Applying Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Intersectionality to Address the Needs of African American Crossover Girls
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Applying Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Intersectionality to Address the Needs of African American Crossover Girls Karen M. Kolivoski1 Accepted: 11 November 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Youth who are victims of maltreatment and engage in delinquency are at a greater risk of adverse emotional and behavioral outcomes compared to those in the general population (Herz and Dierkhising in 2018; Herz et al. in 2019; StouthamerLoeber et al. in 2001). “Crossover youth” is a common, collective term for youth who experience maltreatment and engage in delinquency. Current studies suggest girls and African American youth are more likely to experience crossover between the child welfare and juvenile justice systems. Yet, there is little existing scholarship, especially conceptual articles, specific to consideration of both race and gender regarding crossover youth. Critical Race Theory (CRT) and intersectionality are utilized to analyze and better understand the overrepresentation of African American girls who cross over from the child welfare to the juvenile justice system. This article concludes with implications for social work action strategies, for micro and macro social work, including policy and research, to better address the unique needs of this population. Race and racism, and how these overlap with experiences as girls and young women, are central and cannot be disentangled and need to be included as social work pays more attention to addressing the needs of this especially vulnerable sub-population of crossover youth. Keywords African Americans · Girls · Child welfare · Crossover youth · Juvenile justice Youth who are victims of maltreatment (e.g., abuse, neglect) and later engage in subsequent delinquency are at a greater risk of adverse emotional and behavioral outcomes compared to those in the general population (Herz & Dierkhising, 2018; Herz et al., 2019; Stouthamer-Loeber, Loeber, Homish, & Wei, 2001). “Crossover youth” is a common, collective term for young people who experience maltreatment and exhibit delinquency (Herz, Ryan, & Bilchik, 2010), thus they shift between the child welfare and juvenile justice systems with estimates as high as 67% of juvenile justice-involved youth having maltreatment and child welfare system histories (Herz, 2012). Current studies suggest girls and African American youth are more likely to experience crossover (Herz, Abbott, & Stewart, n.d.; Scrivner, 2012). Yet, there is little existing conceptual scholarship specific to consideration of both race and gender for this population. Critical Race Theory (CRT) is a theoretical framework that examines race, racism, and power structures (Delgado & * Karen M. Kolivoski [email protected] 1
School of Social Work, Howard University, 601 Howard Place NW, Washington, DC 20059, USA
Stefancic, 2012) and is utilized to inform critical analysis of issues as well as to inform action strategies. One of the tenets of CRT is intersectionality (Cole, 2009; Crenshaw, 1991), which
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