Theorizing (Missing) Representation in Teacher Education: Social Justice-Oriented Teaching, Critical Literacy, and Inclusive Education

• In Event: Situating Complexities of (Missing) Representation in Teacher Education for Social Justice: U.S. and German Contexts

Abstract

Paper#1 addresses the need to strengthen intersectional perspectives across subjects, disciplines and faculties in order to transform teacher education for social justice (Pugach et al., 2021, p. 237). As a starting point for our symposium, we present our shared theoretical lens: To address the complexities and situatedness of (missing) representation, we draw on perspectives from social justice-oriented teaching, critical literacy, diversity and inclusive education. Intersectional approaches are relevant across socio-cultural contexts and disciplinary fields, which requires critical reflection (Konstantoni & Emejulu, 2017). Outlining our shared theoretical framework situates our research and course development presented in paper #2, #3 and #4 by providing “directions along which to look” (Blumer, 1954, p. 7).
Broadening notions of diversity in inclusive education is important (Claiborne & Balakrishnan, 2020), but pairings of inclusion and diversity often remain vague (Shure, 2017, p. 649). Following Lawrence-Brown and Sapon-Shevin (2014, p. x), we understand inclusive education as “a commitment to critical pedagogy and social justice that engages disability, race, class, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity as intersecting categories that impact student experiences in transformative ways”. In line with critiques of equating inclusive with special education (Engelbrecht, 2014), inclusive education can be understood “as a critical pedagogy” (Lawrence-Brown, 2014, p. 2).
This emphasizes the need for (power-)critical perspectives (Lewison et al., 2007) on exclusion and systemic oppression and focuses on (future) teachers’ development of critical diversity literacy (Dankwa et al., 2021). For acting as reflective “promoters of multicultural perspectives” (Kardena, 2016, p. 62) and to teach for social justice (Zygmunt & Clark, 2015), (student) teachers need to develop complex theoretical and practical knowledge, discourse competence and critical diversity awareness. In contrast to narrow views on (future) teachers’ competencies in ‘dealing with diversity’, which imagine (future) teacher as a homogeneous group that ‘encounters’ diversity in classrooms, this includes a critical reflection on (missing) representation in teaching and teacher education that recognizes “that representation matters and has yet to be achieved” while rejecting “assimilationist ‘mosaic diversity’ approaches” (Heinz et al., 2022, p. 229; e.g. Matias & Mackey, 2016).
Critical reflection on the social construction of ‘differences’ and processes of essentialization and ‘othering’ (Johnson, 2006) is central to research and course development. This is linked to unterstanding critical reflection as a collective social practice (Heinemann & Mecheril, 2018) and considering the relevance of empathy, as a multidimensional concept that includes cognitive, affective, and emotional domains, for critical literacy and social justice-oriented teaching (Flanagan & Faison, 2001; Luengo Kanacri et al., 2014). In this sense, our shared theoretical lens allows us to address the complexities and situatedness of transforming teacher education for social justice.

Authors

• Ann-Kathrin Arndt, Leibniz University Hannover

• Alena Beck, Technische Universität Braunschweig

• Bettina Lindmeier, Leibniz University Hannover

• Chrystal S. Johnson, Purdue University

• Christy Wessel-Powell, Purdue University