"Vygotsky Must Be Racialized": Conceptualizing a Racialized Cultural Historical Activity Theory

• In Event: The Struggle Against Oppression and Racial Injustice in Education

Abstract

In this scholarly paper, I argue that insights from Cultural-Historical Activity Theory provide important affordances for articulating the nuances of racial meaning- making in classrooms and theorizing its implications for supporting or impeding learning. I consider three key questions: 1) What forms of activity become more legible, or more possible, when we are attuned to processes of racialization in activity systems? 2) In addition to being a robust artifact imbued with cultural and historical implications, what can be made more intelligible by conceptualizing racial meanings as dynamic tools for learning? 3) What can be gained by taking a cultural-historical approach to re-tooling racial meanings in the study of classroom teaching and learning?

Author

• Aireale J. Rodgers, University of Wisconsin - Madison