"You Excluded Us for So Long and Now You Want Us to Be Patriotic?" The Quandary of Citizenship

• In Event: Race, Class, and Gender in Social Studies

Abstract

This qualitative study focused on how five African American women social studies teachers made sense of the construct of citizenship utilizing their knowledge of history and experiential knowledge. The researcher found that the multiple intersections of the participants identities impacted the ways in which they understood and taught citizenship to their students. The women rejected traditional notions of citizenship because they failed to align with their experiences as African American women. They instead chose to teach communal citizenship along with notions of an active citizenry. These alternative views of citizenship may provide a framework in which more inclusive understandings of citizenship can be explored and implemented in social studies classrooms.

Author

• Amanda Elizabeth Vickery, Arizona State University