Montgomery’s Lessons for Desettling Science Learning: Understanding Black Feminist Knowledge-Making in Science

In this conceptual paper, I suggest cultivating Black feminist knowledge-making within science education can address the alienation and marginalization experienced by Black women.I begin by identifying features of Black feminist knowledge-making involved with developing critical consciousness among Black women, explaining how Western science perpetuates white masculine norms.To analyze an example of Black feminist knowledgemaking in science, I focus on storytelling as a modality of Black women's oppositional knowledge-making.I highlight how Beronda Montgomery's (2021) storytelling in Lessons from Plants both contributes to and draws on an intellectual genealogy of Black feminist thought in interdisciplinary ways.I conclude with theoretical and methodological implications for designing science educational environments that foster Black feminist knowledge-making, aiming to create more meaningful and liberatory science learning experiences.This work underscores the need to reimagine science education to support diverse ways of knowing and being, ultimately challenging the dominance of Western scientific paradigms. Features of Black feminist knowledge-makingBlack feminist thought refers to the collective wisdom generated by Black women's oppositional thought and actions in the context of white supremacy (Collins, 2022).It is not a singular thread of canonized ideas, but rather heterogeneous, dialogic knowledge production among Black women in and beyond the United States, oriented towards consciousness development and resisting oppression (Collins, 2022).The enslavement and domination of Black communities involved the lethal suppression and surveillance of Black women's speech, ideas, and actions (Woods, 2017) requiring Black women's oppositional knowledge-making to continually evade capture (McKittrick, 2021).