Racialized social relations in higher education: Black student and faculty experiences of a Canadian university By Rosalind Hampton Department of Integrated Studies in Education Faculty of Education McGill University, Montreal September 2016 A thesis submitted to McGill University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Educational Studies © Rosalind Hampton RACIALIZED SOCIAL RELATIONS IN HIGHER EDUCATION 2 Table of Contents Abstract .............................................................................................................................. 5 Resumé ................................................................................................................................ 6 Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ 7 Chapter One: Introduction ............................................................................................... 8 Settler Colonialism and Education ...................................................................................... 9 The Canadian University ................................................................................................... 13 The University as a site of struggle ............................................................................ 18 Black educational activism .................................................................................... 19 Systemic Inequity and Education in Québec and Canada ................................................. 25 Black Canadian Studies and the Neoliberal University .............................................. 32 My Story of Disjuncture .................................................................................................... 36 Finding a conversation ................................................................................................ 41 “Becoming” an activist ................................................................................................ 43 Overview of the Dissertation ............................................................................................. 50 Objectives and research questions ............................................................................... 50 Structure of the dissertation ......................................................................................... 50 Chapter Two: Theoretical Influences ............................................................................ 52 On Blackness and Whiteness ............................................................................................. 52 Critical Race Theories ....................................................................................................... 55 Critical race theories in education ............................................................................... 56 Interest Convergence ................................................................................................... 57 Critiquing Racial Liberalism ....................................................................................... 59 Canadian multiculturalism and Québec’s interculturalism ................................... 62 Anticolonialism ................................................................................................................. 66 Critiquing colonial ideology ........................................................................................ 72 Neoliberalism and diversity discourses ....................................................................... 78 Deficit and disposability ........................................................................................ 82 Chapter Three: Methods of Inquiry .............................................................................. 86 Defining a Critical Institutional Activist Ethnography ..................................................... 87 The terms of Institutional Ethnography / Political Activist Ethnography ................... 88 Institutions ............................................................................................................. 89 Ruling relations ..................................................................................................... 90 Black people’s work .............................................................................................. 91 Texts ...................................................................................................................... 92 Activism and social change ......................................................................................... 93 Naming and tensions ............................................................................................. 94 Data Collection / Mapping Strategies ................................................................................ 97 Researcher positionality .............................................................................................. 97 Research participants ................................................................................................... 98 Approach to interviews ................................................................................................ 99 Critical race counterstorytelling .......................................................................... 100 RACIALIZED SOCIAL RELATIONS IN HIGHER EDUCATION 3 Chapter Four: Colonial Legacies and Canadian Ivy ................................................. 104 Meeting James McGill .................................................................................................... 106 Slavery and the transatlantic slave economy ............................................................. 109 McGill Lineage and the University ................................................................................. 118 The power to write history ........................................................................................ 122 Anticolonial Resistance and Black Power ....................................................................... 125 Toward a New Millennium ............................................................................................. 134 Conclusion: On a Critical Engagement with History ...................................................... 139 Chapter Five: Navigating the University Environment ............................................. 143 The Idealized ‘Elite University’ ...................................................................................... 143 “A plethora of knowledge” ........................................................................................ 147 “Dealing with James McGill” ......................................................................................... 150 Class Relations: Students “Climbing the Hill” ................................................................ 152 “The McGill Bubble”: A “Sea of Whiteness” ................................................................. 158 “White Hallways” by Cora-Lee Conway .................................................................. 164 The professoriate: “Where are the teachers that look like me?” ............................... 165 Conclusion: Expectations Meet Experience .................................................................... 181 Chapter Six: Socialization and Anticolonial identity work ....................................... 184 The Denigrated ‘Other’ ................................................................................................... 187 Being and Becoming ‘Black’ .......................................................................................... 193 Black Canadian “identity problems” ......................................................................... 195 Managing Interlocking Stereotype Threats ..................................................................... 198 Antiracist Construction Work .......................................................................................... 205 Affinity Groups, Allies and Political Coalitions ............................................................. 210 The Black Student Network ...................................................................................... 210 GSMC, SOCM and C-Uni-T ..................................................................................... 217 The alternative campus community ........................................................................... 219 McGill Daily ........................................................................................................ 220 CKUT .................................................................................................................. 221 QPIRG-McGill .................................................................................................... 224 Conclusion: Navigating and Resisting Racialization and Colonial Ideology ................. 227 Chapter Seven: Service work and non-formal teaching and learning ..................... 230 Serving the University ..................................................................................................... 231 “Diversity & equity” work ........................................................................................ 233 Hiring committees ..................................................................................................... 239 The Africana Studies Committee .............................................................................. 246 Conferences