Toward a Racialized Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (R-CHAT) in Higher Education Research

• In Event: Moscone Center North Roundtable Session 1
  In Roundtable Session: Getting to the Station: Mobility, Community, and Collaboration in Higher Education Research

Abstract

Research highlights multiple affordances of cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT): robust, context-dependent analyses that interrogate issues of power. Yet, an important limitation of CHAT is its lack of engagement with processes of racialization. I put forth a conceptual framework that explicitly takes a race-conscious approach to CHAT. By drawing from critical race theory that positions race and racism as endemic and enduring in U.S. American society, I argue that racialization is a persistent mediating artifact that organizes the functionality of all activity systems. The development of a racialized CHAT (R-CHAT) provides a mechanism for uncovering practices and strategies to identify contradictions in higher education as a “multilayered network of interconnected systems” while moving us toward transformative praxis (Engeström, 1999, p. 36).

Author

• Aireale Joi Rodgers, University of Southern California