Reading Response

The article that I read in place of Ormrod’s Chapter 4 was “Critical Race Theory, Multicultural Education, and the Hidden Curriculum of Hegemony,” by Michelle Jay. I was immediately captivated by her approach, especially since I have just gotten a grasp on Critical Race Theory through a couple of English classes I took last semester. As a high school student, I was always quick to pick up on the fact that every textbook inevitably had a diverse sampling of people from different ethnicities and races scattered throughout its pages in forms of images, personal narratives or blips, or other perspective-giving means. Through this article, I began to wonder for the first time: is that enough? Multicultural education is defined by Jay as having goals “to reduce prejudice and discrimination against oppressed groups, to work toward equal opportunity and social justice for all groups, and to effect an equitable distribution of power among members of different cultural groups” (3, italics mine). Does the multicultural education we implement in schools distribute power to minority groups—whether based on race, class, gender, or culture? If multicultural education rather simply attempts to spread tolerance or “just getting along,” then the status quo remains, which in turn means that a hegemony exists: white males still have a larger share of the power. It seems harsh to put it like that, but I believe it to be so. Jay is not surprised by this fact, for she admits that “transformative knowledge,” or putting multicultural education into action, “is dangerous. It threatens those dominant groups in our society who have a vested interest in the… maintenance of dominant structures, long-present inequalities, and the current power arrangements” (5).

How can I as a teacher bring about change? I may be unusual, for I will (hopefully) be working in a school where the minority groups are the majority. Of course this does not mean I will not encounter prejudice from dominant groups; indeed, every day I imagine I will be combating stereotypes against whites, or perhaps a student who is poorer or has a parent in jail, or “blacker” students than others, or even a student of a different religion or cultural background. One stereotype I am especially passionate against combating is that “to be intelligent is to be white.” This is perhaps its own hegemony—that to succeed in a “white world” would somehow “acting white.” Instead, I want to instill great pride in my students’ background and race, so that they are confident enough to work through the hegemony of the “white world” they inevitably live in.