Fostering Transformational Resistance and Critical Thinking With a Resistance-Focused Curriculum

• In Event: F*ck da System: Womyn of Color Engaging in Critical Praxis

Abstract

The objective of this inquiry is to understand how my positionality as a first-year teacher could foster transformational resistance and critical thinking through a resistance focused curriculum. Furthermore, I wanted to see how my positionality as a self-identified, punk, yellow womyn of color affected my teaching ideologies.

Many students, historically working class students of color, are pushed out of traditional school settings for resisting the norms and culture of society that asks students to conform to the dominant narrative. With this understanding of the schooling system in the United States, the primary theories that informed my inquiry process were Solórzano and Delgado-Bernal’s (2001) resistance framework, hooks’ (2010) definition of critical thinking, and Gibbs’ (n.d.) South Africa Resistance Rally unit as the method.

With the foundation of the resistance framework from Solórzano and Delgado-Bernal (2001) and critical thinking from hooks (2010), I used Gibbs (n.d.) South Africa Resistance to attempt to have students think about what form of resistance one chooses to practice, and the effect of it on oneself and the community that surrounds them. There were two main steps after this. The first was to begin the passbook experiential. This is an experiential that attempts to show students how it felt during South African Apartheid, specifically focusing on the idea of humanity. Students carried this passbook for almost three weeks, ultimately attempting to collaborate and build community. After the experiential, we end at a Socratic seminar where students act as various folks and organizations that practice resistance during Apartheid.

Through their observed actions, oral and written reflections, and responses in their surveys, I hope to capture authentic student perspectives of how they feel and what they think they should and are doing when in unfair, oppressive situations.

My findings are sectioned into three themes: (a) Students resist capitalism and meritocracy in class, (b) Understanding transformational resistance leads to building community, and (c) Students foster and develop their internal transformational resistance through experiential activities. In my findings, I present the truths of my students in their verbal and written reflections and their actions. Moreover, I tell their truths from my perspective, that of the teacher, facilitator, and self-identified working class single mother.

These forms of resistance are based at two intersecting ideas: (a) students having a critique of social oppression and (b) students being motivated by social justice. As defined by the authors, reactionary behavior is not even considered a form of resistance because these actions lack both intersecting ideas. Self-defeating resistance consist of actions by students who have some critique of social oppression, but lack a motivation by social justice. Students who engage in conformist resistance are motivated by social justice, but lack the critique of the systematic social oppression. Lastly, students who practice transformative resistance have both the critique of social oppression and are motivated by social justice (Solórzano & Delgado-Bernal, 2001).

Author

• Jasmine Wang, YouthBuild Charter School of California (YCSC)