THE WHITES TO REMAIN SILENT:CRITICAL RACE THEORY PERSPECTIVE ON
THE SCHOOL-TO-PRISON PIPELINE
M. ALEX EVANSDOCTORAL STUDENT
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGNEDUCATION POLICY, ORGANIZATION AND LEADERSHIP
SOCIAL CULTURAL STUDIES IN EDUCATION POLICY
N.C.C. Law Review SymposiumYouth in N.C. Panel
Central High School 1957 – Little Rock,
Arkansas
“[T]he rights of the oppressed are seldom effectively
asserted and exercised within the dominant
institutionalized channels of the social order.” - JOHN O
CALMORE -
What is Critical Race Theory
Examines relationship between
race, racism, and power.
Includes economics, history,
context, group/self-interest,
feelings, and the unconscious.
Activism beyond understanding
social situations, to transform racial
hierarchies.
Challenges dominant Ideologies
Critical
Race
Theory
Richard Delgado, Critical Race Theory: An Introduction
Critical Race Theory Tenets
1. The Permanence & Pervasiveness
of Racism
2. Whiteness as Property/Privilege
3. Race as a Social Construction
4. Interest-Convergence
5. Intersectionality
6. Storytelling, Counter-storytelling,
Narratives
Richard Delgado, Critical Race Theory: An Introduction
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Permanent and Pervasive Racism
Permanent and Pervasive Racism
Race and racism are central,
endemic, and fundamental in
defining and explaining how U.S.
society functions.o Adrienne D. Dixson and Celia K. Rousseau, “Critical
Race Theory in Education: All God’s Children Got a
Song”.
This principle provides an accurate
historical/context lens and critical
framework to analyze the racially
disparate data in the STPP.
Permanent and Pervasive Racism
In Wake County, Black students are
subject to:
62.3% of short-term
67.5% of long-term suspensions,
73.4% of school-based delinquency
complaints.
26.1% of the total student population
Jason Langberg, The State of the School to Prison Pipeline in the Wake County Public School System. Advocates for
Children’s Services a Project of Legal Aid of North Carolina.
Permanent and Pervasive Racism
1970
2010
0.00%
5.00%
10.00%
15.00%
20.00%
25.00%
BlackStudents
WhiteStudents
Suspension Rates Data from 1970 and 2010
1970 2010
Permanent and Pervasive Racism
0%
10%
20%
30%
BLACK BOYS
WHITE BOYS
BLACK GIRLS
WHITE GIRLS
Middle School Racial and Gender Disparities
Suspended Education: Urban Middle Schools in Crisis - 2010
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Whiteness as Property
Whiteness as Property
Cheryl Harris, Whiteness as Property
“Origins of property rights in the U.S. rooted in racial domination.”
The dominant culture’s perceptions of race and property played a critical role in establishing and maintaining racial and economic subordination.
Refers to: Slavery, Native American Land Seizure, Plessy, Brown, Regents of University of California v. Bakke, City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co., Wygant v. Jackson Bd. of Ed.
Whiteness as Property
White Students Property Rights
Right to an education
Use and Enjoyment of Privilege
Reputation and Status
Right to Exclude
To Remain Silent
Whiteness as Property
STPP Critical Race Theory Research
Subini Ancy Annamma, Whiteness as Property:
Innocence and Ability in Teacher Education.
Provides racial analysis of teachers’ attitudes toward
students of color.
Highlights the need for training in understanding of
race, racism, and inequities that recognize the
historical legacy of whiteness as property.
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Race as a Social Construction
Race as a Social Construction
Race is not a natural, fixed, or biological
concept.
Race is a social and legal construct.
Race has not been constructed neutrally, but
instead coercively as an ideological tool.
See IAN HANEY LÓPEZ, WHITE BY LAW: THE LEGAL
CONSTRUCTION OF RACE 78–108 (rev. ed. 2006).
Race as a Social Construction
David Simson, Exclusion, Punishment, Racism and Our Schools: A Critical Race Theory Perspective on
School Discipline
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Interest-Convergence
Interest-Convergence
Dominant culture (whites) support racial
justice, only when there is something in it for
them. See the movie “Space Traders” by Derrick Bell
“[T]he fourteenth amendment, standing alone,
will not authorize a judicial remedy providing
effective racial equality for blacks where the
remedy sought threatens the superior societal
status of middle and upper class whites.” Derrick Bell, Brown v. Board of Education and the Interest-
Convergence Dilemma
Interest-Convergence
Historical Examples of Interest-Convergence
Abolition of Slavery – Hayes Tilden Compromise
Brown v. Board of Ed & Desegregation – Foreign
Policy
Super Bowl XXVVII – Martin Luther King Day
Controversy
Interest-Convergence = Prison Industrial Complex
Interest-Convergence = Prison Industrial Complex
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Intersectionality
Intersectionality
Study of intersections between
oppression, domination, and
discrimination.
Race, Gender, Class, Ethnicity,
Sexual Orientation, Ability, Religion,
etc…
“Intersectionality” – Term coined by
Kimberle Crenshaw
Intersectionality
Black Girls Matter
“As public concern mounts for the
needs of men and boys of color
through initiatives like the White
House’s My Brother’s Keeper, we
must challenge the assumption that
the lives of girls and women who are
often left out of the national
conversation are not also at risk,” -
Kimberle Crenshaw -Kimberle Crenshaw, Black Girls Matter: Pushed Out, Overpoliced, and
Underprotected
Critical Race Theory and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline
Storytelling & Narratives
Storytelling & Narratives
“Counter-stories can engage conscience and
stir imagination in ways in which more
conventional discourse cannot.”
Stories, parables, chronicles, and narratives
are powerful means for destroying white
supremacist ideals.
Richard Delgado, Storytelling for Oppositionists
and Others: A Plea For Narrative
Conclusion
Critical Race Theory provides a sound
methodological framework to research the
School-to-Prison Pipeline.
As an activism based form of research, it
serves as a change agent with valuable
historical, economical, and social context.
CRT & STTP Articles
Allen, Q., & White-Smith, K. (2014). “Just as Bad as Prisons”: The Challenge
of Dismantling the School-to-Prison Pipeline Through Teacher and Community
Education. Equity & Excellence in Education, 47(4), 445-460.
Blessett, Brandi. (2014). Dismantling the School-to-Prison Pipeline:
Reconfiguring the System from Investing in the Failure of the "Other". In The
American Mosaic: The Latino American Experience. Retrieved March 24,
2014, from http://latinoamerican2.abc-clio.com/
Fasching-Varner, K., Mitchell, R., Martin, L., & Bennett-Haron, K. (2014).
Beyond School-to-Prison Pipeline and Toward an Educational and Penal
Realism. Equity & Excellence in Education, 47(4), 410-429.
Healey, Melina A. (2014) Montana's Rural Version of the School-to-Prison
Pipeline School Discipline and Tragedy on American Indian Reservations.
Montana Law Review. 75, 15-66.
CRT & STTP Articles (cont’d.)
Irizarry, Jason G. & Raible, John. (2014) “A Hidden Part of Me”: Latino/a
Students,
Silencing, and the Epidermalization of Inferiority, Equity & Excellence in
Education, 47:4, 430-444, DOI: 10.1080/10665684.2014.958970
Sherman, F., & Jacobs, F. (2011). Juvenile Prison Schooling and Reentry:
Disciplining Young Men of Color. In Juvenile justice advancing research, policy,
and practice (pp. 310-330). Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley and Sons.
Simson, D. (2014). Exclusion, Punishment, Racism and Our Schools: A Critical
Race Theory Perspective on School Discipline. UCLA Law Review, 61, 506-
563.
Vaught, S. (2012). Hate Speech in a Juvenile Male Prison School and in US
Schooling. The Urban Review, 239-264.
Thank You N.C.C. Law Review V.37
The Whites to Remain Silent:
Critical Race Theory Perspective on
the School-to Prison Pipeline
M. Alex EvansMarch 27, 2015
N.C.C. Law Review Symposium
North Carolina Central University School of Law
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