Introduction
Challenges to racism in education are approached from diverse perspectives and understandings of black childrenâs experiences in the classroom. However, although experiences are unique, some common underlying issues in the form of both institutional and interactional aspects of racism contribute to everyday life in the early years setting. Although often unintentional and misinterpreted, they must be recognised as creating an environment that contributes to the racialisation of black children. This chapter introduces Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a theoretical approach for interpretation of how these factors may operate through childrenâs everyday interactions during their first introduction to an institutional culture that differs from that in their homes. Understanding their experiences through a CRT lens can allow for a greater insight into how possible discriminatory practices can be addressed. CRT accepts as a fundamental truth that racism is embedded in society and its institutions (Ladson-Billings and Tate IV, 2009). The term racialisation is used to describe processes whereby people are categorised based on socially constructed concepts of race. Racialisation is perpetuated not only through personal interactions but also through activity in institutional practices. Despite popular beliefs in their innocence and perceived lack of awareness of racial differences between people, children are not isolated from the effects of racialisation and related notions of power and privilege. By applying CRT precepts it is possible to challenge the complex and often subtle manifestations of race and racism that influence early education (Burdsey, 2011). CRT recognises the historical development of British society, such as slavery and colonisation, as having contributed to the inevitability of racism being present today across all areas of social policy and practice. Social and economic factors impact on young childrenâs lives and their experiences in school. However, the premise that racism is present in both covert and overt forms does not mean that black children are inevitably prevented from accessing educational opportunities. CRT can inform professional and personal responsibilities to address racism and to support childrenâs personal challenges to racialisation, as evidenced through their own stories in this book.
This chapter also discusses the concept of whiteness as a social construct and how this can be an important discriminatory factor in education, as it creates hierarchies of power that marginalise and other those who do not conform to the cultural norms of institutional ethos and practices. Whiteness is accompanied with what McIntosh (1997) refers to as an invisible knapsack of privileges that can go unrecognised by those who carry them. These advantages and the normalisation of whiteness are discussed here as contributing to inequalities in education. The CRT tenets discussed below are aimed at recognising the processes of racialisation that can stealthily marginalise black children. Listening to their voices through a CRT lens can contribute to the existing aims and action in the early years sector towards providing equality.
What is Critical Race Theory?
Critical Race Theory (CRT) emerged in the 1970s as a movement founded in American Critical Legal Studies (CLS) to address disadvantages in the legal system that disempower and discriminate against black people (Taylor, 2009; Yosso, 2005). During the 1960s, the civil rights movement in the United States protested against the unjust treatment of black people across America, resulting in legislative change through civil rights law. This was anticipated to be advantageous to the black community in creating a more equal society and signifying the end of racism. However, racism continued to disadvantage othered communities in all areas of American life. To further address this disadvantage, CRT was introduced as a race-conscious viewpoint within CLS to place race at the centre of legal analyses (Crenshaw, 1995). CRT was further applied in the 1980s to all areas of society through a multidisciplinary approach to centralise race in the challenge to inequalities (Delgado and Stefancic, 2001; Parker and Lynn, 2009). To challenge historically derived discrimination and racism in British society, CRT has recently been adapted to the UK context (Taylor et al., 2009; Hylton et al., 2009). Although the USA and the UK have different historical contexts regarding race relations, there are similarities in power relations between black and white populations as a consequence of slavery. Equality legislation in Britain has been in place since the 1976 Race Relations Act but has made little structural change to the lives of the black communities (MacGregor-Smith, 2017). CRT is applied to the UK context as a means to disrupt this continued disadvantage through centring race and racism in both education and other aspects of social policy as a main determinant in experiences of minority communities. CRT principles can enable a more direct approach to challenge elements that reproduce inequality in early years settings by focusing on the processes that reproduce disadvantage. Action can then be channelled away from personal locations to focus on structural discriminatory practices (Preston, 2009). Personal commitment to challenge racism can have minimal effect unless the institutional factors are also addressed. This can begin by acknowledging how children are racialised through both external and internal processes that reproduce disadvantage. Institutional factors in early years education that impact on inequalities can include pedagogy, curriculum, staffing and procedures for addressing racism.
A more equitable learning environment for young children can be possible by centralising race in policy decisions through a CRT framework that considers the historical, social and political contexts of young black childrenâs experiences in early years education. We are all influenced by our generational histories with social factors, as well as racism at institutional and personal levels, contributing to barriers against equality in education. It is against a current background of increasing cuts in public services, rising unemployment, poverty and unequal housing policies that young British children bring their socio-cultural experiences to the early years setting. A CRT lens places importance on the historical experiences of racism to contextualise young black childrenâs social worlds today in terms of their racialised identities, cultural stereotypes, and social and economic positions. Young children are living with the consequences of government policy on their families during processes of early socialisation when they begin to understand what it means to be black and British. This is discussed in Chapter 2 in relation to black childrenâs identities within the current political context of what constitutes Britishness arising from introduction of the Prevent strategy (HMG, 2011). Young childrenâs early education does not take place in isolation but is influenced by events that impact on families before birth and afterwards within an ecological niche which contextualises their lives (Aubrey et al., 2000). All aspects of childrenâs social and economic lives have relevance to their formative years in education when placed in a cultural-historical context of race relations in the UK. The intersections of immigration status, gender, phenotype, sexuality and religion are all influencing factors on black childrenâs cultures and identities (Yosso, 2005). Gender and phenotype feature strongly in the experiences of children in this book, as revealed in Devonâs and Pinaâs stories (Chapters 3 and 5). Wright Jnr. describes the powerful impact of race on black childrenâs lives as an overriding element:
Race dominates our personal lives because it manifests itself in our speech, dance, neighbours and friends, and in our ways of talking, walking, eating and dreaming.
(1997, p. 321)
The early formative experiences of black children are challenged through their initial relationships with the institutional whiteness of school. This ethos can deny the integral role of black people in society, which Fryer (1985) suggests has existed since the Roman invasion of the second century AD. During slavery and following abolition, black people continued to be part of English society across all classes and professions. It is rarely discussed that from 1885 Queen Victoria financially supported a young African girl and, later, her daughter throughout their education (Myers, 1999). Queen Victoriaâs Asian goddaughter was a member of her court and active in the early suffragette movement. Aspects of British history that tell of past and present roles of the black population in British society are often excluded from the school curriculum, marginalising black communities as the other and alienating pupils through invisibility.
Attitudes in society to the black population in Britain are strongly influenced by government policy on immigration, employment, housing and economic factors. The development of immigration and race relations policies since the 1940s has impacted on the families of many black children currently in early years settings. Original settlers from the Caribbean who came to contribute to the rebuilding of Britain after the Second World War report how discrimination was evident during this period, in housing, employment and education (Phillips and Phillips, 1998). Assimilation was the emerging ideology in race relations during the 1950s as England became more ethnically and racially diverse. Assimilation can be defined as âthe attempt to eradicate, or at least reduce to an absolute minimum, signs of racial and cultural differenceâ (Gillborn, 2009, p. 73). Assimilation of diverse cultures was considered at the time as essential to the maintenance of the dominant culture, as affiliations through ethnicity could be seen to promote alternative group values that threaten traditional Britishness. An immigrant and generational black British youth emerged with economic disadvantage as racism established a barrier to assimilation into white cultural norms.
Integration became the revised policy shift of the 1970s in response to unrealistic expectations of assimilation through denial of cultural diversity. Integration aimed to provide for âco-existence of minority cultures with the majority culture in a two-way process, each being of equal value and being equally respectedâ (Lane, 2008, p. 338). Integration requires acceptance of diverse cultures in society and willingness to live side by side, acknowledging differences positively, which is sometimes referred to as the âmelting potâ of British culture. This is where reified notions of cultural habitus are respected and valued as an âexotic and interesting mixâ when viewed from the accepted but undisrupted hierarchy of white cultural norms (Bradbury, 2013, p. 85).
Multiculturalism and cultural pluralism are coexistent terms applied within the race relations policy of integration. The terms describe intentional support for the right to maintain an independent cultural heritage while publically accepting and abiding by cultural norms established by the white indigenous population. Integration fails to address the structural aspects of racism in society, but rather promotes cultural differences through multiculturalism and harmonious relationships. This approach can further racialise communities by othering those who do not subscribe to cultural norms of a perceived traditional Britishness.
Cultural pluralism and multiculturalism assume commonality within fixed cultural definitions of homogenised groups. This essentialism denies colonial and postcolonial histories of immigrant communities and the development of emerging variations in cultural identities and experiences of racialisation within a concept of Britishness. Without recognition of discriminatory political, social and economic factors as barriers to equality, policies of meritocracy that place responsibility solely on the individual will continue to marginalise sections of the community. These discussions continue within the current debate that blames immigration for economic and social decline in Britain, contributing to the majority decision in 2016 for Britain to leave the European Union. Assimilation has been rephrased as Britishness with cultural diversity interpreted as a destructive element whereas it was historically welcomed in integration policy as being positive towards an inclusive British culture. Social and political factors contribute to the experiences of black children before they enter the early years setting. Multiculturalism can be argued as marginalising rather than including black children through an acceptance of whiteness as the norm in British culture, reproducing essentialist notions of cultural diversity and false stereotypes of their lives. Within a culturally hierarchical society such as Britain with a history of racism, CRT questions whether difference can be interpreted as positive and otherness equal without race and racism being central to the debate (Delgado and Stefancic, 2001).
The guiding principles of CRT towards an understanding of black childrenâs experiences
CRT can provide a focus on how racism impacts on everyday personal interactions and systemic processes within early years institutions. Covert ways in which children are racialised through routines and the hidden curriculum should be considered when determining action to support black children such as those whose experiences form the rationale for this book. Anti-racist activity is facilitated by applying the precepts of CRT as a framework for analysis of childrenâs experiences to understand the processes of racialisation that can impact on early education. CRT is not only a theoretical lens through which to observe and analyse early experiences in education, but it also demands action towards inclusive environments that challenge discriminatory processes. The guiding principles of CRT have no single definition as interpretations can vary according to differing contexts. However, Hylton offers a summary of the tenets that form the foundation of a CRT framework:
- The centralisation of race and racism.
- A transdisciplinary approach to CRT, which recognises the centrality of race and intersectionality of experience in relation to class, gender, ability, culture and religion.
- The centralisation of the marginalised voice.
- The challenge to traditional dominant ideologies around objectivity, meritocracy colour-blindness, race-neutrality and equal opportunities.
- A commitment to social justice, liberation and transformation.
(2009, pp. 29â36)
These tenets, although not exhaustive, form the basis of CRT praxis and are emerging as a useful framework for educational research and practice in England. For further reading, Delgado and Stefancic (2001) provide an introduction to CRT that outlines and discusses the tenets and principles of CRT. This chapter focuses on those tenets that are the most relevant to contextualise, analyse and understand the experiences of the children who share their stories in this book.
Counter-narratives â the centralisation of race and racism in early years education through listening to the voices of black children
A primary tenet of CRT is acceptance that racism is endemic in society, and therefore all young children become aware of racism as they are exposed from birth to societal attitudes to race alongside other areas of discrimination. It is through interactions within families and wider communities that such understandings and attitudes form the foundations for new experiences. Omi and Winant (2005, p. 10) propose that as race is a socially constructed concept based partly on physical appearance, it is historically embedded in society and will determine hierarchies in social relationships despite contextual political, economic and social shifts. They see the concept of race operating as an inevitable and positive âmarker of the infinity of variations humans hold as a common heritageâ. CRT facilitates an understanding of the lived, ever-changing realities of racism and how it continues historically in society to disadvantage sections of the British population and benefit others. By acknowledging how race...
