Building Narratives Through Erasure, aka How the United States Pretends to Be Postcolonial

• In Event: AERA Graduate Student Research in Progress Roundtable Session Two
  In Roundtable Session: Historical Perspectives on Education: Accelerated Enrollment, Colonialism, Police in Schools, and Asian American Academic Achievement (Table 9)

Abstract

"Using a LatCrit framework, this textual case analysis aims to uncover the erasures and misrepresentations of current US colonies – Puerto Rico, Guam, Samoa, etc. – from US social studies coursework.

Using an iterative process of coding, three textbooks are examined to note how contemporary US colonies are depicted. The findings include:
1. Colonies and territories post-1898 exist solely to describe European imperialism and distinguish the post-colonial US from the still-colonial EU.
2. The former US colonies Philippines and Cuba, appear more often than Puerto Rico, Guam, and Samoa, which presents the US as post-colonial.
3. Mentions of Guam, Samoa, and the Philippines center on their strategic military locations.
4. All texts would benefit from the inclusion of experiential knowledge.

Further work and analysis will be done prior to the conference."

Author

• Fabiola Quinones, Teachers College, Columbia University
  Presenting Author