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Who Let the Elephant in the Room? Analyzing Race and Racism Through a Critical Family Literacy Book Club Lamar L

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Who Let the Elephant in the Room? Analyzing Race and Racism Through a Critical Family Literacy Book Club Lamar L University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Theses and Dissertations 12-15-2014 Who Let the Elephant in the Room? Analyzing Race and Racism through a Critical Family Literacy Book Club Lamar L. Johnson University of South Carolina - Columbia Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd Part of the Curriculum and Instruction Commons Recommended Citation Johnson, L. L.(2014). Who Let the Elephant in the Room? Analyzing Race and Racism through a Critical Family Literacy Book Club. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/3048 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you by Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Who Let the Elephant in the Room? Analyzing Race and Racism through a Critical Family Literacy Book Club by Lamar L. Johnson Bachelor of Arts University of South Carolina, 2010 Master of Arts in Teaching University of South Carolina, 2011 Master of Education University of South Carolina, 2012 ________________________________________________________________________ Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Education in Curriculum and Instruction College of Education University of South Carolina 2014 Accepted by: Gloria Boutte, Major Professor Tambra Jackson, Major Professor Allison Anders, Committee Member Rhonda Jeffries, Committee Member Lacy Ford, Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies © Copyright by Lamar L. Johnson, 2014 All Rights Reserved. ii DEDICATION To my parents, Robert and Barbara Howard and my grandmother, Fannie Mae Johnson. Your words of wisdom, your hard work, and most importantly, your unconditional love were sources of inspiration and encouragement. And To my students Thanks so much for supporting me through this project. Remember, we are freedom fighters who are fighting to create the world that is not yet. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There are many people who were influential and instrumental in the development of this dissertation---too many to name. Nonetheless, I have been blessed and fortunate to have so many supportive people around me---thank you for your love, support, and time during this process. I will be forever grateful of your kind words and most importantly, your unwavering faith in me to achieve this goal. Some of those people are (in no particular order): Barbara and Robert Howard Fannie Mae Johnson Dr. Gloria Boutte Dr. Tambra Jackson Dr. Allison Anders Dr. Rhonda Jefferies Dr. Nathaniel Bryan Dywanna Smith Brittany Garvin Roblesha Howard Dalisha Williams Shel Lessington Jennifer Doyle Jaimie Small iv Devin Biggers Shea Husser Michael Irby Zaphane Holland Garridon Hankins Courtney Bryan v ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to interpret, investigate, and analyze how race, racism, and power are embedded and intertwined not only in society but also in the education system and in homes and communities. Specifically, through parent and student engagement during a series of book club meetings, I investigated how parents’ racial identities impacted how they created critical dialogue pertaining to issues of race, racism, and power with their children. Guided by critical race pedagogy, critical race theory (CRT) and CRT methodology, this study used race as a critical analytic lens to examine the lives and work of people of color and Whites as well as the roles their homes, schools, and communities played in the development of their racial and cultural identities. I conducted in-depth reflexive interviews and focus groups with high school freshmen and their parents to investigate their experiences as they maneuvered race-related processes and discourses in society, schools, home, and communities. Drawing from interviews, memos, field notes, and other forms of research data, I created composite characters, and I presented the findings of this study through a dramaturgical performance. Findings showed that parents created dialogues with their children about social and equity issues in “episodic” moments (our memory of experiences and specific events in time in a sequential form). Furthermore, because of their involvement in the book club parents and students gained a deeper critical understanding of race and racism as vi evidenced by the findings and reoccurring themes from the data. Throughout the book club, some of the students and parents possessed a colorblind approach when it came to race. Furthermore, implications are provided to support educators, policy makers, researchers, parents, and students in challenging and overturning racial practices in various social institutions such as homes and schools as we begin to address and challenge the perplexity and the systemic effects of racism while taking different approaches to foreground an anti-racist agenda. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION ................................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... iv ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................... vi LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ xi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION .................................................................................1 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM ...................................................................... 8 RESEARCH PURPOSE AND QUESTIONS ......................................................12 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY.......................................................................13 RATIONALE FOR A CRITICAL FAMILY LITERACY BOOK CLUB ...........14 DEFINITIONS OF TERMS ..................................................................................15 CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF RELATED RESEARCH .............................................17 THEORETICAL AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK ....................................17 THE SOCIALCULTURAL NATURE OF LITERACY .......................................26 CRITICAL LITERACY ........................................................................................30 LITERACY AND RACIAL JUSTICE ..................................................................31 PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT.............................................................................35 POSITIVISTIC LITERATURE ON PARENT INVOLVEMENT .......................42 ECOLOGICAL LITERATURE ON PARENT INVOLVEMENT .......................44 CRITICAL LITERATURE ON PARENT INVOLVEMENT ..............................47 CHAPTER THREE: IMPETUS FOR PILOT STUDY ....................................................51 viii PILOT STUDY ......................................................................................................54 PARTICIPANTS ...................................................................................................55 RESEARCH QUESTIONS ...................................................................................55 PROCEDURES......................................................................................................55 DATA SOURCES AND DATA COLLECTION..................................................56 FINDINGS .............................................................................................................58 CHAPTER FOUR: METHODOLOGY ...........................................................................63 ROLE OF NARRATIVE IN CRITICAL RACE METHODOLOGY ..................65 CONTEXT AND PARTICIPANTS ......................................................................66 DATA COLLECTION AND METHODS ............................................................67 OBSERVATIONS AND FIELD NOTES .............................................................67 INTERVIEWS .......................................................................................................67 FOCUS GROUPS ..................................................................................................67 DATA ANALYSIS: CREATING COMPOSITE CHARACTERS ......................68 RESEARCHER’S SITUATED KNOWLEDGE ...................................................76 TRUSTWORTHINESS .........................................................................................80 LIMITATIONS ......................................................................................................81 CHAPTER FIVE: DRAMATURGICAL PERFORMANCE ...........................................83 ACT ONE: OVERTURE OF THE PLAY.............................................................84 ACT TWO: “HERE IN THE SOUTH, WE ARE TWENTY YEARS BEHIND”: RACE IN THE SOUTH.........................................................................................89 ACT THREE: “I FEEL LIKE I DON’T BELONG”: RACE AS AN IDENTITY CONSTRUCTOR ..................................................................................................92 ACT FOUR: “WE HAVE TO SEE COLOR”: COLORBLINDNESS .................96 ix ACT FIVE: “BLACK IS IN AND LIGHT IS OUT”: COLORISM .....................98 ACT SIX: BLACKNESS AS A TOOL OF RESISTANCE ................................100 CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................104 SUMMARY .........................................................................................................104
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