Black Queer Students’ Counter-Stories of Invisibility in Undergraduate STEM as a White, Cisheteropatriarchal Space

Abstract

Black queer undergraduates experience invisibility at the juncture of anti-Black racism and cisheteropatriarchy in their campus environments. With the absence of research on queer students of color in undergraduate STEM, it has been unexplored how Black queer invisibility is reinforced and disrupted in uniquely racialized and cisheteronormative STEM spaces. Drawing on Black queer studies and a proposed framework of STEM education as a White, cisheteropatriarchal space, our study addresses this research gap by exploring four Black queer students’ experiences of oppression and agency in navigating invisibility as STEM majors. A counter-storytelling analysis reveals how curricular erasure and within-group peer tensions shaped variation in undergraduate Black queer students’ STEM experiences of invisibility. Findings inform implications for education research, practice, and policy.