A "Bad Fit" for "Our" Kids: Politics, Identity, and Power in Parental Discourse on Educational Programming and Child Well-Being

• In Event: 66.058 - Roundtable Session 28
  In Roundtable Session: 66.058-9 - Parents, Communities, and the Negotiation of Complex Power Relationships

Abstract

The American public education system has been a primary context in which issues of race and class have long been debated. Although contemporary discourse regarding issues of race and power in American schools may be less overt in racist ideology than in previous decades, the impact of coded racist discourse can be equally powerful and dangerous. A need exists to identify racist and classist discourse in educational contexts so that the ideologies and practices these discourses reflect can be challenged. This paper uses critical discourse analysis and Critical Race Theory to examine how the discourses of race, class, and power are enacted within a discussion of educational programming and child well-being in a predominantly White, upper-middle class suburban public school.

Author

• Erin Sugrue, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities