Defining Social Justice for New Times and New Contexts
Sonia Nieto
Diversity and Globalization Conference
University of Helsinki, Finland
April 2008

• How does our current sociopolitical context including issues of globalization, immigration, and diversity - influence teacher education and the work we do with future and practicing teachers?
• What difference can multicultural education make?
• What do teachers need to know in terms of skills, competencies, values, beliefs, practices, and strategies in order to negotiate the current context?

The Sociopolitical Context globalization diversity immigration racism exploitation

(David Gillborn, 2008)
Economic and social policies
National security
Social and cultural identity
Political policies

• Approximately 192,000,000 people live outside their place of birth
• This represents about 3% of the world’s population
• Annual growth is about 3% and growing
• 75% of the increase occurred in just 17 countries

like “smog in the air”:
“Sometimes it is so thick it is visible, other times it is less apparent, but always, day in and day out, we are breathing it in. None of us would introduce ourselves as ‘smog-breathers’ (and most of us don’t want to be described as prejudiced), but if we live in a smoggy place, how can we avoid breathing the air?
Beverly Daniel Tatum

“Everyday racism”
Laws, traditions
Slavery, genocide
Virulent Softer “postmodern racism”
(Flecha et al, 2006)
“Everyday racism”
(Essed, 1991)

• Individual/ personal
• Institutional
• Denial
– Colorblindness
– Colormute
(Pollock, 2004)
– “No problem here”
(Gaine, 1987)
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• “…English education policy plays an active role in supporting and affirming… racist inequities and structures of oppression…”
Gillborn (2005)
• “ represents a new synthesis of the technocratic/industrial model of education”
(Luke,
2004)

“Finland is allergic to immigration”
(Castells, 2005)
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Immigrants make up
2% of entire Finnish population of 5.2 million
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About 122,000 foreign-born who speak more than 60 languages

several levels of the sociopolitical context
Personal…
Collective…
Institutional…
Ideological…

Education in a
Sociopolitical Context
• Laws, regulations, policies, practices, traditions
• Ideologies, assumptions, and expectations
• Structural barriers and biases based on these laws, policies, ideologies, and assumptions

Who is intelligent?
Whose language is “standard”?
Whose lifestyle is “normal”?
Who decides? Who benefits? Who loses?

Manifestations of the sociopolitical context at the school and classroom levels
How do school policies and practices benefit some students over others
(curriculum, pedagogy, hiring practices, extracurricular activities…
Who decides? benefits? Who loses?

Manifestations of at the individual level
• Relationships with students:
– Who are favored?
– Which students receive
“additive” (Cummins, 1996) education and which ones receive “subtractive education” (Valenzuela,
1999)?
• What is the basis for sorting and other pedagogical decisions?

r u c t s l r a t u
Lack of resources in home and school
Racism and personal and institutional biases
Poverty
Poor infrastructure
Unfair bureaucratic policies and practices e q u i n t y a li

Critical multicultural education: some assumptions
• Identity, difference, power, and privilege are all connected
• Multicultural education is inclusive of many differences
• Teachers are not the villains

• Anti-racist and antibias
• Basic
• Important for all students
• Pervasive
• A process
• Education for social justice
• Critical pedagogy

• Not simply celebratory
• Does not
“automatically” take care of racism and other biases
• Confronts racism and other biases through content and pedagogy
– Welcomes
“dangerous discourses”
– Encourages students to take action

• As basic as reading, writing, arithmetic, bilingualism and computer literacy
• Part of the core curriculum
• A more representative and more truthful canon
• Preparation for living in an increasingly diverse world

Not just for immigrant students or others thought to be “disadvantaged”
All students are
“disadvantaged” and miseducated, but in different ways

• Not a specific subject matter, unit, class, or teacher
• Not just learning the national language
• Not just ethnic tidbits, holidays, festivals, or fairs
A philosophy, a lifestyle, a way of thinking about the world

• Draws on students’ resources, talents, and strengths, and “funds of knowledge”
(González & Moll,
2005)
• Creates a learning environment that promotes critical thinking and agency for social change

• Challenges, confronts, and disrupts misconceptions, untruths, and stereotypes
• Provides all students with the resources necessary to become fully human and to learn to their full potential (both material and emotional)

Education for Social Justice
• Asks “profoundly multicultural questions”:
•
Who has access to high level knowledge?
•
Is the program for immigrant/refugee children in the basement?
• Prepares students for their future as citizens in a multicultural and democratic society
• Is democracy at its best: messy, complicated, and sometimes full of conflict

• Goes beyond curriculum and materials, textbooks and units
• Is dynamic, ongoing, ever-changing
• Requires learning about students’ identities, histories, and communities
• Involves intangibles:
•
•
Relationships
Communication

• Knowledge is always political
(Freire, 1970)
• Every educational decision reflects a political perspective
• Not about “political correctness” but about multiple perspectives
• Teaches students to question, explore, critique, ask “why?” and “why not?”

Multicultural EDUCATION =

What the research says is needed to prepare “highly qualified teachers”
• a solid general education background
• a deep knowledge of their subject matter
• familiarity with numerous pedagogical approaches
• strong communication skills
• effective organizational skills

Values
Beliefs
Sensibilities
Political awareness and commitment

BUILDING ON TEACHERS’ VALUES
AND CONCERNS
• A sense of mission
• Solidarity with, and empathy for, students
• The courage to question mainstream knowledge and conventional wisdom
• Improvisation
• A passion for social justice

A Sense of Mission: Mary Cowhey
Teaching is a way to live in the world. I just can’t see myself living in this world if I am not doing something positive. Size and effectiveness do not matter too much to me, if I nurture one plant or a large garden, if
I help one person well, if I reach 20 children and their families in a year, or thousands, what is important is that I do it and do it well, that I do it with heart…
I teach because I agree with
Gandhi: “If we are to achieve real peace, we shall have to begin with the children.”

Solidarity with, and empathy for, students
• caring
• mentoring
• advocacy
• admiration
• high expectations

I teach because I see extraordinary possibilities in students. One teacher was José, a student with a speech impediment and hearing impairment. He helped me to understand that the words “I can’t” have no place in the classroom.
Melinda Pellerin-Duck

The courage to challenge mainstream knowledge and conventional wisdom
“Critical education has to integrate the students and the teachers into a mutual creation and re-creation of knowledge”
Ira Shor (1987)

The Courage to Challenge mainstream knowledge and conventional wisdom
I want my students to realize that science is not the objective pursuit of knowledge that it is professed to be. I want them to understand that data may support a hypothesis that is not valid to begin with. I want them to know that correlation does not imply causality. I want them to know there are hidden variables that may affect an experiment. I want them to know about researcher bias. I want them to know all this so that when they read in the newspaper that “minority SAT scores are down,” they know that these data must be due to social, economic, and political inequities in our society. They are not due to genetic inferiority.
Jennifer Welborn

…”a way of thinking and behaving… creativity within structure”
(Theresa Jenoure)
Ayla Gavins:
Teaching is like being on a moving train, because “on any given day, teachers make hundreds, even thousands of decisions to keep a balance of fairness and equity.”

Ambrizeth Lima:
Teaching is always about power. That is why it must also be about social justice.
Is it morally right for me, as a teacher, to witness injustice toward students and remain quiet?

social Justice in the curriculum
Patty Bode: “my skin color art lesson tells me so much about my students, but more important, it tells my students why I teach: to create a classroom that is deliberately anti-racist, where respectful dialogue, critical thinking, and lots of messy art making are required.”

SOCIAL JUSTICE AND ADVOCACY
Bill Dunn:
So why do I teach? I teach because someone has to tell my students that they are not the ones who are dumb. They need to know that only the blissfully ignorant and profoundly evil make up tests to prove that they and people like them are smart…

Provide the time and resources for teachers to be exposed these ideas
• Promote teacher research
• Set aside time for learning and reflection
• Provide resources that are meaningful and useful

Create opportunities for teachers to work collaboratively
The What Keeps Teachers Going?
Inquiry Group

Support teachers in their efforts to take
Risks and make change
“Everything that affects our students is our responsibility.
Standing up for what I believe has always been a part of my being. This meant that I would have to muster up the courage to continue to take risks for the benefit of my students.”
Nina Tepper

It is fundamental for us to know that without certain qualities or virtues, such as a generous loving heart, respect for others,
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tolerance, humility, a joyful disposition, love of life, openness to what is new, a disposition to welcome change, perseverance in the struggle, a refusal of determinism, a spirit of hope, and openness to justice, progressive pedagogical practice is not possible. It it something that the merely scientific, technical mind cannot accomplish.
Paulo Freire (1920-1997)