scholarly journals Dismantling white supremacy in environmental studies and sciences: an argument for anti-racist and decolonizing pedagogies

Author(s):  
Eve Z. Bratman ◽  
William P. DeLince

AbstractMany academic disciplines are presently striving to reveal and dismantle structures of domination by working to reform and reimagine their curricula, and the ethics and values that underpin classroom settings. This trend is impelled by momentum from the Black Lives Matter movement in tandem with a worldwide call from Indigenous scholars and their allies for more equality in research and epistemological plurality. We contribute to such efforts through applying perspective and analysis concerning anti-racist and decolonized approaches to teaching environmental studies and sciences (ESS). This article discusses the opportunities and challenges of embracing a decolonized and anti-racist approach with an emphasis on courses in higher education in North America. We conclude with guidance for educators about strategies for incorporating such approaches.

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Courtney Cole ◽  
Audrey Grace

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to respond to racial injustice and white supremacy, within the context of ongoing Black Lives Matter activism against police brutality through public protests.Design/methodology/approachIn this paper, the authors consider the work of organizing institutions of higher education so that Black Lives Matter.FindingsThe authors offer a number of practical insights and suggestions in order to deal with racial injustice and white supremacy and better support Black faculty, staff and students on college campuses.Originality/valueIn addressing issues of racial injustice and white supremacy on college campuses, the authors bring together our experiences and perspectives as diversity officer and faculty member, respectively.


2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 64-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Лаврова ◽  
Oksana Lavrova ◽  
Шведов ◽  
Evgeniy Shvedov

The necessity to form a legal type of thinking for cadets and listeners of higher education institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, to develop the ability to independently make procedural decisions in specific legal situations presupposes the teacher's search for new approaches to teaching, including practical testing of the theoretical knowledge obtained on conditionally-factual material. In this aspect, the participation of cadets and listeners in the production of virtual (educational) investigative actions in carrying out practical exercises on the academic disciplines of the criminal procedure cycle and criminology is advisable. Practical training in a virtual form will allow the teacher to demonstrate to the students the procedural order and stages of investigative actions, teach them a legal assessment of the initial factual situation, instill practical skills in the activities of the investigator, inquirer, and determine the level of theoretical training for cadets and listeners.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 199
Author(s):  
Lena Pauler-Kuppinger ◽  
Regina Jucks

Many debates in higher education center around the role of approaches to teaching (measured with ATI-R) and impact of academic disciplines (soft vs. hard) on teaching practice, e.g. advice giving. An online study with N = 70 academic teachers was conducted and the advice given was content analyzed. Regression analyses showed that academics with a higher student focus (ATI-R) advised more deep learning strategies. Academics from the soft disciplines wrote longer answers, advised more resource management strategies, and provided more reasons for student self-learning that contained fewer external motivators. Hence, the study supports the role of approaches to teaching and academic disciplines on teaching practice.


Humanities ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ken Mondschein

The author makes a strategic argument for the liberal arts grounded in realpolitik (that is, the “realistic” manipulation of the levers of power). In a time of neoliberal university governance, it is useful for fields of study to base appeals for their continued existence on their utility to their institutions. The growth of equity and diversity initiatives in the academy, particularly in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, gives us a means of making this argument, as the liberal arts have utility in questioning the structures of white supremacy and received history and values. By exploiting the cognitive dissonance between the demands of neoliberal governance and the need for diversity and equity, we can make a persuasive case for reinvestment in the liberal arts. Further, this reinvestment ought to be democratized and carried out through all levels of higher education, including, and especially, non-selective, vocationally oriented institutions.


Author(s):  
Cheryl Teelucksingh

On August 12, 2017, in Charlottesville, Virginia, alt-right/White supremacy groups and Black Lives Matter (BLM) supporters came face-to-face regarding what to do about public monuments that celebrate key figures from slavery and the Jim Crow era. White supremacists and White nationalists did not hide their racist ideologies as they demanded that their privileged place in history not be erased. The BLM movement, which challenges state-sanctioned anti-Black racism, was ready to confront themes of White discontent and reverse racism, critiques of political correctness, and the assumption that racialized people should know their place and be content to be the subordinate other.It is easy to frame the events in Charlottesville as indicative of US-specific race problems. However, a sense that White spaces should prevail and an ongoing history of anti-Black racism are not unique to the United States. The rise of Canadian activism under the BLM banner also signals a movement to change Canadian forms of institutional racism in policing, education, and the labor market. This article responds to perceptions that the BLM movement has given insufficient attention to environmental concerns (Pellow 2016; Halpern 2017). Drawing on critical race theory as a conceptual tool, this article focuses on the Canadian context as part of the author’s argument in favor of greater collaboration between BLM and the environmental justice (EJ) movement in Canada. This article also engages with the common stereotype that Blacks in Canada have it better than Blacks in the United States.


2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 169-191
Author(s):  
Eric Burton

AbstractFrom the late 1950s, Africans seeking higher education went to a rapidly increasing number of destinations, both within Africa and overseas. Based on multi-sited archival research and memoirs, this article shows how Africans forged and used new routes to gain access to higher education denied to them in their territories of origin, and in this way also shaped scholarship policies across the globe. Focusing on British-ruled territories in East Africa, the article establishes the importance of African intermediaries and independent countries as hubs of mobility. The agency of students and intermediaries, as well as official responses, are examined in three interconnected cases: the clandestine ‘Nile route’ from East Africa to Egypt and eastern Europe; the ‘airlifts’ from East Africa to North America; and the ‘exodus’ of African students from the Eastern bloc to western Europe. Although all of these routes were short-lived, they transformed official scholarship provisions, and significantly shaped the postcolonial period in the countries of origin.


2017 ◽  
Vol 114 (3) ◽  
pp. 347-356 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Alfred Smith

The Black Lives Matter movement is one of the most dynamic social justice movements currently emerging in the USA. This movement led by young Blacks unapologetically calls out the shameful, historical legacy of American racism and White supremacy while asserting the humanity and sacredness of Black lives, particularly those of unarmed persons senselessly murdered by police officers. While Black Lives Matter is a new movement, it is also an extension of the 400-year struggle of Black people in America to affirm Black dignity, equality, and human rights, even while the major institutions of American society have propagated doctrines and enforced unjust rules/laws to denigrate Black life. Black Christians have found hope and inspiration from the Gospel to claim their humanity and to struggle to gain justice for Black lives and for the lives of all oppressed people. In addition, the Black Lives Matter movement provides a helpful critique of many Black churches, challenging them to confront their biases, which label young Black males as “thugs” (the new N-word) and which cruelly demonize the LGBTQ community. The story of Peter and Cornelius in Acts 10 provides a scriptural basis for Christian introspection and responses to God’s vision for beloved community, and for the call to action from the Black Lives Matter movement.


Author(s):  
Esme Choonara

The emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020 in the context of a COVID-19 pandemic that was already disproportionally impacting on the lives of people from black, Asian and other minority ethnicities in the UK and the US has provoked scrutiny of how racism impacts on all areas of our lives. This article will examine some competing theories of racism, and ask what theoretical tools we need to successfully confront racism in health and social care. In particular, it will scrutinise the different levels at which racism operates – individual, institutional and structural – and ask how these are related. Furthermore, it will argue against theories that see racism as a product of whiteness per se or ‘white supremacy’, insisting instead that racism should be understood as firmly bound to the functioning and perpetuation of capitalism.


2021 ◽  

Premised on the disruption and lessons learnt from the Covid-19 pandemic, and in meticulous response to the impact of the pandemic on higher education – especially in South Africa – this collection of chapters spotlights the effects, consequences, and ramifications of an unprecedented pandemic in the areas of knowledge production, knowledge transfer and innovation. With the pandemic, the traditional way of teaching and learning was completely upended. It is within this context that this book presents interdisciplinary perspectives that focus on what the impact of Covid-19 implies for higher education institutions. Contributors have critically reflected from within their specific academic disciplines in their attempt to proffer solutions to the disruptions brought to the South African higher education space. Academics and education leaders have particularly responded to the objective of this book by focusing on how the academia could tackle the Covid-19 motivated disruption and resuscitate teaching, research, and innovation activities in South African higher education, and the whole of Africa by extension.


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