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“I Don't Want to Hear That!”: Legitimating Whiteness through Silence in Schools
Author(s) -
Castagno Angelina E.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
anthropology and education quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.531
H-Index - 46
eISSN - 1548-1492
pISSN - 0161-7761
DOI - 10.1111/j.1548-1492.2008.00024.x
Subject(s) - silence , race (biology) , sociology , legitimation , ethnography , gender studies , racism , status quo , aesthetics , political science , law , anthropology , art , politics
In this article, I examine the ways in which silences around race contribute to the maintenance and legitimation of Whiteness. Drawing on ethnographic data from two demographically different schools, I highlight patterns of racially coded language, teacher silence, silencing students’ race talk, and the conflating of culture with race, equality with equity, and difference with deficit. These silences and acts of silencing create and perpetuate an educational culture in which inequities are ignored, the status quo is maintained, and Whiteness is both protected and entrenched. [silence, Whiteness, race]