Premium
The Power of Contexts: Teaching and Learning in Recently Desegregated Schools
Author(s) -
Chapman Thandeka K.
Publication year - 2007
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 - 10.1525/aeq.2007.38.3.297
Subject(s) - sociology , hostility , empowerment , injustice , ethnography , multiculturalism , pedagogy , power (physics) , critical theory , power structure , multicultural education , race (biology) , critical race theory , social psychology , gender studies , psychology , anthropology , epistemology , political science , physics , quantum mechanics , law , philosophy
The following critical ethnography interrogates what it means for urban students to learn in multicultural ways, given the oppressive historical and present contexts of their newly desegregated urban district. By retelling events that occurred in the district and the classroom, I present a picture of urban students who are willing to learn and engage in classroom activities when the activities do not threaten their emotional safety. Although their actions are understandable, the students' conscious decisions to disengage from school stifles learning opportunities that would allow them to empathize and connect with other students as a move toward individual and group empowerment. Using critical race theory, I problematize the possibilities for successful multicultural classrooms in urban districts with complex legacies of injustice and racial hostility.