“We Sort of Dance Around the Race Thing”: Race-Evasiveness in Teacher Education

Abstract

The racial and linguistic diversity of U.S. classrooms has drawn attention to the intersecting dynamics of race, racism, and language learning in teacher education. While most studies in this vein focus on teachers, almost no research has focused on teacher educators themselves. Therefore, this study draws on interviews with teacher educators to document how they addressed—or more often, evaded—the topics of race and racism. Participants ( n = 33) were instructors for state-mandated courses on teaching emergent bilinguals for general educators across the state of Massachusetts. Through the lens of poststructural discourse analysis, the findings of this study demonstrate that race-evasiveness is not a byproduct of passive omission, but instead involves active, discursive effort. These findings underscore the importance of individual and collective efforts to disrupt race-evasiveness, but also illustrate the limits of surface-level race-intentionality for advancing antiracism in teacher education.

“We started talking about race and racism after George Floyd”: insights from research into practitioner preparedness for anti-racist social work practice in England

“…Here, it is important to recognise that this participant's reference to anti-racist practice not being in a 'module' may mean that it is not a theme throughout the programme, corroborating race evasiveness (Chang-Bacon, 2022). As TAFG4 also states: "We didn't have the time to have a lecture specifically on anti-racism as a full lecture.…”

“…I feel that's pushed to the side.' (SFG5) Chang-Bacon (2022) argues that the low number of Black and racially minoritised students has been used to justify race evasiveness within the classroom.…”

“…It has not been the purpose of this article to examine the barriers to social work educators delivering content on anti-racism; however, it is crucial to note some of barriers that could affect the delivery of anti-racist pedagogy within social work classrooms. The first barrier is racism itself, arising from evading discussions about race and racism (Chang-Bacon, 2022). This may be a controversial point to raise; however, it is important to note that unconscious, personal and/or institutional racism can result in social work educators ignoring this content in teaching, or offering basic and ineffective content.…”

“…Recommendations for improving teaching around anti-racist practice are made, alongside a call for social work educators to enhance their teaching of anti-racism through 'race intentionality' which is about explicitly addressing topics of race and racism in teaching (Chang-Bacon, 2022), as this has direct implications for practice with Black service users and their families, and could minimise the overrepresentation of Black and racially minoritised service users already mentioned. The following discussion will trace the history of anti-racist practice in social work in England and Wales, and also comment on the importance of ensuring that social workers are equipped with the skills, knowledge and tools to work within an antiracist framework.…”

Race, Gender, and Teacher Equity Beliefs: Construct Validation of the Attributions of Mathematical Excellence Scale

“…Third, we claim that race-neutral and gender-neutral attribution beliefs are aligned with (rather than opposed to) racial stereotypes that make analogous attributions. For example, teachers who agree with ostensibly race-neutral statements (e.g., “Students who struggle to understand mathematics do not study enough.”) may be more likely than others to endorse analogous attributions of success to effort, even when these statements echo racial stereotypes (e.g., “Black students struggle in mathematics because they are lazy,” is an analogous attribution that echoes the racist stereotype “Black people are lazy.”) Building on analyses of “color-blindness,” in which individuals claim to not see race (e.g., Delgado & Stefancic, 2013), and related concepts of “color-evasiveness” (Annamma et al, 2017) and “race-evasiveness” (Chang-Bacon, 2021) in which individuals actively avoid discussing or acknowledging race, we conjecture that both attribution statements reflect the same underlying belief (i.e., the attribution of mathematical excellence to personal characteristics associated with race; c.f., ideology , below). If this conjecture holds, equity in mathematics teaching and learning is likely shaped by teachers’ attribution beliefs.…”