UMD Department of English invites educators to discuss racism in academia
Dr. Stephanie Jones, assistant professor of education at Grinnell College, speaking on curriculum violence during the “Rupturing Anti-blackness in English Education: A Roundtable” virtual event. (Tinashe Chingarande/Black Explosion)
The Center for Literary and Comparative Studies at the University of Maryland hosted an online roundtable on how educators can combat anti-Blackness in English education on Friday.
The event, “Rupturing Anti-blackness in English Education: A Roundtable,” was the fifth installation of the English department’s “Antiracism: Communities + Collaborations” series. It was co-sponsored by the College of Education’s Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership Department Antiracist Task Force.
“There are many conversations to be married,” said Dr. Rossina Zamora Liu, who moderated the event. Liu is an assistant clinical professor at the university’s college of education.
“By focusing on anti-Blackness in education [we are] looking at [how] our structures and systems are rooted in white supremacy,” she said.
Anti-Backness exists in all forms of oppression experienced in the U.S., said Liu. Therefore, dismantling systems of white supremacy addresses other forms of oppression such as sexism and queerphobia, she added.
As it relates to educators, Liu suggested that teachers should “check from within” to combat anti-Blackness within their work.
“You have to think about who you are in relation to structures,” said Liu.
Liu said that while this thought process may be complex, it is necessary that teachers interrogate how they benefit, or not, from white-centric education systems and “move toward change.”
During the roundtable, panelists also discussed curriculum violence.
Curriculum violence is a deliberate manipulation of academic programming that compromises the intellectual or psychological well-being of learners, according to scholars Erhabor Ighodaro and Greg Wiggan in “Curriculum Violence: America’s New Civil Rights Issue.”
Dr. Stephanie Jones, one of the panelists and the assistant professor of education at Grinnell College in Iowa, referenced curriculum violence when mentioning how teachers in the classroom — intentionally or subtly — can perpetuate racist stereotypes that harm and dehumanize students of color.
She said that an example of curriculum violence can be seen when history teachers describe white settlers as “benevolent” and say they fought for the South in the Civil War, but not because they believed in enslavement.
Jones believes this is a form of brainwashing because it tries justify the abstract of the South while ignoring the harm inflicted upon Black people through slavery.
“[Teachers] engage in violence against Black and Brown students of color who have to sit through, witness and endure these violent narratives,” said Liu in agreement.