Womanist Ethnography Conference 2019
We bring together community leaders, scholars, activists, and students who are interested in foregrounding a womanist ethnographic method that centers the lives and experiences of Black women and women of the African diaspora.
Past conferences have focused on Black women’s vocational narratives (funded by a Louisville Institute Research Grant), Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Puerto Rican, and US Black women in South Africa, Black Women’s Religious Experience, and Sexuality.
This year marks the 3rd annual Womanist Ethnography Conference: June 16-17, 2021
The conference will be virtual this year beginning Thursday afternoon 2:00—5:00 pm, and concluding Friday morning, 9:00—12:00 am. This year’s theme, “The Moral of the Story: What does Womanist Ethnography Teach Us About Black Women’s Ethical and Moral Deliberations?” Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Womanist Ethnography Conference 2021
The theme gives rise to another question: What do Black women’s lives demand of us?
Each year the conference opens with a ritual to remember the ancestors and request their presence as we host an interdisciplinary lineup of scholars, community religious leaders, and activists to engage in conversations as means to share their work.
This year, we begin the conference with a panel of elders who will discuss how they came to be ethnographers, womanist approaches, and what they have learned along the way about “the moral of the story.” The second panel will address power in the womanist ethnographic space and the third panel follows with a conversation on womanist ethnography and activism. Our final panel will respond to the question, “What does “Africa” mean in ‘African Diaspora’-focused womanist ethnography?
Each day of the conference is anchored by an ethnographic experiential process whereby conference attendees engage in a mini-community ethnography exercise that they can use “at home” as part of their community’s work toward transformation.
Finally, the goal of the conference is to make womanist ethnography a research process informed by and for Black women’s communities.