Curricular Countermovements: How White Parents Mounted a Popular Challenge to Ethnic Studies

• In Event: Racism and White Supremacy: Confrontation, Conflict, and Curriculum

Abstract

This critical ethnography investigates how white parent-activists organized an oppositional movement to Ethnic Studies (ES). Drawing on critical whiteness studies and sociological studies of countermovements, I argue that white parents crafted an oppositional narrative that positioned white, Christian, American boys as victims of ES. I then trace how activists leveraged this narrative to forge an alliance with disability advocates and digitally suture or bind their local ES countermovement to broader right-wing populist currents. Data includes 11 months of participant observation, 146 public school board testimonies, and 20 ethnographic interviews. I conclude by discussing how studies of curricular countermovements might inform scholarly and activist attempts to divest from whiteness and make ES available for all students.

Author

• Ethan Chang, University of Hawaii - Manoa