Race and Class

"Course Description:
Can HipHop culture help produce a more just world? If so, what theory and praxis best advance this aim? These are the questions that drive this conceptual course. Our critical interrogation of the relationship between HipHop and social justice considers the culture from its U.S. Black Power era underpinnings to its disparate contemporary “glocal” manifestations. We begin by asking what is "HipHop," what is "social justice," and what is their relationship, and proceed to consider how HipHop can be an effective force for social justice and what obstacles mitigate against this potential. These discussions will develop familiarity with important concepts in Black studies and social theory such as race and colonialism, imperialism and hegemony, structure and agency, identity and strategic essentialism. Weekly readings will typically pair writings specifically on HipHop with theory from across the humanities and social sciences including philosophy, sociology, cultural studies, and political economy. Students will participate in the selection of weekly required listening/viewing of music and videos. We will endeavor to consider the race/class/gender dimensions of our weekly topics. Students will acquire a broader familiarity with HipHop activism, and develop new conceptual tools and critical thinking skills.  "

The Ghadar movement holds the clues to unravelling two paradoxes of modern India. First, India remains a constitutional democracy even when authoritarianism is embedded in the architecture of the state. The second paradox is that internationally India is a model for “democratic-development” even though the country has regressed into an abyss of poverty, dispossession,internal strife, ecological precariousness, rising fundamentalisms and militarism since Independence. The Ghadar centenary year is an opportune moment to reflect on the constitutive nature of the rebellion-repression-reform cycles that is formative of the Indian state and Constitution.

In England and Australia, higher education institutions (HEIs) are expected to widen participation (WP) in higher education (HE) to enhance social justice and improve individual and national economic returns. Furthermore, HEIs are the major providers of initial and in-service teacher education. This article surveys international literature to explore ways in which teacher education programmes could and do contribute to preparing teachers to advocate for WP, including drawing on learning from WP research that demonstrates the value of current HE students engaging young people in schools and colleges to support them in seriously considering progressing to HE. We conclude that teachers and pre-service teachers are well placed to be advocates for WP. In the majority of higher education institutions, however, WP and teacher education functions are not working collaboratively to embed advocacy for WP into teacher education programmes

"This article explores gender inequities and sexual double standards in teens’ digital image exchange, drawing on a UK qualitative research project on youth ‘sexting’. We develop a critique of ‘postfeminist’ media cultures, suggesting teen ‘sexting’ presents specific age and gender related contradictions: teen girls are called upon to produce particular forms of ‘sexy’ self display, yet face legal repercussions, moral condemnation and ‘slut shaming’ when they do so.We examine the production/circulation of gendered value and sexual morality via teens’ discussions of activities on Facebook and Blackberry. For instance, some boys accumulated ‘ratings’ by possessing and exchanging images of girls’ breasts, which operated as a form of currency and value. Girls, in contrast, largely discussed the taking, sharing or posting of such images as risky, potentially inciting blame and shame around sexual reputation (e.g. being called ‘slut’, ‘slag’ or ‘sket’). The daily negotiations of these new digitally mediated, heterosexualised norms of performing teen feminine and masculine desirability are considered."

"The aim of this article is to demystify what we think we are doing when we engage in qualitative analysis. We illustrate the
centrality of affect in meaning making, showing how interpretation is always already entangled in complex affective ethical and political relationalities that circulate in, through, and outside empirical research. We explore research processes
as “intra-acting” drawing upon Barad, and develop Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts of “assemblages,” “intensities,”
“territorialization,” and “lines of flight” to analyze research encounters. Taking inspiration from MacLure’s notions of data
“hot spots” that “glow,” we explore methodological processes of working with “affective intensities.” In particular, we
draw upon our research with teen girls, mapping out how the discursive-embodied category “slut” works as an affective
intensity that propels our feminist research assemblage––from the co-creation of “data” in the field to the “data” analysis
and beyond."

The present scientific monograph, based on research conducted under the supervision of the Educational Research Institute in Ljubljana (ERI), and with financial support from the European Social Fund, aims to identify and explain some of the determinants of school performance in Slovenian schools. In the scientific and journalistic literature, school performance is nowadays linked to the future career success and socioeconomic status of individuals, to the absence and presence of deviance, and even to the likelihood of marital stability. It is also known that the national income and competitiveness of an economy and society on an international scale also depends on its educational performance. When dealing with school performance, it is not only an intra-school issues which are relevant. Education performance has far-reaching consequences and is associated not merely with the future of children and adults, but also with the future of a society as a whole, particularly in terms of its social and economic configuration. Consequently, the study of school success determinants is a key task, especially for a modern society, since its functioning is particularly strongly linked to its ability to produce new knowledge and skills. The present contribution gives an insight into the differences and similarities of the analysed populations (the sample for empirical analysis included students of all types of secondary schools in Slovenia (n = 1317) in school year 2007/2008 and was formed based on secondary school structure in Slovenia according to the official data of the Statistical office of the Republic of Slovenia). The impact of a multitude of psychological and sociological measures of determinants of school performance was analysed (e.g., adolescent self-esteem, locus of control, social anxiety, etc.), the relationship between parents and children were studies (relations between children and parents, parental socioeconomic status) and relations between teachers and students were also a focal point (including school delinquency and a sense of school attachment). In addition, the monograph also analyses the impact of broader social environment, including cultural capital and the use of time among adolescents, especially youth leisure activities. It is also worth noting that the impact of intellectual ability on academic performance is also studied, particularly in relation to the aforementioned psychological and sociological concepts. The authors of the present text firmly believe that the monograph is undoubtedly an important contribution to the field of sociology of education and is at the same time a firm basis for the formation of social and educational policies.

"This article examines how we should study the rise of the middle ‘class’ in present-day China. It first discusses why extant Western class theories, including Marxist, Weberian and Neo-Weberian, cannot provide an adequate analytical account of class formation. A ‘cultural turn’ of social class theories, initiated by Bourdieu, emphasizing multi-dimensionality of capital and integrating culture and economy, apparently provides a more insightful perspective on the study of class. However, the Bourdieusian cultural turn approach has yet to adequately account for the Chinese new middle class formation. Building on the Bourdieusian framework, this article proposes a socio-cultural approach to explaining the reproduction of class in contemporary China. It explores how and why the Maoist social institutions of danwei (work unit) and hukou (household registration) still play an influential role in determining middle class’s life chance in post-reform China. In addition, unlike the Western experience, party-state cadres assume a pivotal role in the emergence of the Chinese new middle class in that entrepreneurs and professionals in the private sector maintain strong ties with cadres, the actual beneficiaries of the economic reforms. The paper concludes that market, class and political capital are of importance in deciding one’s life chance, setting limits on the role of the middle class as an agent for political change in modernizing China.  [214 words]

Keywords
The Chinese new middle class, cadres, danwei (单位), hukou (户口), guanxi
""

""This book takes the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze and applies it to educational practice. To understand how and why to do this, David R Cole puts forward the notion of educational life-forms in this writing, which are moving concepts based on Deleuzian principles. This book turns on and through the construction of the philosophy of life in education. The life-forms that will come about due to the philosophy of life in education rest on epiphanies, the virtual and affect. The author looks to infuse educational practice with the philosophy of life, though not through simple affirmation or a construction of counter metaphysics to representation in education. This book uses Deleuze for practical purposes and sets out to help teachers and students to think otherwise about the current praxis of education.         



"With this book Educational Life-Forms which is an examination of the significance of the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze for education, David R Cole proves himself to be one of the very small number of philosophers of education who has provided intelligent commentary of Deleuze's difficult corpus. Cole keenly appreciates the conceptual creativity of Deleuze especially in relation to the concepts of 'life forms' and 'body without organs' and effectively demonstrates its practical implications for education." - Michael A. Peters Professor, Educational Policy Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.



“David R Cole's, Educational Life-Forms: Deleuzian Teaching and Learning Practice is a profound, speculative work that offers both new ways of thinking about the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze (as a practical thinker with ideas that can be applied at the 'coal face', as it were) and new ways of thinking about teaching and learning. It engages with actual policy debates as they are played out in the complex reality of the classroom situation and brings to them a fresh perspective developed through a close reading of Deleuze. This is an exciting new work which will be rewarding reading for both Deleuzians and non-Deleuzians and is sure to win converts amongst the latter.” - Ian Buchanan, Editor Deleuze Studies Professor of Critical Studies, Dean of research in the Arts and Social Sciences University of Woolongong.



In this thoughtful and engaging book, David R Cole has given us an answer to the important question of how Deleuze's philosophy enters into the practice of education. Cole situates this philosophy within existing debates around teaching and learning not only through a very lucid account of Deleuze's work and current theory, but also through highly effective and often moving examples of practice. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in Deleuze and education - James Williams Professor of European Philosophy, University of Dundee.""

"Black Educational Choice:
Assessing the Private and Public Alternatives
to Traditional K–12 Public Schools

In November 2008, then President-elect Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama decided to send their two girls to Sidwell Friends School, an elite private insitution. Unfortunately, this educational opportunity is far beyond the reach of most African American families. Indeed, of the five million students in non-public K–12 schools in the United States, only 5.8 percent are African American, whereas African Americans compose 14.9 percent of the U.S. school-age population.

Closing the K–12 achievement gap is critical to the future welfare of
African American individuals, families, and communities—and to the
future of our nation as a whole. The Black-white academic achievement gap—the significant statistical difference in academic performance between African American students and their white peers—is the single greatest impediment to achieving racial equality and social justice in America.

Black Educational Choice provides parents, citizens, educators,
and policymakers the critical knowledge they need to leverage the
national trend toward increasing and diversifying K–12 school choice
beyond traditional neighborhood public schools. Parents can use this
information to optimize the success of their own African American
children, while policymakers and educators can apply these insights
to help close the Black-white academic achievement gap throughout
America.

Diana Slaughter-Defore, Howard Stevenson, Edith Arrington, & Deborah J Johnson (Editors)"