(EDU5) Canadian and Comparative Perspectives on Race, Class, and Contested Frameworks in Education

This session is an ‘authors meets critics’ panel which explores issues highlighted in a new anthology, On Class, Race, and Educational Reform: Contested Perspectives, which explores dimensions of educational reform through engagement across critical race theory, Marxism, intersectionality, critical ethnic studies, and other critical frameworks. It brings together Canadian scholars, who will address in particular the relevance of these themes within the Canadian context, followed by commentary by several contributors to the book offering reflections on similarities and differences across contexts, including the US, UK, and other nations. The session is intended foster further dialogue and engagement focused on advancing progressive reform in education and other institutional sites.

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This session is co-sponsored by the Canadian Society for the Study of Education.  We invite you to attend our session in the morning, (EDU4) Race, Class, and Contested Frameworks in Education: A Dialogic Project.

Moderator: Terry Wotherspoon, Department of Sociology, University of Saskatchewan

Participants:

Elaine Coburn, International Studies, York University

Johanne Jean-Pierre, Department of Sociology, York University

Dan Cui, Department of Child and Youth Studies, Brock University

The Continuing Debates on Race and Class: Reflecting on Chinese Immigrants in Canada

This paper responds to the book, On Class, Race, and Educational Reform: Contested Perspectives by highlighting some relevant experiences of Chinese Immigrants in Canada. Particularly, it discusses the discrimination and exclusion that Chinese immigrant labourers encountered in the labour market and Chinese immigrant students experienced at school and through their school to university transition from history to the present. It contributes to the continuing academic debates on race and class by showcasing the complexity of racism and capitalism in subordinating racialized minority groups in the global power hierarchy. More importantly, it highlights the continuing significance of “race” in depriving racialized minority students of equal educational opportunities and life chances. Theoretically, drawing on Bourdieu, it elaborates on the concept of “racialized habitus” and expands its primary theoretical focus from class to race. Such theoretical understanding, it argues, will help the scholars on the left to better understand what they are fighting against, most importantly, what is missing and what else should be done.

Discussants:

• Antonia Darder, Leavey Emerita Chair in Ethics and Moral Leadership, Loyola Marymount University
• Cleveland Hayes, Indiana University, USA
• Kevin Lam, School of Education, Drake University
• Howard Ryan, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, West Virginia University

 

Tags: Canadian Sociology, Education, Race and Ethnicity

Organizers: Terry Wotherspoon, University of Saskatchewan, Howard Ryan, West Virgina University, Antonia Darder, Loyola Marymount University