Is "Diversity" the Word? How Seeking Equality (Re)produces Invisibility and Racial Melancholia

• In Event: 42.029 - Then and Now: Grappling With Race in Psyche and Society

Abstract

This paper is a theoretical examination of diversity and inclusion as well as the discourse of equality that reverberates in school policies, curriculum, and pedagogy. Drawing on the “Racial Contract” (Mills, 1997, 2011) and racial melancholia (Cheng, 1997, 2001) and grounded in African American literature, we interrogate the structures, which undergird the relationship between the premises of equality and the struggle to be visible. We believe that in order to confront this tension and to reimagine curriculum and pedagogy that works for all, teachers, scholars, and activists must engage in the political, psychological, and historical processes that mold schools and classrooms into melancholic spaces that simultaneously encourage inclusivity and equality, while also manufacturing invisible subjects.

Authors

• Alissa Case, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• Ezekiel Joubert, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• Colleen Rost-Banik, Windward Community College

• Noah Isaiah Sims, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• David Andrew Melendez, The University of Minnesota