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UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO Which UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO Which Neither Devils nor Tyrants Could Remove: The Racial-Spatial Pedagogies of Modern U.S. Higher Education A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnic Studies by Vineeta Singh Committee in charge: Professor Dayo F. Gore, Chair Professor Akosua Boatema Boateng Professor Kirstie A. Dorr Professor Sara Clarke Kaplan Professor Curtis F. Marez Professor Shelley Streeby 2018 Copyright Vineeta Singh, 2018 All Rights Reserved. The Dissertation of Vineeta Singh is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________ Chair University of California San Diego 2018 iii DEDICATION Because Jhalakraj Singh. iv EPIGRAPH I would crawl on my hands and knees through mud and mire, to the feet of a learned man, where I would sit and humbly supplicate him to instil into me, that which neither devils nor tyrants could remove, only with my life—for coloured people to acquire learning in this country, makes tyrants quake and tremble on their sandy foundation. Why, what is the matter? Why, they know that their infernal deeds of cruelty will be known to the world. -David Walker Walker's Appeal, in Four Articles; Together with a Preamble, to the Coloured Citizens of the World, but in Particular, and Very Expressly, to Those of the United States of America, Written in Boston, State of Massachusetts, September 28, 1829 v TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page ······················································································ iii Dedication ···························································································· iv Epigraph ······························································································ v Table of Contents ···················································································· vi List of Abbreviations ············································································· viii Acknowledgements ················································································· ix Vita ··································································································· xii Abstract of the Dissertation ······································································ xiii Introduction ·························································································· 1 Literature Review: History and Historical Sociology of U.S. Higher Education ······· 5 Theoretical Framework and Methodology ·················································· 16 Chapter Outline ················································································· 22 Chapter 1 “They Didn’t Fight for This”: The Hampton Institute, Manual Training, and the Enclosure of Black Higher Education ··························································· 26 1.1 The Peake School and the Rival Geography of the Grand Contraband Camp ····· 30 1.2 Hand, Head, and Heart: Samuel Chapman Armstrong and the Hampton Curriculum ································································································ 47 1.3 The Fox and the Stork: The Indian Program and the Fulcrum of White Supremacy ································································································ 59 1.4 “If You Wipe the Color Line We Are Gone” ········································· 78 Chapter 2 “A College for All the People”: The Urban Frontier, Progressive Reform, and the Unfinished Promise of the Community College ··············································· 86 2.1 The Urban Frontier and the Origins of the Community College ···················· 93 2.2 100 Years of the People’s College ···················································· 109 2.2.1 Crane Junior College: 1911-1933 ················································ 111 2.2.2 Malcolm X Community College: 1968-2010 ·································· 117 2.2.3 MXC: 2011- ········································································ 127 2.3 The Evolving Community College Promise ·········································· 130 Chapter 3 “Tearing Down the House”: Third Worldist Pedagogy and the Rise of the Neoliberal Diversity Paradigm ································································· 140 3.1 The Cold War University ······························································· 145 vi 3.2 Third College ············································································· 150 3.3 Lumumba Zapata Coalition ····························································· 157 3.4 Lumumba Zapata College ······························································· 164 3.5 Third (World) College ··································································· 170 3.6 Third College Revisited ································································· 175 3.7 Thurgood Marshall College ····························································· 178 Chapter 4 “Relentless Pursuit”: Teach For America, Progressive Neoliberalism, and the Criminalization of Urban Space ································································ 187 4.1 “Meaning and Direction”: Teach For America and the Leadership Development Mission ····························································································· 196 4.2 “Let Us Make the Teachers and We Will Make the People”: Teacher Training and Racial-Spatial Pedagogy ········································································ 206 4 3 “Preparation Meets Opportunity”: Teach For America and Disaster Capitalism 220 4.4 TFA and the Future of Teacher Training ············································· 231 Conclusion ························································································· 238 Summary of Key Findings and Arguments ··············································· 238 Limitations and Future Directions ·························································· 242 Final Reflections ·············································································· 245 Bibliography ······················································································ 248 vii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS American Association of University Professors (AAUP) American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) American Home Mission Society (AHMS) American Missionary Association (AMA) Black Student Caucus (BSC) Black Student Union (BSU) Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) Chicago City Colleges (CCC) Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) Critical University Studies (CUS) Free Speech Movement (FSM) Grow-Your-Own (GYO) Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) Ideological State Apparatus (ISA) Leadership Development Programs (LDP) Logan Square Neighborhood Association (LSNA) Lumumba Zapata Coalition (LZC) Mexican American Youth Association (MAYA) Movimiento Estudiantil Chicanx de Aztlán, formerly Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA) National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) National Teacher Corps (NTC) No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB) Predominantly White Institution (PWI) Recovery School District (RSD) Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) Teach For America (TFA) Thurgood Marshall College (TMC) Universities Studying Slavery (USS) Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA) viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I know that my achievement is quite ordinary. I am not the only man to seek his fortune far from home, and certainly I am not the first. Still, there are times I am bewildered by each mile I have travelled, each meal I have eaten, each person I have known, each room in which I have slept. As ordinary as it all appears, there are times when it is beyond my imagination.1 There can be no account of the debts and gifts that have made this dissertation possible. But I will take this opportunity to mention some of the people whose work has allowed this dissertation to happen but who—following academic convention—do not appear in the bibliography on the other end. My family, especially my parents Lata Dusre and Vijay K. Singh, who taught me my first lessons in feminism, and my grandmother, Jhalakraj Singh, who taught me everything else I needed to know. My muh-boli family, especially my first rakhi sisters: Farrah Al- Mansoor, Katelyn Gallagher, Nancy Wang, Nina Ren, and Mar Chiesa Barceló, I could not have written so much as an e-mail without your support. Thank you for me. My other teachers: Mr. John Leary, Ms. Nancy Shay, and Ms. Deborah Wilcheck, who taught me to read, write, and speak up; Ma’am Meenakshi Seth, Ma’am Primrose Pepper, Professors Juan Carlos Quintero Herencia, Ana Patricia Rodriguez, Laura Demaria, Eyda Merediz, and Lucía Melgar, who made me believe my convictions were worth pursuing and my thoughts worth sharing. The Greater Cohort: LeKeisha Hughes, Robert Xachary
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