR artist does not have the authority to speak about the impact of education on Black people; but they do. We know nurses and dancers who think they need a PhD to join us in this space. They don’t. We want to learn firsthand about the challenges you face, the victories you’ve WON. We want to smell the brownies you baked for the school fair and what you did when the library tried to ban the Black books you donated. Most of all we want to hear from you.
It is because of our community that the beautiful complexities of Black life can seed, sprout, flower, and blossom in the soils of our ancestors, kinfolk, and relatives.
“To build community requires vigilant awareness of the work we must continually do to undermine all the socialization that leads us to behave in ways that perpetuate domination.”
― bell hooks, Teaching Community
Nuff said.
Notes from the Studio: Notes or commentary can be up to 1,000-2,500 words (exclusive of references) and pertain to engaged projects, Black liberatory practices, and abolitionism.
Youth Speaks: Young people need to write the world and we intend for Black Educology to be a space where they can do just that. Youth voices need to be heard. Not from the fold-up table with the plastic chairs, but from the big oak table with the white cloth.
There is an ancient African proverb that is a powerful AND present reminder that “until the story of the hunt is told by the lion, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” Young folks are too often preyed upon by a society that speaks for the youth instead of with the youth. Removing the hierarchical approach to academia by incorporating youth voices is exactly the type of disruption that makes our mixtape subversive.
We invite the youth to put their elbows up on the table so we can learn from them. The youth possess a hunger, a directness of experience that is sometimes overlooked because the elders are so obsessed with serving the old orders and allegiances. When the youth speaks, we listen with the same gravity as an ancestor. Youth Speaks is our attempt to share space and see youth perspectives as central to unpacking Blackness, Education, Ecology, and/or Action.
Artwork: Artists whose craft addresses Black education and liberation are encouraged to submit images, art, and zines that raise important considerations on Black education. If selected, Artists will be credited on the journal website.To submit: For information on how to submit, contact producers@blackeducology.org
