Marla Goins, PhD '20, published the book “A Amiga Estadunidense da Abayomi” in collaboration with Maria Aline Soares, a teacher and activist in Brazil. Goins earned her doctorate from the College of Education Human Ecology and was a visiting research fellow at the University of São Paulo in 2018 and 2019-2020 as part of her doctoral studies in the Teaching and Learning program.
Goins also recently published an article titled “Diva’s Culturally Sustaining Black Feminism: Tales from an Afro-Brazilian Teacher-Activist-Mother” in the Comparative Education Review issue on Black Lives Matter and Global Struggles for Racial Justice in Education.
In the article, the epistemology and pedagogy of an Afro-Brazilian woman named Diva are discussed as a culturally sustaining praxis in the context of the transnational and feminist #BlackLivesMatter movement. Diva works to dismantle white supremacy in her roles as a preschool teacher, doll maker, children’s book author and mother. Findings come from ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2018 and 2020 that involved collecting narratives and videos, examining artifacts, and developing a continued relationship and solidarity.
The book originates from the relationship that started during the research.
“Diva and I cowrote a […] book in which Abayomi has an African American friend named Marla who comes to visit her from the United States,” Goins said. The was published by Academia Periférica das Letras.