#Tradwives, Waldorf Schools, and Sad Beige Children: Progressive Schooling and the White Mom Imaginary

• In Event: Tangles of Difference: Transnational and Transgenerational Curriculum Relationalities

Abstract

Objective/Purpose: The purpose of this conceptual paper is to interrogate the ways in which whiteness is rendered invisible, yet communicated, through popular discourses surrounding progressive schooling philosophies (Montessori, Reggio Emilia, Steiner/Waldorf), and how these philosophies and pedagogies are then appropriated as markers of capitalist status, including wealth, exceptional abilities, and the need for protection.

Framing: Drawing on Hunter Knight’s work that examines the production of “innocence” in progressive schooling (2022), we frame our inquiry using Hasslanger’s (2000) work on what race is. She writes, “...in different contexts, racial distinctions are drawn on the basis of different characteristics…we might say that race is the social meaning of the geographically marked body, familiar markers being skin color, hair type, eye shape, physique.” (pg. 43). We place Hasslanger’s layered annotation on race in conversation with Lipsitz’s (2006) discussion of the ways in which folks invest in whiteness as a means to consider the ways in which race is leveraged as a material good used to hoard resources and then used to cultivate identity.

Methods: Together we pursued dialogic reflexivity (Author et al., 2021) as a means to engage with our varied experiences and understandings of progressive schooling in the U.S., juxtaposed with our observations and experiences while studying the philosophical origins of these pedagogies, and their current iterations, in Italy. Situating this study outside of the U.S. is significant to understanding how these pedagogies appear and function in varied contexts. This helps us contextualize our understanding of the racialized implications of Montessori, Reggio Emilia, and Waldorf/Steiner within the racial systems in the United States.

Data: Data for this inquiry come from observations and conversations the authors engaged in while teaching and facilitating an education policy course in Rome that focused on understanding both the origins and present iterations of progressive schooling philosophies and comparing these understandings to the U.S. contexts as they are portrayed through popular media.

Point of View: The point of view we are interested in is an ongoing and nuanced examination of the ways in which the racing of these progressive schooling philosophies is an ongoing project of whiteness, how this happened, and what we can learn about this from considering the historical and cultural origins of these philosophies.

Significance: If we are to confront racism head-on, then surely one step must be examining the ways in which progressive whiteness undermines efforts to reconsider and redistribute resources and obscures conversations about racism. The idiosyncratic “progressive” that seems to orbit “nice white parents” (Joffe-Walt, 2020) provides a significant challenge to any attempts to act on efforts to redistribute resources, surely, but also, often on our ability to engage in meaningful conversation about the systems and ideologies that are bolstered by our “possessive investment in whiteness” as it appears in progressive schools (Lipsitz, 2006).

Authors

• Maureen Negrelli Coomer, Colorado College

• Elena H. Silverman, Indiana University - Indianapolis

• Francesca Cicchilli, IFSA-Butler