Geographies of resistance within the black Belt Aouth

Abstract

The Black Belt South is a strategically unacknowledged racialized space. Current framing and discourses describing the region continue to “naturalize… poor and black agony and distress” (McKittrick and Woods 2007, p 2). Yet, communities in the region have strong traditions of resilient responses to social, political, economic and cultural oppressions (Woods 1998). In this article we draw upon frames from the emerging field of Black geographies to gain insight into the narrative of a recent movement, the Black Belt Initiative (BBI), within the Black Belt South, to understand the tensions, struggles, political resistances and triumphs accompanying the ongoing production of Black geographical spaces that affirm humanness and community.