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This article synthesizes the collaborative autoethnographic reflections of three Black women administrators who worked together at a predominantly White institution. The authors examine their lived experiences, or linked fate, within the complicated structural arrangements of the university-industrial complex, as well as the damaging narratives that depict Black women in the academy. The study contributes time capital and title-power through the lens of human agency, to the much-needed scholarship that centers Black female leaders in academia.
Keywords: Black women, leadership, higher education, time capital, title-power
Introduction
Institutions of higher education remain strongholds of status quo custom and tradition, despite claims of progressive liberal ideology and practice. One area in which change and social inclusion has been slow to take hold is in positions of higher education administration, markedly for Black women in positions of leadership and authority. Mosley (1980) explained, over 30 years ago, while "Black women have been pioneers in education for Black and white people, even though historical references reflect little about their role" (p. 295), this particular group of higher education administrators has been deemed "endangered species." Their challenges include having little power and being "underpaid and overworked," which remains part of their narrative today. Black women are doubly oppressed (Moses, 1989; Zamani, 2003), which has made them (in)visible in the academy (Zamani, 2003), potentially troubling their trajectory to postsecondary administration.
"Stereotypes and bias are among the leading obstacles to women's leadership" (Hill et al., 2016, p. v). Such an outcome is further exacerbated by race/ethnicity, which Zamani (2003) explained, "differentiates experiences and opportunities." Women of color make up a small percentage of those who hold postsecondary leadership positions (Hill et al., 2016). However, grouping Women of Color's experience in administration, rather than having a disaggregated understanding discounts how racial treatment differentially manifests for different racial/ethnic groups; furthermore, grouping universalizes experiences and enables institutional communities to over-generalize about their leadership. Miller and Vaughn (1997) argued "the twin disguise of racism and sexism still impose great restraints on the utilization of the competence and talents of African American women at both predominantly black and predominantly white institutions" (p. 179). Additionally, Oguntoyinbo (2014) found Black women, while they have been faculty and administrators within the context of historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs), within...