Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Date of Degree

6-2026

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Program

Women's and Gender Studies

Advisor

Nathalie Etoke

Subject Categories

Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies | Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies

Keywords

CUNY, Audre Lorde, June Jordan, Black feminism, Higher Education, Pedagogy

Abstract

In this paper, I center the University as one site for radical pedagogy towards social justice.  This paper examines texts written on anti-racist, anti-sexist educational movements within the City University of New York, as well as archival materials from CUNY professors on the topic of radical, social justice-oriented learning. Conor Tomás Reed’s 2023 book New York Liberation School is one recent text on how CUNY activists dismantled the distinction between the University and its surrounding community, inextricably linking academic work with social-political activism. I take his extensive history of CUNY in tandem with various pedagogies developed by CUNY feminist educators across decades (June Jordan's Life Studies, Audre Lorde’s expansive and non-traditional syllabi, Rosa Rivera-McCutchen's Radical Care, etc.) to suggest strategies for remaking higher education in ways that actually serve students’ lives. The CUNY archives are living documents of anti-racist, anti-sexist, anti-imperial, and anti-colonial education and action. My research provides analyses of past and present CUNY praxes, based in Black feminisms, as well as strategies to address the urgent struggles faced by academic activists today. Freedom starts with embracing difference, building solidarity across identities, and reshaping institutions so they align with the interests of their diverse faculty/student bodies. The need for these bodies and minds to come together is as strong as ever.

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