Education for Black Liberation (325-0-20)
Instructors
Kihana Miraya Ross
Meeting Info
Kresge Centennial Hall 2-331: Mon, Wed 2:00PM - 3:20PM
Overview of class
This class considers what it means to conceptualize, articulate, and actualize a liberatory Black educational project within U.S. public schools structured by anti-Black solidarity. In the first section of the course, we explore the fight to desegregate public schools and the ways the historic Brown v. Board of Education case transformed schooling for Black children and their communities. In considering the impact of the Brown decision on the experiences of Black students in U.S. public schools, we interrogate the rebukes of Brown including the various educational projects (community control, Panther freedom schools, the Black independent school movement etc.) advanced in Brown's aftermath. In the second section of the course, we explore the myriad ways Black students experience antiblackness and anti-Black racism in U.S. public schools contemporarily, as well as the ways Black students, educators, administrators, community and family members, and scholars have articulated what the notion of liberation may mean in the face of antiblackness. In the final section of the course, we consider the tensions and possibilities in the desire to "get free" within the confines of U.S. public schools.
Learning Objectives
Comprehend historical foundations of U.S. public education and its intersection with anti-Black racism
Cultivate ability to stake and debate claims regarding Black educational activism
Develop critical understandings of the meanings and practices of liberation in Black educational settings
Flex muscles of imagination in thinking beyond current educational structures to what might be
Discussion of weekly readings and short papers on course topics will illustrate such comprehension.
30% of the grade is either classroom discussion or presentation, and the final project is to write a speech in the voice of an actual interlocutor in Black educational debates. Each of these develops claims-making skills. This assessment foregrounds the ability to foster respectful debate.
The short papers will review examples from the readings about Black liberation experiments, and the classroom discussions will allow students to learn from each other and sharpen their critical analytical skills.
The short papers and the final written speech both allow students to go beyond the class discussion to imagine better ways of creating learning communities for Black children.
Class Attributes
Social and Behavioral Science Foundational Discipl
U.S. Perspectives on Power, Justice, and Equity
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area