Understanding Critical Race Research Methods and Methodologies

Lessons from the Field

Jessica T. DeCuir-Gunby, Thandeka K. Chapman, Paul A. Schutz, Jessica T. DeCuir-Gunby, Thandeka K. Chapman, Paul A. Schutz

• Éditeur: Routledge
• Année: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781351587617
• Édition: 1
• Sujet: Éducation
• Sous-sujet: Éducation générale

Despite the growing urgency for Critical Race Theory (CRT) in the field of education, the "how" of this theoretical framework can often be overlooked. This exciting edited collection presents different methods and methodologies, which are used by education researchers to investigate critical issues of racial justice in education from a CRT perspective. Featuring scholars from a range of disciplines, the chapters showcase how various researchers synthesize different methods—including qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods, and historical and archival research—with CRT to explore issues of equity and access in the field of education. Scholars discuss their current research approaches using CRT and present new models of conducting research within a CRT framework, offering a valuable contribution to ongoing methodological debates. Researchers across different levels of expertise will find the articulations of CRT and methods insightful and compelling.

Part I
Introduction

1
Critical Race Theory, Racial Justice, and Education

Understanding Critical Race Research Methods and Methodologies

Jessica T. DeCuir-Gunby, Thandeka K. Chapman, and Paul A. Schutz

Although there has been substantial Critical Race Theory (CRT) research in education over the last 20-plus years, focusing on a variety of areas, more forms of critical race research in education are needed to interrogate the complexities of race and racism in education. We are currently experiencing a variety of race-related issues within education that disproportionately impact People of Color. For instance, there is increasing underfunding of public schools (e.g. slashing of state budgets, redirecting of school funding through voucher systems and charter schools, etc.). There are continued attacks on multicultural education/ initiatives and ethnic studies. Within higher education, affirmative action policies are actively being eradicated. Anti-immigrant sentiments, especially towards people of Latinx descent, are on the rise. White nationalism is growing in acceptance within social and political arenas. All of these issues will detrimentally impact People of Color socially, emotionally, politically, and/or financially for generations. Thus, there is an urgency for more CRT research in education focusing on such topics as well as other topics that address racial justice. Despite this growing urgency around the need for more research into racial justice and education, there is a lack of discussion regarding the use of different research methods and methodologies used to seek racial justice. Thus, our aim in this edited book is to discuss and analyze the different methods and methodologies, including qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods used by researchers to investigate educational research problems from a CRT perspective.

Critical Race Theory and Research Methods

Although a few special journal issues (Dixson, Chapman & Hill, 2005; Lynn, Yosso, Solórzano, & Parker 2002; Parker, 2015) and a handful of books (Hopson & Dixson, 2013; Lynn & Dixson 2013; Parker, 1998) have explored race-based research methods and methodologies, there have been few systematic efforts to discuss and analyze how scholars use different research methods and methodologies to examine educational problems from a CRT framework (DeCuir & Dixson, 2004). These published works also reveal the extensive use of qualitative methods in CRT research. In fact, the majority of CRT research in education has utilized qualitative methodological approaches (Hopson & Dixson, 2013; Lynn, Yosso, Solórzano, & Parker 2002; Parker, 1998).

Despite, the majority of CRT research taking a qualitative approach, CRT research is beginning to embrace other methodological approaches. Researchers are increasingly using quantitative approaches. In fact, a recent special issue of Race Ethnicity and Education discussed the emergence of QuantCrit or Quantitative Critical Race Theory in the field (see Garcia, Lopez, & Vélez, 2018). Also, CRT researchers are increasingly using mixed-methods research, the combining of quantitative and qualitative approaches within one study (see DeCuir-Gunby & Walker-DeVose, 2013). This departure from CRT’s qualitative roots has not been without some debate. There are many researchers that feel that quantitative approaches are antithetical to critical frameworks in that quantitative methods are rooted in positivism/post-positivism which embraces assumptions of one truth while qualitative research assumes there are multiple truths (Zuberi & Bonilla-Silva, 2008). However, others feel as though quantitative and mixed methods approaches can be compatible with a CRT framework, as long as the researchers remain true to the tenets of CRT and work to address racial justice (Gillborn, Warmington, & Demack, 2018). Yet, many scholars would agree that the complicated nature of education problems requires varied methodological approaches.

Thus, in general, the objectives of this edited volume are (1) to analyze the research methods and methodologies that have been developed by researchers to investigate educational problems from a critical race theoretical perspective; and (2) to examine the epistemological and ontological issues associated with the transactions among research methods, methodologies, and in this case, critical race theoretical perspectives. This edited book features a number of scholars from a variety of disciplines (i.e. Teacher Education and Policy, School Finance and Policy, and Education Psychology) who use various research methods (e.g. qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods, historical, and archival research) to explore issues of equity and access in the field of education. These scholars discuss their current research approaches using CRT as well as present new models of conducting research within a CRT framework.

Critical Race Theory (CRT) was created as a critique of the slow progress of racial reform within the United States legal arena. It centers around the idea that racism is a permanent fixture of society and focuses on racial power (Bell, 1993). As indicated by Crenshaw, Gotanda, Peller, and Thomas (1995), CRT seeks to understand the creation and maintenance of White Supremacy and how it subordinates People of Color. CRT also seeks to better understand how to change the relationship between race and the law (Matsuda, Lawrence, Delgado, & Crenshaw, 1993).

Although CRT began within the legal realm, it has expanded to many disciplines including the field of education. Ladson-Billings and Tate’s (1995) seminal article, “Toward a Critical Race Theory of Education,” introduced CRT as an essential framework for examining race and racism in education. Since the publication of Ladson-Billings and Tate’s (1995) germinal article, thousands of articles, chapters, and books using a CRT framework have been written, demonstrating the growing importance of CRT in the study of educational problems (Howard & Navarro, 2016). Dixson and Rousseau (2005) provided the initial review of CRT research in education, a ten-year retrospective, and found that most CRT research in education focused on voice, restrictive and expansive views of equality, and colorblindness. Ten years later, Ledesma and Calderón (2015), conducted a review and found that CRT research within K-12 has largely centered around the topics of (1) curriculum and pedagogy; (2) teaching and learning (e.g. teacher attitudes); (3) schooling in general (e.g. climate); and (4) policy, school finance, and community engagement, while the research in higher education has focused on the topics of (1) colorblindness (e.g. language in diversity policies); (2) admissions policies; and (3) campus racial climates (e.g. student and faculty perspectives including racial microaggressions). A review by McCoy and Rodricks (2015) in higher education had similar findings. Within the body of research of CRT in education, researchers have explored instantiations of race and racism through the tenets provided by Ladson-Billings and Tate (1995) as well as other articulations of the theory (Gillborn, 2006; Solórzano & Delgado Bernal 2001; Solórzano & Yosso, 2001; Tate, 1997). Those scholars who use CRT understand the following principles:

• The Centrality of race and racism. Race remains the dominant and consistent, yet sometimes elusive, factor that influences laws, policies, relationships, and practices in education.
• U.S. society is based upon property rights. This proposition postulates that it is essential to examine social inequities, particularly educational inequities, from the understanding that racism is systemic and Whiteness has value.
• Intersectionality of race and racism with other forms of subordination. Racism is intricately woven within all aspects of society and actively interacts with all forms of subordination.
• Challenge to dominant ideology. A major goal of CRT is to question and challenge the status quo or majoritarian perspective. CRT promotes skepticism towards how the law operates in terms of neutrality, objectivity, and colorblindness (being uninfluenced by race).
• Myth of meritocracy. This principle questions the existence of meritocracy or the idea that advancement in society only occurs because of hard work and ability.
• Commitment to social justice. CRT is a liberatory, transformative and emancipatory theory that focuses on racial justice (Peller, 1990). The ultimate goal of CRT is to end racial oppression and other forms of oppression through systemic change.
• Centrality of experiential knowledge. CRT analyses highlight the importance of voice and focuses on the experiences of People of Color.
• Transdisciplinary perspective. In utilizing CRT, there is a focus on a contextual yet historical interpretation of the law. It is essential to apply a CRT analysis taking context into perspective.
• Crosses epistemological understandings of race. CRT stresses the importance of connecting with other disciplines in order to address racism because of its complexity and intricateness.
• Reinterpretation of civil rights outcomes. CRT examines the social and political outcomes of civil rights law to explain current institutional and structural components of racism.

Different research methods in CRT allow scholars to more specifically highlight particular structures, events, behaviors, and outcomes, in different aspects of education, through the lens of CRT. As the field of CRT in education becomes more open to the use of different research methods, scholars are able to use the tenets of CRT to analyze different types of data to attack inequity and injustice in education. In no way do we negate the powerful use of storytelling that remains at the heart of CRT. Indeed, what different methods provide to the field of education research are new ways to understand the myriad inflections of race and racism in society—a new way to uncover and process stories that have yet to be told and stories that hold so much complexity that they require multiple tellings.

Book Structure: Critical Race Methods and Methodologies in Context

The chapters in this book provide readers with examples that show how scholars use various methods and methodologies to construct new ways to interrogate race and racism through CRT. As editors, we asked the authors to explain what some may see as difficult to explain—how they, as the primary tools in the research process, design, implement, and evaluate a critical race methodology in their work. We asked the authors to address their writing tasks, not as “how-to” text-book authors, but through the mode of self-reflection and as generators of new knowledge. As such, not only do the authors share intricate frameworks for research, but also the complexities, seen and unforeseen, of conducting CRT research. To provide readers with a familiar structure, this book is organized under traditional expressions of research methods and methodologies. However, in addition to methodological approaches, the chapters in each section feature a variety of education contexts, epistemological confluences, and research challenges.

In the section following this, Critical Race Archival and Historical Analysis, the authors focus on inquiries of critical race research methods and methodologies in relations to document analysis including archival and historical analysis. Document Analysis is a foundational approach in critical race research, often utilized by legal scholars. The scholars in this section demonstrate a variety of ways in which they utilize document analysis in their research. In Chapter 2, Jamel K. Donnor addresses the importance of history and the legal foundation of CRT by focusing on Brown v. Board of Education and its impact on White antipathy to school desegregation. Similarly, in Chapter 3, Jerome E. Morris and Benjamin D. Parker draw upon historiographic methods to discuss how CRT can be used to examine historical documents and archival records in education. The last chapter in this section, Chapter 4 by Sonja L. Lanehart, uses document analysis to review the seminal journals in the field of linguistics, focusing on intersectionality, and demonstrates how Black women have been ignored in linguistics research.

The next section of the book, Critical Race Qualitative Methods, features chapters that are centered on qualitative research methods. Specifically, this section features chapters that challenge traditional qualitative approaches, critiques researchers own implementations of traditional approaches, and provides novel ways to conduct qualitative research involving CRT. In Chapter 5, Bryan McKinley Jones Brayboy and Jeremiah Chin create a counter-narrative regarding the protagonist Henry Sampson and his experiences in tribal communities and education that is analyzed using the combination of CRT and Critical Indigenous Research Methodologies (CIRM). In Chapter 6, Adrienne D. Dixson, ArCasia James, and Brittany L. Frieson examine the intersection of CRT and Participatory Action Research (PAR) as well discussing the challenges of utilizing such approaches in education reform research. In Chapter 7, David Stovall combines CRT, Jazz Methodology, and Youth Participant Action Research (YPAR) in his discussion of the development of a neighborhood school, focusing on the development of his own member-checking and data triangulation processes as well as the critique of traditional qualitative research processes. In Chapter 8, Theodorea Regina Berry and Elizabeth J. Bowers Cook explore the combining of intersectionality and Narrative Analysis, focusing on how narrative analysis and CRT, particularly counter-storytelling, are compatible. In Chapter 9, Thandeka K. Chapman, Nicholas D. Hartlep, Mary Vang, Talonda Lipsey-Brown, and Tatiana Joseph discuss Team-Based Approaches to conducting CRT research, focusing on the importance of researcher positionality, researcher-participant reciprocity, and general research complexity of team-based research. In the last chapter of this section, Chapter 10, Dolores...