‘There’s a problem, and we’ve got to face it’: how staff members wrestled with race in an urban high school

Buehler, Jennifer

doi:10.1080/13613324.2011.646256

Cited by 20 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…With this background in mind, educational sociologists and anthropologists have recently reported at length on the dominance of colorblind ideology in schools in many countries (Buehler ; Hardie and Tyson ; Hooks and Miskovic ; Lewis ; Perry ; Pollock ). These studies describe how discourses, personal identifications, specific practices, and structural characteristics in schools construct and reinforce the denial of race and racism in everyday life and thus preserve the stability of institutional racism and cultural hierarchies.…”

Section: Ethnicity Race and Racism In Schoolsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ethnographies of “A Lesson in Racism”: Class, Ethnicity, and the Supremacy of the Psychological Discourse

Shoshana

2017

Anthropology & Education Quarterly

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Through the ethnographies of two schools serving different socioeconomic communities, this article offers an examination of students' and teachers' interpretations of the anti-racism text "Brown Morning" taught in civics classes. Findings present the dramatic differences between the interpretations of students from dissimilar socioeconomic communities, the manners in which these interpretations discordantly activate the teachers, and the disparity of assorted class dynamics. These findings proffer a discussion of the link between education, class, ethnicity, and racism. [class, racism, ethnicity, psychological discourse]

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Section: Ethnicity Race and Racism In Schoolsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ethnographies of “A Lesson in Racism”: Class, Ethnicity, and the Supremacy of the Psychological Discourse

Shoshana

2017

Anthropology & Education Quarterly

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“…Picower (2009) has shown that there is potential in enabling beginning teachers to reflect on their experiences and to engage in discussion and reading alongside their teaching load, and Buehler (2012) argues that when talk about race is seen as acceptable among staff, it opens up possibilities for change in schools. There appear to be three factors in enabling the kind of reflectiveness that is essential for such dialogue.…”

Section: Addressing Race and Racism In Initial Teacher Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Consequently, the non-racist way to behave is to ignore the issue all together. More recently Dickar (2008) and Buehler (2012) have argued that while many white teachers are indeed unwilling to engage with issues of race, this reluctance sometimes stems, not from a desire to appear non-racist, but from an acute sense of the complexity and personal threat involved in race talk. Regardless of the motivation, the effect of such evasiveness is to maintain race inequity.…”

Section: Definitions Of Racism In Popular and Academic Discoursementioning

confidence: 99%

Special Issue Race Ethnicity and Education: Initial teacher education: developments, dilemmas and challenges

Lander

2013

Race Ethnicity and Education

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dilemmas and challenges IntroductionVini Lander University of Chichester v.lander@chi.ac.ukThe education of new teachers is a fundamental aspect of education provision within any country in the world. The education of pre-service teachers is known to have a direct impact on the outcomes for children in our schools. In England, teacher education within universities has been subject to erosion with the introduction of more school-based training and greater scrutiny by the government inspection agency, the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) (DfE 2011). The education of teachers in England continues to be an arena within which greater and greater government control is being exercised (DfE 2011). The preparation of teachers in England within the higher education sector has recently had to demonstrate greater flexibility as market forces have been brought to bear with the forthcoming introduction of School Direct in September 2013 (DfE 2011). This new training route reinforces the conception amongst some of the teacher as a technicist rather than an intellectual (Down and Smyth 2012). Under this new School Direct training regime new entrants will be trained to become teachers in one year, in one school, in one locality with minimum input from a higher education institution. The outcomes of such parochial preparation to teach will no doubt be documented in future years.In England, as in most countries, such as Australia and Norway, the pupil population is becoming increasingly diverse whilst simultaneously neo-liberal ideology plays out (Ball 2012) through government policies to limit the content of the teacher education curriculum to a list of classroom related competencies which include little or no reference to diversity, 'race', ethnicity or culture. The significance of these factors on the lives of children within a diverse society are absent within the official Teachers ' Standards 2012 (DfE 2012. This mismatch between the content of the teacher education curriculum, the ethnicity of the candidates who enter pre-service courses [in 2011, 12% of primary trainee teachers in England were from Black and minority ethnic groups (NCTL) and in the US approximately 21% of teachers are from African American or Hispanic groups (Nolet 2013)] and the demographics of the pupil population (in 2011 26.5% of primary/elementary pupils were from Black and minority ethnic groups) seem to be a concern for only a minority of teacher educators across the UK, US, Europe and Australia. In England, we continue to struggle to maintain a foothold (at times this feels like a fingernail hold) to introduce new teachers to issues related to 'race', ethnicity and the education for the benefit of all children in our schools. This special issue is intended to highlight the factors that student teachers, especially new candidates of colour, face in their pursuit to become teachers in what appear to be, at times, hostile or indifferent attitudes to ethnic diversity and the pursuit for social justice. As a teacher educator who has worked in t...

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“…More recently Dickar (2008) and Buehler (2012) have argued that while many white teachers are indeed unwilling to engage with issues of race, this reluctance sometimes stems, not from a desire to appear non-racist, but from an acute sense of the complexity and personal threat involved in race talk. Regardless of the motivation, the effect of such evasiveness is to maintain race inequity.…”

Section: Definitions Of Racism In Popular and Academic Discoursementioning

confidence: 99%

“…In this context, it may be prudent to begin to look for ways to address race and racism which can be accommodated in schools. Picower (2009) has shown that there is potential in enabling beginning teachers to reflect on their experiences and to engage in discussion and reading alongside their teaching load, and Buehler (2012) argues that when talk about race is seen as acceptable among staff, it opens up possibilities for change in schools. There appear to be three factors in enabling the kind of reflectiveness that is essential for such dialogue.…”

Section: Addressing Race and Racism In Initial Teacher Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dealing with racist incidents: what do beginning teachers learn from schools?

Pearce

2013

Race Ethnicity and Education

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This article focuses on how schools respond to racist incidents, and what new teachers learn from their involvement in those processes. It analyses four incidents involving the pupils of four beginning teachers. The article suggests that in each case, schools either partly or wholly avoided addressing the incident, and that this avoidance can be understood in terms of the colour and power evasive discourse, which is the dominant discourse on race in Western societies, and in most schools. One aspect of this discourse is that racism is defined on the basis of individual intentions, not outcomes. The article argues that it may be possible to adopt a more race cognisant approach with student teachers and staff in schools, building on nascent understandings of institutional racism, which shifts the focus to outcomes rather than intentions. The article demonstrates this approach, analysing each incident in terms of its consequences for the learning of the new teacher, and for the promotion of race equality in the school. While the small number of incidents may initially appear heartening, their negative impact on both teacher confidence and children's understanding may be significant. The findings suggest that in the changing context of initial teacher education in England, approaches to supporting both schools and new teachers in this often misunderstood area are much needed, and that one way forward may be to give teachers time and support to critically reflect on and discuss their experiences.Keywords: race, racist incidents, institutional racism, student teachers, beginning teachers, whiteness IntroductionRacism remains an important problem in UK schools. In 2012 the BBC's news website reported that the number of racist incidents logged by schools rose steadily between 2007 and 2010, the year in which the current Coalition Government removed the obligation for schools to keep records (BBC 2012) 1 . In some areas, the number of reported cases increased by 40% in that period. The BBC website reported a leading anti-racism campaign group describing the 88,000cases as 'the tip of the iceberg', since such cases are very often under-reported (BBC 2012). Yet one popular newspaper reported the story of the release of the figures under the headline, '88,000 children branded racists' (Daily Mail, 2012). In taking this stance, the newspaper drew on the dominant discourse on race in British society and elsewhere, which fails to understand the purpose of monitoring such incidents, and sees racism only as extreme and violent acts, rather than a subtle and pervasive feature of our social structures. The headline suggests that the act of logging a racist incident automatically defines the individual involved as 'a racist': racism is only ever understood as personal prejudice. But some of the individual cases quoted in the story suggest another aspect of this discourse: some senior managers in school appeared to have defined any direct reference children made to race as a racist incident. According to this colourblind way of th...

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‘There’s a problem, and we’ve got to face it’: how staff members wrestled with race in an urban high school

Cited by 20 publications

References 29 publications

Ethnographies of “A Lesson in Racism”: Class, Ethnicity, and the Supremacy of the Psychological Discourse

Ethnographies of “A Lesson in Racism”: Class, Ethnicity, and the Supremacy of the Psychological Discourse

Special Issue Race Ethnicity and Education: Initial teacher education: developments, dilemmas and challenges

Dealing with racist incidents: what do beginning teachers learn from schools?

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