Week 8: Postcolonialism

Week 8: Postcolonialism
Jackie Clark

Unlike last week, I found the concepts in this week's readings much easier to understand. We discuss postcolonialism in our department quite often in the context of social justice and student services. But our readings provided a much more scholarly and historical context for this area of research and practice, and that was helpful. I especially appreciated the section discussing why the colonialism of the last 500 years is different than any that came before. I had been wondering about this since the concept of using other people and cultures for gain is an ancient practice. I had not considered the global reach, restructuring of the society for colonialized people, and what neocolonialism means today. It did not occur to me that the impact could be so deep as to destroy cultures to a point where they are forever different. The deep psychological harm caused by colonial rule was also important to consider, as Fanon described. What was described in the chapter by Prassad certainly captures any documentary or scholarly piece I have ever read, in terms of the deep destruction of communities due to colonial invasion, and the inability of these communities to restructure successfully after the colonial rulers abandon them. I really don't know much in depth about this, and that bothers me. It seems that there must be a better way to help cultures recover post-colonial, but when the damage is so deep I don't even know where you would begin. I was also really glad one of the referenced articles was about neocolonialism and museums. My past work in Art History and museum education had me thinking about this as I was reading, it's a huge issue in the museum community, and highly contested by museum professionals. There are complex considerations needed when deciding if you are going to represent art and artists through a social justice and restorative lens, or use the art to make money and increase attendance.

The Minkel piece about 6 Latino/a students was really good. It was constructed so well, and flowed smoothly for the reader. I was hooked on the content, the stories, and the lives of these students. She did a great job describing the methodology used and her reasons for using it, somehow in a language that would be accessible to many disciplines. I think this is a model article for writing in the qualitative world. The content was also really interesting, as I have not seen a critique of the terminology around microagressions before. She makes a compelling case for her additional terms, racialized aggression and contested microagressions. Working from the stories of her participants, it was clear that the current vocabulary around these race-based situations is inadequate. She follows the framework of CRT by writing about the socially constructed worlds of the students, but also recommending action and change. I followed her rationale for the cross-case analysis but was unclear about how it was also grounded theory.

Finally, the Ladson-Billings piece was also an excellent resource for understanding CRT. I had read quite a bit about the legal foundations for CRT from CLS, and it was helpful to review that history again. Coming to grips with white privilege and whiteness as property is hard, and intellectually demanding. Deconstructing the whole social framework we use in this country is hard to accept, but hard to argue. As a white person I have never had to question the systems I use every day, and have had a mostly positive relationship with them. Understanding that for others, this is not the case is really disturbing. More and more I understand why people of color don't trust agencies in this country, because they have no reason to believe that they will be given the benefit of the doubt at any time. In this case, connecting CRT to education was very clear, and easy to understand. Again, it disrupts the common belief that white majority citizen tend to have that systems are fair, and everyone has an equal chance. Looking more deeply at curriculum, instruction and pedagogy, and school funding makes it painfully clear that equality is a myth.