For the Poetic Scholars: A Black Feminist Prospectus on the Use of Poetic Positionality Statements in Qualitative Research

The underpinning of positivism persists even in the most progressive of education canons. Thus, critiques of dominant research paradigms still remain at the margins. So, we stand at the edge of the margins and “talk back” (or defiantly re-engage) the methodological canon to uproot persistent barriers to authenticity, trustworthiness, and criticality within qualitative inquiry. This study examines how two Black women tenure-track assistant professors fused Black feminism and the use of poetics for positionality statements to create what we call “positionality poems.” We created self-authored poems as a methodological tool to explore the relationship between researcher identity and qualitative inquiry. Using an interpretivist approach, we analyze our poems alongside works by Black women poets to investigate how positionality and poetics challenge dominant paradigms in education research; and to demonstrate how arts-based methods can enhance authenticity and trustworthiness in qualitative research. Findings reveal four “ancestral whispers” that illuminate the liberatory potential of integrating Black feminisms and poetics into research design and analysis, offering both a methodological and empirical contribution to the field of education research.