Guess the (CRT) Syllabus?

[Orbit]

This gets back to the OP Where's the syllabus?

As a general observation, not directed at you @Orbit, it seems that no one associated is willing to put any stakes in the sand as far as any specific claims or ideas we can associate with CRT. Yes, we get some general ideas, but as I've said many times in this thread, the devil is in the details, and the details of CRT seem slippery. Given the contentious nature of the topic, it would seem that details would really help.

The details will vary and the ones with the syllabi are the teachers--that's why I keep saying it's revealing that no one is talking to the teachers.

 

[Orbit]

I completely agree. You listen to people and you collect data and you generate some statistically based conclusions.

What you ought NOT do is prefer one person's story over the stats.

I didn't say you privilege ONE person's story. You don't. You interview many people and look for patterns.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

You might be right, but how do you know?

Because I have actually read intersectional theory and have a basic grasp of what it is. The same reason I know that when people say things like "evolution teaches that life came from nothing" I know that they're wrong; because I have a basic grasp of the concepts involved. It's as simple as having a glance over the wikipedia page.

The school board didn't just pull these ideas out of thin air.

Correct. They pulled them out of Twitter and right-wing ideologues and think-tanks.

Is the book mentioned definitive? If not, what is?

There is no "definitive" text on intersectionality, just as there is no "definitive" book on feminism, evolution, media studies or critical theory in general. There are lots of texts with lots of applications and perspectives, no one "definitive" perspective. It's an analytical framework, not an ideology.

 

[icehorse]

Correct. They pulled them out of Twitter and right-wing ideologues and think-tanks.

What I'm gathering from your post is that you have developed your understanding of these topics through study and synthesis, correct. So who's to say that your conclusions are the correct ones? I can tell you from my direct experience that I have heard people - in live conversations - put forth some of the arguments that the school board is railing against. So who's to say that their conclusions are wrong and yours are correct?

I guess another way to put this is: there's the theory and there's the practice.

So once again, as I stated in the OP, wouldn't it be useful if the actual proposed syllabus was available for review?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

What I'm gathering from your post is that you have developed your understanding of these topics through study and synthesis, correct. So who's to say that your conclusions are the correct ones?

Maybe do some research into the subject and see whose interpretation is more accurate? You don't have to take my words for it, or theirs.

I can tell you from my direct experience that I have heard people - in live conversations - put forth some of the arguments that the school board is railing against.

And I have also heard people say that evolution proves their no God. That doesn't mean it is literally the thing that is taught as part of the theory.

So who's to say that their conclusions are wrong and yours are correct?

The same as the above example. Look into it yourself.

I guess another way to put this is: there's the theory and there's the practice.

No, that's not the same thing. Again, people saying that "evolution proves there is no God" is not example of the "practice" of evolution. It's people misunderstanding or misapplying it.

So once again, as I stated in the OP, wouldn't it be useful if the actual proposed syllabus was available for review?

It would. But until it is, it's a good idea not to go into investigating it with a inaccurate interpretation of what it means.

Perhaps I should put it another way.

Let's say you wanted to do a sociological study to see the ways in which white people and black people experience society. You get 10,000 white people and 10,000 black people and ask them a series of questions about their personal experiences of privilege and oppression. In your study, you find that one group's experiences are wildly different from the other, and because the only factor in the grouping of your study was race, you chalk these experiences up to race.

However, if you were to apply intersectional analytics to your study, you may realise that a lot of the oppression one group suffered may be less down to a single factor and more down to a multitude of other factors. For example, one person may report that they feel that people tend to stare at them often, and, because your study only took into account their race, you may miss the fact that race may not play as big a part in that is does the fact that that individual was in a wheelchair. If you were to carry out a study using intersectionality, you would take account of the fact that race is not the only factor that plays into how these groups experience society, privilege and oppression, and you would take more account of other factors.

That's literally all it is, in practice. The conclusions reached using the framework vary, naturally, but the application of the framework essentially boils down to the above. It's just taking account of multiple individual factors in how people may experience or interact with privilege and oppression.

 

[Curious George]

Or, they're reacting to what they THINK these things are, but they don't understand the concepts.


It's not an ideology. It's the application of critical analytical theory to the concept of race. It has been a part of sociology courses for years.


This is just an absurd claim. Critical theory doesn't deal with "moral fault" and it certainly doesn't assign moral fault to individuals based on race.


Not a thing.


Yes. But they have nothing to do with CRT or intersectionality.


The people framing the syllabus that way. They clearly have no understanding of what CRT or intersectionality are, or are framing it dishonestly for personal reasons.

While I appreciate your responses in this thread, I hope you realize that plenty of people read something, somewhere and then misapply, misrepresent, and take things out of context. Some of these people are teachers. While it is not necessarily the case, it is quite possible that some of the push back comes from these misrepresentations. How often on RF how you been met with people who have negative things to say about academic concepts like white privilege, intersectionality, or critical race theory? If we accept that these are poorly understood and relayed by some then we should also accept that there are some who build curriculum with their poor understanding.

This is then held up as representative of the concepts. This is also then put in the spotlight by some for political ambition. Not sure how to fix this, but it might need fixing.