How Do Black Men Succeed in Information Technology Careers? The Effects of Capital

While most of the literature on Black men prescribe to a deficit model that focuses on academic failures and poverty, this work focuses on the positive by profiling Black men who have successfully entered information technology (IT) majors. Here we reveal various capitals, their accumulation, and their effects using Bourdieu’s framework to inductively uncover that Black men succeed in IT careers by accumulating five forms of capital—Cultural, Social, Symbolic, Technical, and Economic—that mold their habitus. The accumulated capital affects IT Career Choices, General Skills, IT Skills, Institutional Benefits, Symbolic Benefits, Financial Benefits, Self-efficacy, Ambition, Expectations, Extra Burden, The Black Experience, and Sense of Service. These effects are well aligned with the rules of playing in the IT field.