An official website of the United States government
BACKGROUND. Calculus instruction is underexamined as a source of racialized and gendered inequity in higher education, despite research that documents minoritized students’ marginalizing experiences in undergraduate mathematics classes. This study fills this research gap by investigating mathematics faculty’s perceptions of the significance of race and gender to calculus instruction at a large, public, historically white research university. METHODS. Theories of colorblind racism and dysconsciousness guided a critical discourse analysis of seven undergraduate calculus faculty’s perceptions of instructional events. FINDINGS. Our analysis revealed two dominant discourses: (i) Race and gender are insignificant social markers in undergraduate calculus; and (ii) Instructional events can be objectively deemed race- and gender-neutral. We illustrate how calculus faculty varyingly engaged these colorblind discourses as well as discourses that challenged such conceptions of instruction. We also highlight how faculty dysconsciousness in reports of instructional practices reflect potential operationalization of dominant discourses that reinforce colorblind racism. CONTRIBUTION. With limited research on faculty perspectives on racial equity in mathematics, our study documents how color-evasive, gender-neutral discourses among mathematics faculty shape orientations to instruction that reinforce the gatekeeping role of calculus in STEM higher education. Implications are provided for race- and gender-conscious undergraduate mathematics instruction and faculty development.
more »
« less
Resisting Racist Discourses with Research Methods, Active Learning, and Storytelling
This article contributes to building anti-racist teaching resources in the scholarship of teaching and learning in sociology. We developed an active learning-based project in which students conduct and analyze an interview with someone they are close to on how their family discussed racial discourses during their childhoods. Using Latinx Critical Race Theory as a framework and through qualitative analyses of student assignments, we found that the course project developed students’ critical consciousness by helping them evaluate how biographies are shaped by race, racism, and racial discourses and identify how racism and resistance manifest in family life through storytelling.
more »
« less
- PAR ID:
- 10416594
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Sociology of Race and Ethnicity
- Volume:
- 9
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 2332-6492
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 103 to 108
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Marketing a culture of achievement to Black and Brown students: TNTP and neoliberal multiculturalismGillborn, David (Ed.)Neoliberal multiculturalism is a global racialization process that works as a unifying discourse for the rationalization of neoliberal policies within U.S. global ascendancy and capitalist development. Invoking state multiculturalism, e.g., “diversity” or “equity,” neoliberal multiculturalism is officially antiracist. Official antiracism portrays multiculturalism as being at its core while limiting discussions of race and racism to sanctioned racial discourses. Using neoliberal multiculturalism as a framework, this paper presents a critical analysis of the racial ideology presented in TNTP’s founding teacher training curriculum designed specifically for its Teaching Fellows. The analysis demonstrates how official antiracism can function in curriculum designed to train fast-tracked selective alternative route program teachers to teach predominantly Black, Latino and immigrant students in lower-income neighborhood public schools.more » « less
-
Researchers across the engineering education research spectrum are investigating engineering and engineering education’s persistent racial homogeneity. Administrators and instructors alike talk about how they want their classrooms to be more racially diverse, and yet despite the herculean efforts of “minority in engineering” programs and the like, the needle has moved little. In this position paper, we describe a theoretical lens developed in critical race theory that has so far had little influence in engineering education to thinking about race although we consider it to have ample affordances. This lens is a theoretical framework developed by sociologist Eduardo Bonilla-Silva called “color-blind racism,” and comprises 4 frames: abstract liberalism, cultural racism, naturalization, and minimization of racism. Because the author team sees great value in understanding how cultural values and practices associated with a US experience of Whiteness have been built into U.S. engineering education, we offer here an articulation of these frames, and illustrate each frame through a curated set of stories drawn from our experiences as K-12 students, as undergraduate engineering students, and as engineering faculty at Predominantly White Institutions (PWIs) and Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs). We note some limitations of the color-blind racism theory as we have applied it, offer some practical applications of the theory to consider, and issue a call to action for both engineering education researchers and engineering instructors.more » « less
-
We report on a curriculum development project in which students explore environmental racism through data. Recognizing that quantitative data alone is insufficient to understand the sociohistorical contexts of racism, we draw from syncretic approaches to learning that put everyday experiences and qualitative evidence into direct conversation with quantitative datasets through storytelling. Through two focal cases, we demonstrate how one student leveraged personal experience to engage in deep integrative analysis of data, while another with fewer perceived personal connections to environmental racism focused more specifically on patterns, with less structural or racial analysis. Implications of the analysis include the need to carefully attend to the use of quantitative data related to race and to scaffold the integration of other sources of information with quantitative data sets.more » « less
-
Against a backdrop of calls for increased access and participation in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) in the United States have emerged as critical access points for Latina/o/x and other Students of Color. Federal grants can become important levers for building institutional capacity for broadening participation in STEM and transforming HSIs toward better serving Students of Color, specifically as it relates to curricula and pedagogy. In this study, we focus on the engineering faculty at an HSI who are participants in a National Science Foundation-funded, equity-focused professional development program. Operationalizing Bonilla-Silva’s color-evasive racial ideology framework, we use content analysis techniques to explore how engineering faculty discuss race and racism as part of the professional development experience. First, we find that engineering faculty largely rely on color-evasive racial frameworks (i.e., abstract liberalism, minimization of racism) when describing their motivations for participating in the program. Moreover, we find that engineering faculty responses depict a range of surprise and familiarity when reflecting on issues of race and racism. Finally, regardless of prior exposure to module concepts, at the end of the program, the majority of action projects reflect a recognition of race and racism as important.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1177/23326492221127957
