Educational Impact. Step Into My World: A Pedagogy of Black Male Caring

• In Event: AERA Teachers of Color Handbook Session 2

Abstract

A chorus of educational stakeholders acknowledge culturally consonant care as essential to fostering the academic success and buttressing the socio-emotional health of African-American learners. This account elucidates the story of Jason Thomas, a Black male educator, who negotiated culturally rich and gendered care-oriented practices in a female-dominated workspace. We assert that this teacher’s care practice was critical and deliberate. His gender and racialized identity governed his care-oriented intentions and actions that gave way to care-specific activities seemingly patriarchal in presentation. More important, his care pedagogy influenced the civic perspectives and racialized identity of his students. Findings offer insights into the pedagogical dispositions of the Black male educator and add to the limited research on Black care pedagogy.

Authors

• Chrystal S. Johnson, Purdue University

• Jennifer Sdunzik, Purdue University