Understanding American Reform Jewish Teens' Emerging Racial Literacy and Historical Consciousness

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Wednesday 9:00 am Four Seasons Ballroom 1
  In Roundtable Session: CERECG SIG Round Table 1: Disrupting Whiteness and Cultivating Racial Consciousness in Education (Table 3)

Abstract

American Jewish educational institutions likely continue to construct and disseminate reductive narratives about the history and legacy of racism and inequality to their students, despite the extant historiographical research that has called the veracity of these narratives into question (Brodkin, 2010; Greenberg, 2010; Shapiro, 2014). My research investigates the narratives through which American Reform Jewish students are socialized around issues of racism, inequality, and Jewish history – and the narratives students themselves harbor about these issues. This research unearths the specific needs of American Reform Jewish students’ emerging racial literacy, and it demonstrates a significant dissonance between American Reform Jewish students’ understanding of racism and inequity and their ability to apply these concepts to their own community’s history and legacy.

Author

• Bryan Hanan Oren, University of Haifa