W. E. B. Du Bois’s Caste Education: Internalized Borders and Securitization as Safety

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Abstract

Scholars have long critiqued the reach of the criminal legal system into schools, noting the pervasive trend towards securitization (Annamma, 2017; Dizon et al., 2022). Securitization can be viewed through the lens of biopolitics as a means for sorting and segregating students along the lines of a worthy/unworthy dichotomy. Within this paper, I examine the pervasive trend towards securitization through the lens of border studies and decolonial philosophy. I argue that security structures operate as internalized borders within schools that exercise control over racialized student bodies and serve to mediate the risk posed by Black and Brown students to White students, cementing a caste educational system and ensuring a Racial Capitalist future (Du Bois, 1998).

Author

• Martha Perez-Mugg, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign