Bio

Dr. Gabrielle Kubi (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of Women's and Gender Studies; and leads the Venerating Intersections of Blackness in Education & Schooling (VIBES) Lab. Her research focuses on Black girls’ and women’s intersectional awareness of misogynoir as it interlocks with other forms of oppression, such as adultism; their self-definition and/or meaning-making; and the reimagination of schooling to better cultivate young Black people’s sociopolitical and identity development, particularly through university-school partnerships. She is a proud auntie and a celebrated educator, mentor, and school partner. Her work has been funded by the American Educational Research Association; the American Psychological Foundation; and the Society for Community Research and Action.

Education

B.S., Human Development with Minors in Education and Inequality Studies, Cornell University
Ph.D., Education & Psychology, University of Michigan
Graduate Certificate, African American & Diasporic Studies, University of Michigan
Graduate Certificate, Graduate Teaching, University of Michigan

Specialization

Developmental science (Black girls' and women's identity and sociopolitical development); Black girlhood studies (Black girls' counternarratives about their educational, psychological, and developmental experiences; critical pedagogies and consciousness-raising curricula that center Black girls to the benefit of all students + the experiences of adult co-conspirators, namely Black woman educators, who facilitate these learning experiences); Community engagement (translational research; university-school and university-community partnerships; design, implementation, and evaluation of curricula and contexts of youth practice)  

Selected Honors & Awards

2026: Eastern Michigan University Faculty Development Center Thank-An-Eagle Nominee

2025: University of Tennessee, Knoxville College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences Political Violence Against & Joy Among Black Girls Research Convening Invitee

Eastern Michigan Women’s Basketball Faculty Appreciation Honoree

2024: AERA Division C Shark Tank People’s Choice Award

2023: Action for Racial Justice and Equity Fund Recipient, Society for Community Research and Action Council on Cultural, Ethnic, and Racial Affairs

2022: Michigan Housing Fall 2022 Honored Instructor

Curriculum Inquiry Writing Fellow

2022: Mamie Phipps Clark Diversity Research Grant Recipient, Psi Chi, the International Honor Society in Psychology

Queen-Nellie Evans Scholar, American Psychological Foundation

Honorable Mention, Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship

2021: Honorable Mention, National Science Foundation Graduate Research

Fellowship Program 

2020-26: University of Michigan Rackham Merit Fellow

2018-20: Cornell University Program for Research on Youth Development & Engagement (PRYDE) Scholar

Representative Publications

^ = includes student author/s
^Kubi, G., Johnson, M., Yang, H. M., Cherukavada, S., & Montgomery, H. (2024). “We… speak up… because we care:” Critical conversation spaces as consciousness-raising contexts for Black girls. Curriculum Inquiry, 54(4). Curriculum Inquiry Writing Fellow invited submission. 1-26. [link]

Onuoha, A. C., Kubi, G., Coghill, K., Golden, A., & Joseph-McCatty, A. (in preparation). Confronting political violence through intersectional awareness, critical consciousness, & collective joy for Black girls’ health.

Kubi, G., & Lewis, J. A. (under review). “[Standing] firmly… in my Black girlhood”: Gendered-racial identity development as Black feminist resistance. 

Kubi, G. (under review). Conversations in Color: Conceptualizing an intersectional awareness of misogynoir. Journal of Adolescent Research.

^Kubi, G. & Johnson, M.^[1], Yang, H. M., & Pelton-Flavin, K. (in press). “A different energy”: Black girls’ interpretation of vibe as a power metric. In C. Jacobs & K. Clonan-Roy (Eds.), Exploring the Educational and Developmental Experiences of Girls of Color: Girlhood Reimagined. Invited submission. Emerald Publishing. [^[1]Kubi & Johnson share first authorship of this chapter.]

Owusu, M., Almore, A., cooper, m., Johnson, M., Kubi, G., & Quince, C. L., (2024). It’s up and it’s stuck: Witnessing Black girl joy in digital spaces. Urban Education,^[2] 1-28. [link] [^[2]As Black feminists, this article honors collectivism and rigorous citation practice. This citation lists the creator of the study first and then the members of this collective in alphabetical order.]

Quiles-Kwock, T. B. & Pinetta, B. J.^[3], Kubi, G., Mathews, C. J., & Leath, S. (2025). “I love that ‘bout myself and us”: Black, Latina, and Afro-Latina girls’ self-definition and valuation processes as resistance to gendered racism. Psychology of Women Quarterly. [link] [^[3]Quiles-Kwock & Pinetta share first authorship of this article.]