Critical Race Theory and Cultural Historical Activity Theory in education: Surfacing and disrupting systemic inequities

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 7:45 am - Gold 4
  In Roundtable Session: Structural Forces and Storywork: Qualitative Methodologies for Understanding Identity, Inequity, and Opportunity

Abstract

Despite calls for justice in the educational system in the United States, injustice persists, especially for historically marginalized people. Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a powerful theoretical approach to investigate and surface injustice. Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) provides a productive way to examine activity in context. In tandem, CRT and CHAT can provide effective systematic ways of surfacing power and positionality, and inform improvement in schools. In this paper we present three qualitative studies grounded in CRT and employing three different analytic approaches using CHAT. We highlight how using CRT and CHAT can work to surface and disrupt inequities. We present affordances from the different CHAT analytic approaches to surface and to attend to issues of power and position.

Authors

• Doron Zinger, California State University - Dominguez Hills

• Socorro Cambero, University of California - Irvine

• Abdul-Rehman M. Issa, University of California - San Diego