Thesis advisor: Sara Moorman / Thesis advisor: Eve Spangler / This research project explores the narratives of how and when young Black people came to understand their race, as well as the implications of it. In order to expand upon the existing studies regarding racial realization and provide specific stories of such instances, qualitative interviews with nine Black people (ages 18-22) were conducted. The upbringings of these young Black people were analyzed in depth in order to provide insight to different types of racial socialization. It was found that both colorblind upbringings and non-colorblind upbringings that center individuals rather than systems of oppression are not helpful in the racial identity formation of young Black people. They both result in the perpetuation of the idea that racially marginalized people should modify their behavior. Additionally, this project exposes some of the reasons why racial realization is often a jarring experience for Black people in America, and in turn, expose some of the ways it can be less so. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Sociology.

The research presented in “Creating Identity” investigates Black identity formation within the Steve Biko Cultural Institute (Biko) in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, a pre-vestibular – or college entrance exam preparation course – for Afro-Brazilian high school and aspiring college students. The curriculum, Cidadania e Consciência Negra (Black Consciousness and Citizenship; abbreviated CCN) serves as a vital pillar to the institutional approach to Black identity. In a Eurocentric society like Brazil and a world where Black identity is largely discriminated against including in educational spaces, Biko represents a movement to combat the exclusion of Afro-descendant youth from university, improve self-esteem and perceptions of the value of Black identity, and change who graduates from Bahia state universities. Over the course of nine months, in 2015 and 2016, field data were collected in the city of Salvador, Brazil and at the Biko institute. Since the research was cross-linguistic, cross-cultural, and hosted internationally, I assumed a methodologically narrative approach. The research design incorporated a survey, interviews, observations, and document analysis. Forty-two students completed surveys, twenty-six Biko students, staff and alumni participated in interviews, and well over 400 hours of participatory field observation were completed. Policy, demographic and curricular documents were also analyzed. CCN heavily influenced participants’ identity development through student and teacher discourse. The institution is a center of critical activism in the community. Aside from being a major part of the instructional approach to preparation for the college entrance exam, CCN heavily influenced the relationships between participants and their families and friends over newly affirmed Black identities. Although Biko students and alumni became more socially alert to the racial issues in their communities, they remain at risk of being racially profiled. Additionally, understanding blackness through the eyes of participants required an understanding of class and gender structures in Brazil. One major implication of the research for the participants is: blackness is CCN is Biko. Thereby, knowledge production and interaction with universities by Biko students are heavily influenced by Biko tenets and ideologies discussing race and racism, prejudice, discrimination, women’s rights, and economic development.

Recent research has uncovered a new phenomenon in some distressed areas, black gentrification. Black gentrification follows the same pattern as mainstream gentrification with one notable exception: In black gentrifying neighborhoods both the poor and working class residents who resided in the neighborhood prior to its “gentrification” and the new residents of greater economic means are black. An additional hallmark of black gentrification that distinguishes it from traditional gentrification is that black gentrifiers in black gentrifying neighborhoods often feel a responsibility or obligation to their lower income black neighbors. Prior to the economic downturn in the United States, some in-town Atlanta neighborhoods were undergoing black gentrification. Amidst the current mortgage foreclosure epidemic facing the U.S., distressed urban areas like the ones under study, which began to gentrify in the last ten to twenty years, can easily fall prey to mortgage fraud and/or further decline. Sustained revitalization efforts require that the neighborhoods maintain a critical density level; therefore, neighborhoods cannot afford to lose more citizens. My dissertation focuses on two historic, black gentrifying in-town Atlanta neighborhoods: the Old Fourth Ward and the West End. The Old Fourth Ward is the location of the birth home of one of Atlanta’s most celebrated sons, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The West End, once a center of black consciousness in the city, now boasts one of the highest mortgage fraud rates in the nation. Revitalization efforts in both communities are in jeopardy. This dissertation explores ways to strengthen social and economic cohesion in these gentrifying black communities. Specifically, I argue that attachment to the neighborhood space (something I term “place affinity”) has the potential to obviate social tensions in gentrifying black communities and bind residents to each other and the social space they all occupy.