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 EDUCATING ACTIVIST
ALLIES
SocialJustice Pedagogy with the
Suburban and Urban Elite

Katy M. Swalwe/1

11 Routledge
I~ Taylo,6.FrandsQoup
NEWYORIC
AND LONDON
Fim published 2013
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Simult:mc:ouslypublished in the UK
by Routlcdgt:
2 l1Jrk Square:, Milton Park. Abingdon. Oxon OXl4 4RN For my mom, who is always in my heart.
R,1111/r,(~r
is ,111
i111J1tilll c,..,.,,,
.if1/1rT<Jy/,,r[~ Fr,mris ,111
i,y.,1111"
/,11,ittr.ss
(0 2013 T :1ylor & l'mtcis
The right ofK:11y M. SwJlwdl to be idcmilicd as author of this work hJs
been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, D<:sig11sand l'atcms Act l'JH8.
All rights reserved . No pJrt of this book may be reprimed or reproduced or
uuhzed in any fonn or by any elccironic, 111echmical,or other means, now
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from the publishers.
Tradrm,1rkr1,•1irr:
Produce or corpor-.atenames may be tr•dc111.1rks or
registered tr-Jdcmarks, and arc used only for identification Jnd cxpbnation
w11hou1iment 10 infringe.
Ul,r,1ty,f C.•11J.1rrss D,11"
C.,1"/,'J,/it((l•i11-/'11/1/ir,11ic111
Swalwcll, K:iryM.
f.Jucating activist allies : social justice pcd.agoh'Ywith the suburlm1 and
urb .111elite / by Kary M . Swalwcll.
p.1gcscm. - (The critical sociJI thought series ; 38)
Includes bibliogr:iphic al rl'ferenccs and index.
I. Elite (Social scienc•-s)-Educ a1ion-Uni1cJ St:itcs.
2. Upper elm-Education-United Sratcs.
3. Critical pedagogy-United Smcs. I. Title .
lC-1941.S!.132013
371 .8:!621-Jc2J 20120375%
ISBN : 978-0-415-52945-7 (hbk)
ISBN : 1>78-0-415-5:!9-l<,-4 (pbk)
ISBN : 978- 0- 203-11780-4 (cbk)
T ypeset in lkmbo
hy Cenveo Publ isher Services

l1rintcd and bound in the United Stales of America by Publisher.;Gr.tphics,

LLC on i,usrainablysourced paper.
CONTENTS

SeriesEditor's lntrod11ctiot1 xiii

Acknowledgments xvii
Introduction xix

PARTI
The Education of Privileged Youth in Theory 1
1 Why the Education of Privileged Children Matters 3

2 Disconnected, Paralyzed, and Charitable: SocialJustice

Pedagogy with Privileged Children 15

PARTII
The Education of Privileged Youth in Practice 29
3 Sheltered and Exceptional: Privileged Students'
Conceptions of Themselves and Their Communities 31

4 Social Justice Pedagogy in Action: "Bursting the Bubble"

and "Disturbing the Comfortable" 53

5 Did They Get It? Students' R esponses to

SocialJustice Pedagogy 88
xii Contents

6 Eyes Pne. d O pen.

• . A Framework for Educating
110
Activist Allies

126
Appc11dixA 129
SERIES EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION
Appendix B 141
Natcs 145
Refcrc11ccs 156
llldcx

The society in which we live is dearly troubled. Unemployment remains high.

Three out of every five jobs that are being created are pa.id significantly less than
before, with fewer benefits, little unionization, and a loss of control over nearly all
aspects of one's labor. As ifit wasn't bad enough, the latest Census data show that
real meruan income continued its decline. Even more distressing is the fact that
now 22% of children in the United States are living in poverty. At the same time ,
overall poverty increased to over 46 million and nearly 49 million people had no
health insurance, a figure that would be even higher were it not for the health
refonns instituted by the Obama government. Yet the income gap between the
wealthiest 20% of US households and the rest of us grew sharply. To make it even
more stark, the top 5% of the population saw an adrutional 5% gain in wealth. This
was on top of the massive gains they had already received during the last decade
(see Harris, 2012; Tavernise, 2012). All of these figures are even more rustressing
when race is taken into account, clearly documenting the racializing nature of the
institutional structures that organize this society (Leonardo 2009; Tavemise, 2012).
There are a number of important things to realize from these data. The first is
the deep seated nature of inequality, and that inequality is worsening over the
years. The second, less visible, point is that these are official government data, data
that historically have tended to under - report the actual conditions ofimpoverish-
ment and despair that exist in so many parts of the nation. Thus, the figures on real
unemployment may need to be nearly doubled, with youth, people of color, and
many impoverished women suffering even more.
In the face of these conditions, what can education do? Dominant groups have
a particular set of visions of what is wrong with this society and a particular set of
formulaic responses to what education must do in these times. We are being told
that education is both the source of and the cure for an entire range of things that
 SeriesEditor's Introduction xv
xiv Series Editor's Introduction

. . . • Schools and the teachers within them arc ~nd~r con- to make a major ditference in the lives of their students and in the communities
arc wrong Ill tlus society. . i offered include such things as markct1zat1on and in whi c h they are embedded (see also Gutstein, 2006). Even more recently ,
certcd attack. The ans~ei:5 bent . l· d ever more testing, pcrfonnancc pay Vajra Watson has shown what this looks like in community-based education
competition, standard1zat1on o cumcula aln . , I d to keep up. There is actually {WatsOI!, 2012) .
• proposa st 1:1t1t s 1ar
for teachers, and so many more 1 . ctually work in the long run Much of the emphasis in critical education has been on poor and oppressed
.d that any of these proposa s a d
little robust evi ence . . . tly being contested in large an populations and this is true of most of the material to which I pointed in my
?006) F rther these poh c1es arc constan )
(Apple, - . > • u .' . . d schools throughout the n.ation (sec Lipman, 2011 .. previous paragraph. In no way do I wish to diminish the crucial importance of
small ways m conunumucs an_ . . fi well-known educators who had prcv1- the hard work that teachers, community workers, and so many others continue to
Indccd, even in the fac~ of c~t1c1smsl_r~m d who are now totally opposed to do to build an engaging, culturally responsive, and socially critical education with
I ·d these donunant po 1c1csan
ous y supportc l I f "refonns" still keeps coming. these students. However, because so much attention is rightly given to the poor
them (Ravitch, 2011), the ava anc_1eol ti1"t "re possible or available. and disenfranchised and to those whom this society has marginalized as the
1 nl ducauona responses .. ..
But arc these. t 1e o y e_ "No " There is a rich set of .1pproaches that h,ivc "Other," less attention has been paid to critical education for those who benefit
Herc the answer ts a resoun~mg 1· d unities throughout this nation the most from this society's dominant institutions and power relations, what Katy
I d . d used Ill schoo s an comm .
been deve ope an d'ffi t kinds of nonns, ones involvmg Swalwell calls the "suburban and urban elite."
and many others . These embody very ftl cren ds cn't1'cal and democratic- This is a distinct problem. All sets of social relations are just that-relations. For
. d · Both o t 1csc wor -
critically democratic e ucauon . 1· . d ctices that arc embodied in these there to be the "poor" there is a corresponding category of the "affluent ,"
. Tl educational po ic1cs an pra 'd f
arc unportant. 1c d . t ower relations inside and outs1 c o For there to be "people of color" there is a corresponding category of people
approa~hes illuminate and _co:t:s: tl~::::s::r: the agency of teachers and stu~cnts. who see themselves as the "human ordinary"-"White." Th.is simple point
cducauon. But they do so .n~ y dagogically their aim is not to sunply has considerable political bite. There is not a poor problem unless there is a rich
They are indeed deeply cnncal . However, pe . I •
. d dominant ideology with anot icr. problem. There is less of a Black problem than there is a White problem. Less of
replace one unqu~s~1one . I ve a vc long theorcticJl and practical his- a gay problem than a straight problem. Less of a women's problem than a men's
These more cnt1cal approache _s ldi~ ?OOi) Some arc based in the influential problem.
• , Apple Au and Gan n, - · ·· l
tory (see, e.g., • ' F •· Others come from cnttca This has important implications for education and for Swalwell's book. It asks
B
work of the great r.1z1ian c
r •ducator Pau 1o n:1re.
. . tivists cultural workers, and
. developed by connnumty ac , us not only to focus on those who are oppressed by this society's dominant power
educationa I pr.acttces U . d S • But 110matter where they come relations, but to also pay considerably more attention to those who are situated in
. I l I lout the mte tatcs.
teachers m sc 100 st iroug • . d ducarion for social justice and to classed, gender, and raced positions that give them more advantages because of
• · d •cply comnutte to an e
from, eac I1 o f t I1cm is t: I . I di students teachers, and com- that very location.
r . I ·s that sees pcop t..'-lllC u ng ,
a set o f ega itanan va uc . . K S alwell and the fine book you are Among the tasks of the critical scholar/ activist in education are: 1) to tell the
munities-as co-responsible subJeCtls: aty fwd cators asking and answering the truth about the nature of the inequalities in tlus society; 2) to show where there
d 't t ·din a long ustory o e u
about to rca arc st ua c . I I n lay a role in social transfonna- are opportunities, spaces, for engaging in work that challenges these inequalities;
qucstion of whether and m what ways sc 100 s ca p
and 3) to act as critical secretaries of those individuals and groups who are engaged
tion (Apple, 2013). . .. "t'cal eda ogy" is that it is often in the creative and hard practical etforts of actually successfully acting on these
One of the criticisms of the literature on en t p I . g_ •ry style makes it
. . h convoluted ways, t tat its vc challenges (Apple, 2013). EducatingActivistAllies does all three and does them well.
so theoretical, and wntten m sue! I• . ht enter into it. This will not Jo. It is grounded in a substantive understanding of the ways this society is organized
I rd r-. ducators to see w tcre t iey nug . I d'f.
very ta ior c d . . . I work and how to do it wit • I - to produce massive inequalities in power and resources and in how schools fit into
We need powerful analyses of how to o ~nuca .
f d d . l different kmds of settings. these relations. It illuminates the spaces in schools where teachers have maintained
fcrcnt kinds o stu ents an . n . . II democratic educators have tumed their autonomy and where they can engage in critical pedagogic and curricular
There arc places to wluch ma~yblc~uca. y • of conservative attacks on schools work. And, finally, it provides us with detailed portraits of what committed critical
. . f what is poss, e m a umc
for rich d escnpuons o . be a center for the pro- educational work looks like in classrooms.
and teachers. The journal Rctl1i11ki11.1?kScpliools clonbtmuk~ss::ch as Dc11111cratic Sc/1Mls
· · \ d · c·anal wor · opu ar 00 f But this is not all. Swalwell is a fine writer, someone who does all of this with
motion of cnttca e uc., I 1 .. v ·n teachers and administrators, many o theoretical elegance and insightful accounts that draw the reader in to the lives of
(Apple and Beane, 2007) also tavc gi c Id d detailed looks at class- real teachers and students in real communities. She takes us inside the classrooms
whom are deeply dissatisfied with what they arc to to o~ 1· . • . d pr.actices
. 't'cally democrauc po 1c1cs,111 of two dedicated and talented teachers, both of whom are working in affluent
rooms and entire schools that arc usmg en I •
xvi Series Editor's Introduction

. . all dvantaged students. We go with them on their

areas with more econonuc y a al I . I I r
classtri s. We sit in on their intense discussions of the unequ re at1~~. t l~t c ta;
acteriz: this society and of the issues of their own personal res~ons1b1li~m sue I
. W !1owteachers constantly try to create an educauonal environment
a society. e sec
.
where senous en ·u·cal
f h
etl1icaland political insights are natural parts o t e cumcu-
. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
!um and teaching in their classrooms. fi al h d ws
Swalwell is not content to simply be ;m observer. Her m c apter . r.i
. rtant lessons from these teachers' classrooms for those educators wh~ wish to
impo . . . d fulfilling work of doing critically democrattc educa-
engage III the creative an h ·11 blc
tion. In the process, Educatitl)! ActivistAllies provides us with steps t at ~1 ena
fi d In so doing it also helps us to then tell those who wish to tum
us tog~ o~ar . . . d' who have forgotten what an education worthy of
educat1on mto trammg---an bl r ·.
. . l1t be-that there arcrealistic alternatives to the lamenta e po ic1cs
1ts name nug f h' ti n and
now being all too readily imposed on the schools and teac1iers o t is na o
all too many others. Michael W. Apple
John Bascom Professor of Curriculum a~d
Instruction and Educational Policy Studies No one ever writes a book alone or, at least, they shouldn't. A litany of loved
University of Wisconsin-Madison ones diligently kept me focused throughout this process when I needed to buckle
down and distracted me when I needed a break. Heath Henderson, Rachael
Goodman, and Kate and Brian Mitchell (along with their daughter, Abby) have
References gallantly borne the brunt of these duties this past year with patience and humor.
/' /'t NewYork · In addition, my sister, Abbey Henderson, and my dad, Rick Swalwell, have logged
rite'Ri.1!111
Apple, M. (2006). Ed11c,11ir1,I! •1v,1y: God, "'" nm/II"r y.
M,irkcts,s1,111rl,mls, .
over thirty years of inspiring and supporting me. Without complaint, they (and
Routledge. . • .. ti ·d c
I MW ('>013) C.111 ed11r,11io11
d,,mgcsor,cty?New York. Rou c g . their wonderful spouses, Eric and Karen) fielded numerous phone calls at varying
App c, • . - . d G d ' l A (Eds ) ("009) TI,c Ro111/c1l1!c /1,111dbo,,k
inrcn1.rtiil11"/
Apple, M.W., Au, W., an an m, · · · - · · stresslevels and welcomed me home whenever I needed to get away. I am ridicu-
ofmticiilc,l11c,11io11.
New York; Routledge. . .r. I I . lously lucky to have you all in my life and love you very much.
':J
Apple, M.W. Jn
dB J A (Eds)
eanc, . . .· -
("007). Demom11ic scl,oo/s:Les.sons"'111,wcvu er ,m,11011,
I also owe an enormous debt of gratitude to those family, friends, and col-
"nd cd Portsmouth NH: Hememann. r. .
Gu;tcin, E.
{2006). Rc,;di11g
,111,I
ivritirl,I!
1/1cworldwit/,u1dtl1c111,1liC$:
To1,,.ml,, 11c1/,1.f!0}1YJor
sonc1 1 leagues who took time to read and think about my work in its many stages.
Though not an exhaustive list (and my apologies to anyone I have forgotten), the
j1blirc. New York: Routlcdg~. , . , · five children arc living
H· . p {"OP). US Census hgurL-Sshow more tl1an one m . following people deserve special thanks: Janel Anderson, Michael Apple, Wayne
ar;;t o~e;ty G,w,li,m. September 13. www.guardian.eo.uk / busmess/ 20l2 / se/ l2 / us- Au, Kristen Buras, Alexa Dimick, Joe Ferrare, Daniel Friedrich, Naomi Fynboh,
p fi . ch'1ldr~11-poverty Downloaded September 13, 2012, 2:15pm. Lauren Gatti, Paul Gorski, Diana Hess, Mary Klehr, Courtney Koestler, Miriam
census• 1gurcs- ~ · ti d
'>00'') n ,cc J,itcucss.rwl crl11mtim1. New York: Rou c gc. .
L conar d o Z · (- -.,· ru • 111 ' 'b 1· I tirene1/r1111 Kopelow, Kerry Kretchmar,Jane Mlenar, Adam Nelson, Kate O'Connor, Mariana
. p' ("011) 11,c11crv 110/itier,I
economyof ctl11mti,m : Nco/1crc1rsw, ,,ice,,mr .,
L 1pn1.1n, . - . Pacheco, Katie Payne,Judy Perez,Joyce Rupp, Rob Sanders, Simone Schweber,
tlic city New York: Routledge. . , J
R . I D
av1tc 1, • -
("011) TI,c tlc,11l1 mu/ life of the .f!mll A111crio111
y k- B-sic Books.
sr/100/system:How rcs1111 .~ ,111 BethSondel, SamanthaSpinney,Ann VanEtten,Jenice View ,Anita Wager, Quentin
: . . • Wheeler -Bell, and all the past and present members of Friday Group at the
cl,ofrc,,remulm1111111111 c,l1mW011. New or . a N \': k Times
. S ("01") US income gap rose , sign of uneven recovery. e111 or ' University of Wisconsin- Madison. Their suggestions, critiques, questions, and
Tavc nuse, b. -1.,-. w nyt1'n1es com / 2012 / 09/ 13/u s/ us- incomcs-droppcd -last-ycar- curiosity have been both personally and professionally sustaining. Given that
Scpu:m er - · ww · ·
census-bureau. Downloaded September 13, 2012, 2:00p1n. . . . . mb Ill my work is markedly better for having crossed their paths, I also thank them on
( "01") Le,mriu" to libcr,,tc:Co11111r1111ity
b,1scrl
so/1111011.s
10 tire msrs Ill '
W acson, V . - - · ., behalf of my editors and readers. Speaking of editors, I would be remiss if I did
ctlumriou.New York : Routledge. not mention Catherine Bernard, Allison Bush and Emily How who have been
enormously gracious (and patient) in helping to prepare this book for publication.
xvlll Acknowledgments

Lastly' l want to tl1.1nkthe students who participated in this study as. we~I as
d L' J hnson two exceptional educ:itors who contume . to
~cr~on Sl~an an •:n:i and ~rofcssional life and whose real identities I wish
111sp1reme Ill my pcrs · d b nerving
, der to properly acknowledge them. It is no ou t un
l cou Id reveaI Ill or ,, d al
e a stran er into your classroom who may cnt1que an an yzc your INTRODUCTION
to welcom I •g arely hesitated to invite me "behind - the- scenes" and let me
~very mo:e, yet t teti:r. d challenges. This book would quite simply not have
111 on their hopes, ears, an · I · ed our
been possible without their generosity and openness and l gcnume y cnJoy
time together. From the bottom ofmy heart, thank you.

A few years ago, I presented a workshop entitled "Addressing Wealth Inequality

with Students in AfHuent Communities" at the Northwest Teachers for Social
Justice Conference. A wonderful event that can inspire even the most demoralized
of educators, it is well worth the trip to Portland, Oregon. As I turned on the
overhead projector and collated handouts before the session began, I wondered
if my focus on affluent students would attract anyone among a group of such
committed and talented social justice educators, I was stunned (and relieved)
when the room filled to capacity with curious conference attendees.
One by one, the teachers introduced themselves and shared why they had
come to the session. Almost all of them worked at private or suburban public
schools primarily serving White students from affluent families. They expressed
frustration with how to challenge their students' meritocratic perceptions of the
world. They gave examples of student apathy, willful ignorance, or missionary
zeal in response to a social justice curriculum. And they talked of pushback to
their teaching from parents, administrators, and fellow colleagues. Perhaps most
movingly, they expressed gratitude for a space to talk about doing this work with
these kids. "I'm embarrassed to say where I teach when I come to things like this,"
one teacher told me. "It's like ifl really cared about socialjustice, then I shouldn' t
be working in this kind of school."
The education of children from communities of privilege is admittedly not a
particularly common or popular approach for those committed to social justice
education.• There is no doubt that students from low-income families and
students of color are among those most deeply and immediately hurt by the
increasing stratification and segregation of society made worse by a "conservative
modernization" that drives American schooling at the macro and micro levels
(Apple, 2006). Schools are not simply sites of opportunity; rather they are deeply
 Introduction ul
xx Introduction
·d and labeled and where the policies, potential for such curriculum and instruction to backfire with students.
political places where students a~e sortc_ eproducc society's inequalities Ratherthan cultivate a deep awareness ofinjustice, a sense of empowerment, and
.
ractices, cu m·cul·•
~, and infon11almteract1ons can r 5)
P b" ous ways (Oakes, 200 . alliances with marginalized groups, the current research base points to privileged
in both covert an d unam tgu d ... I f tl11· s state of affairs, it may seem youth's feelings of disconnection, paralysis from guilt or anger when implicated
I b th aware an cnttca o
'_Io t~10sew 10 ~r~ s:hools celcbr.ited for their success as defined by test scores in injustice, and participation in unidirectional charity.
ant1thcttcal to work lll I h 11othing is perceived as broken , Part II attempts to understand how these undesirable outcomes might be
. 1 . These are p aces w ere
and matncu at1on rates. . d d . ·ustice is perceived as something that rectified by· examining the experiences of social justice teachers and their
. I · ely qucst1one , an tnJ .
the cumcu um 15rar I 1 d 1ts' obliviousness to oppression students in suburban and urban elite educational settings. Chapter 3, "Sheltered
I • •lse Ac these sc 100 s, stu e1
happens somew tcre c : . . . db "teachers preachers, parents, and the and Exceptional: Privileged Students' Conceptions of Themselves and The ir
I , 1 · I 'p to 1t 1s mamtame Y • . .
and t 1e1rre anons u . b' d [wlw} have made the choice to 11c Communities," investigates the impact of social class and place on students' per-
. . I1 they are da11y su ~ecte
111
mass media to w c . . ,, f'\YT' • ., u p xi) Rather than give up ceptions of their communities. For example, middle-class suburban studen ts
. I d' 1 or by onuss1on \ •• ise, - 00 o, . .
to them, ett 1cr ucct y I . I • e_ ce of such powerful reproductive thought of themselves as living with.in a bubble while upper-class urban stu-
· c space to ot 1ers 111 t le ra
and cede t11at pc d agogt to work in communities of dents thought of themselves as exceptionaJ members of a privileged class at ease
• I • e arc educators w 1io c11oose .
forces, however, t icr I . auence they possess to mtcrrupt with.in the world. Chapter 4, " Social Justice Pedagogy in Action: 'Bursting the
d 1 npt to use w 1atcver mu
privilc~e- an. w to atte1_ .. ual and structural level. Tea chers committed to Bubble' and 'Disturbing the Comfortable'" explores the divergent pltilosophies
social uuust1ces at the md1v1d b I . ll • •d by their collc.igues who arc of two social justice teachers whose classrooms serve as critical ethnographic case
· · I chools may e c 1a enge
social JUSUceat sue 1 s •11. by their J.ustice- oriented peers studies that highlight strategies to address the inherent tensions within social jus-
. f the status quo as we as
unaware or acceptmg O • . d .. to work in non - marginalized tice pedagogy with privileged children. Of particular interest is how teachers
from ot I1cr scI100Is WllO qucstton t11e1r eClSIOll negotiated fusing college prep with social justice teaching, exposing students to
communities. de_ I • Ito help them develop. It is to multiple perspectives as well as sociaJ critique, and balancing pragmatism with
. k . fi I teachers an ,or t 1ose w
Tlus boo - ts or t iose I id . ou11d chem even when they idealism when making pedagogic decisions.
d , • eyes to t 1e wor ar •
help them open stu cuts . fi I d" turbing or in contradiction with Chapter 5, "Did They Get It?: Privileged Students' Responses to Social Justice
• things that are pam u , ts •
arc reluctant m s~e I Id There is much teachers can do to help Pedagogy," examines students' interpretations of their sociaJ responsibilities
their original beliefs about t ie war , . d troubling infonnation. By describ- with regards to injustice in ways that both reproduced and re-networked their
I encounter new, strange, an fi
stu d ents as t tey . f . 1 · a·ce tc•achers and their students rom. privilege , I introduce four "modes of thinking" that represent students' ideas
. al · I e expcnences o socta JUS
mg and an yz1~g t t t an elite private academy and a suburban pubhc about just.ice and privilege: the Meritocrat, the Benevolent Benefactor, the
two social stu~1es cla;:.~,7~~st;1ese educators that they are not alone, s~1areideas Resigned, and the Activist Ally. This chapter also draws attention to the unique
school, I hope I can . d . ke a case for why they arc an unportant experiences of working-class students, students of color, and politically conserva-
for improving their own pracn~cs, an ma .
· I · ti.cc education conunuruty. tive students in these classrooms. The book concludes with Chapter 6, "Eyes Pried
part of the soc•; _J~ ok I tried to sec the text from the perspectives of classroom Open: A Framework for Educating Activist Allies," in which l introduce a model
As I wrote t us o ' b . ,eluding that which they might find most of social justice pedagogy with children from privileged communities based upon
teachers and teacher educators y u . fj d fi 1 2 Thus 1 have an analysis of the common characteristics among activities that tended to elicit
. . . . ways they nught Ill most use u . '
helpful and org.imzmg tt m . I I ters chat can be read in order or an Activist Ally mode of thinking among students. I conclude the chapter with
. . b k · t0 two parts wit 1 c 1ap
d1v1ded t11e oo 111 estions· why is it important to several practical steps to assist teachers and teacher educator.; hoping to effectively
. . I . In Part I I attempt to answer two qu . d
Ill iso anon. .' . . rivile •ed communities, and how shoul implement this model.
consider the educanon of cluldren"1Wn Ip I •gEducation of Privileged Children Though the focus of this book is students with access to economic and racial
d d) In Chapter 1 ty t 1c
they be e ucate . 'b " . ·1c e" and outline several reasons why privilege, I recognize the need to trouble the binary of"privileged" and "margin-
Matters," I explain wha~ I mca~ y pn:u ~1t to care about the ways in which alized" when enacting or analyzing social just.ice education. Rather than approach
social just ice educators, mdced all ~~l~s, d !tuldren: to better understand how students' identities as fixed positions, this work is rooted in the idea that people's
d I . t nds we educ.ice pnv1 ege . . d
an to w ,a e . . bout hanicssing the power they mhent, an ".intersecting" identities are contradictory and context-specific (Edwards, 2006;
inequalities persist, to be strate~c a fferers of dehumanization. In Chapter 2, Curry-Stevens, 2007). Though their experiences are unique enough to warrant
~~ ~emonstra·tdccpo:ty·::10:n~1~~:a:t:~lc:
SocialJustice Pedagogy with Privilcgcl·d focused attention, it is important to remember that the lessons here are not only
D1sconnecte , a · • . . . ·d· and review t 1e intended for segregated classes of White, affluent students who may be classified
Cltildrcn ," I explain what I mean by social Justice pc agogy
xxll Introduction

as "net beneficiaries" of privilege, but rather ought to be a means for students

from all backgrounds to examine how systems position people in ways that
benefit and marginalize them, to identify the contexts in which they are posi-
tioned as beneficiaries, and to practice how to use such power in ways that advance
justice. To all those educators eng:>gedin such work, I wish you luck and hope
this volume is a helpful bruide.
PART I

Notes The Educationof

I outline more specifically what r mean by "privilege" and what r me:in by "social
justice education" in the next chapter.
2 l was a classroom teacher for several years and am now a teacher educator working
Privileged Youth in Theory
primarily within communities of privilege. For an overview of my background and
how it influenced the collection and an:ilysisof data for this book, sec Appendix A.
 1
WHY THE EDUCATION OF
PRIVILEGED CHILDREN MATTERS

In the egoistic pursuit of having as a possessing class, (the oppressors) suffocate in

their own possessions and no longer arc; they merely have.
(Freire
, 2000, p. 58)

It is possible that if I surveyed a group of educational scholars and practitioners,

a majority would respond with a quick and firm "we shouldn't" to the question
of whether we ought to be concerned with the education of elite children.
For the record, I am not unsympathetic to this position as there are many other
populations of students whose schooling is dearly in crisis. And yet, I find this
question to be not so easy to dismiss. For me, it hangs in the air, lurking in the
shadows of conversations about justice and equity in education, buried deep
in the assumptions of current educational refonns, and haunting the critical
reflections of my own schooling. If we begin to entertain this question, if we
let it linger, we soon find that it begets other even more difficult and important
questions: How should these students be educated? What happens when we try to
educate them in those ways?

Why Ask This Question Now?

Before providing a few possible answers to this fundamental question of why we
ought to care about the education of elite children, and before diving into stories
about how these students can and should be educated, we must first position this
inquiry in a particular context of time and space. I write this from the United
States at the end of the first decade of the 21st century when a widening gap
between the rich and poor and increasing defactosegregation are startlingly harsh
realities playing out amidst mythic claims ofliving in a "post-racial" society where
 Why the Education of PrivilegedChildren Matters 5
4 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory

. k I ard While politicJI debates rage about why about how they are educated, however, we must first address the problematic
anyone can get ahead ,f they wor l . d I ght to be done about them, nature of a category like "privilege" given the multiplicity of ways that all of us
d . equalities persist an w 1at ou
. I 10 .
economic an rJcta
1
ti • United States is beconung experience advantage or marginalization to some degree.
few debate this basic truth: in fundamenta w.iys, le
more separate and less equal. d .. ffi ct.ivcly disavowing a need for
. S preme Court ec1s1ons e e I Who Is Privileged?
Despite recent u . , ( n • ,ts Sea/lieSclrtiol District,Mere,1ii Iv.
· d tional pohc1es e g. i-iirc, 11·
rJce-consc1ous e uca . . ''d tru<mle with significant and increas- A discourse of privilege within social justice circles has emerged in the last several
Jiffcrw11 e(>1111/y ), pu blic schools nattonwt .
e s .,.,
(Orfi ld F ankcnberg & Garces, 2008}. s
A
decades from a rejection of traditional justice-based work focusing on the oppres-
ing economic ,md racial -segregJttO~ _1e 'b r.b l chart~r ·md private schools sion of particular groups towards a deconstruction of the ways in which dominant
t'. ·i· ll their cluldren Ill su ur ai , ''
more White i;mu ies enro I ) fi Other r.icial groups (Frankenberg, groups maintain and reproduce power (i.e., studying the ways in which men
t students (or teac 1ers rom d
with lit cle exposure o d t of color are siphoned into un er- actively reproduce sex.ism as well as researching women's experiences of oppres-
W ?010} more stu ens
Siegel-Haw Iey, & :mg, - ' I 'd l l ,. in the country's large urban sion) (Bonnett, 1996; Choules, 2007). With her landmark article "Unpacking the
.. e=tcd" or "apart 1e1 sc 100 s . .
funded 11yper-scgr r,- rfi ld ?003) Though the stereotypical Wlute, White Knapsack," Peggy McIntosh (1990) is probably the most famous example
• b •ro Lee & 0 ,c ' - . .
centers (Fr.ink en c .,, ' . ki' I· ss urban center 1s of how someone adopting a position of privilege (in her case, White privilege)
I kirtS of a diverse wor ng-c a
wealthy suburb on t 1e ou~s. ti WI . • tudt/ms is still the nonn. In fact, the finds herself made newly accountable to those whose oppression benefits her.
changing,' racial homogeneity or l ulte sl • 77% of the student body is also Postcolon.ial, postmodern, cultural, and critical theorists have also been quite
. d ·nt attends a sc 100 w 1erc .l
aver.ige WI ute stu c . . . ualities exacerbate this r.icta productive in problematizing traditional liberal and conservative understandings
., 009 } u d ·rlymg econonuc 111eq
White (0 rfitcId' - . n c 430/ fBI· ck and Hispanic students attended of oppression and privilege, particularly with regards to male privilege and
. F . uple as of?009, 70 o a Id
segregation. or exa1 ' - I ·1 t'. than 4'.V..of White du rcn Whiteness (e.g., McIntosh, 1997),
. over 80'¾>w 11 c Jcwer
schools with poverty rates dl O uk & Acevedo-Garcia, 2010). Ovcr.tll, A variety of tenns with different connotations has surfaced: terms that
attended such schools (M~Ar . c, syp 'is 58'¾, of Whites' (Isaacs, 2007}, arc de-center privileged people like non-marginalized, tenns that indicate active intent
Black families earn a mc~1an mcomc t~1at b 'l'ty than Whites (Sharkey, 2009}, like oppressorand dominator,and tentlS that imply an invisible hand producing
.k I pcnencc ccononuc mo 1 1
much less l1 ·c Y to ex • . . ,ffrcts of the recent foreclosure inequality like advantaged, privileged,and dominant.An emerging field offers work
and have disproportionately felt the ncgJtlVe c c
focusing on a pedagogy for the uo,1-pPor(Evans, A., Evans, R., & Kennedy, 1995),
epidemic (Rothstein, 2012). .1 I . ps however as the correlation pedagogyefthe oppressor(Schapiro, 1999), pedagogyfor 1l1eclii/drenefthe oppressors
Mobility has decreased for all r.1c1a/ ct u~IC grou • .· ' l· (S whill &
. . d. 1e has unhmgcd for the workmg c ass a (van Gorder, 2007), or educatio11for theprivileged(Goodman, 2000a, 2000b). Because
between product1v1ty an mcon
l
. I
tto ?011) Sunp y put, t 1e
l • current oap between the rich
r-·
of their prevalence, [ have adopted the tenns communitiesefprivilegeand privileged,
Morton, 2 007 ; Al egrc ' - . · . A , . can history. Whtie the .iverJge with the hope that they encourage "the beneficiaries ofinjustice to see themselves
· f the widest ever Ill men
and the poor 1s one O • bout ?5% in the past forty as implicated and having some collective responsibility for the perpetuation of
l · •. mings mcrease a •
American househol d saw t 1c1r ca . d b ( 8'¼ the top 1% by 323% injustice" (Choules, 2007, p. 474).
. f th • richest 5% has mcreasc y } "• .
years, the mcomc o c • • b 49"' ¾, (Khan, 2011). A recent Econouuc I adopt th.isdiscourse with great caution, however, in an attempt to listen to the
. I •st one-tenth of a percent y - l (:3 50 1
and tllC nc le S'¾ fl seholds currently contra i • 111 insightful critiques from scholars who warn that the term "privilege(d)" obscures
Policy Institute report notes that tl~;~i)
;~om;~ matters worse, it is not just that the subject of domination by describing oppression as happening without the
of the nation's wealth (Allegretto, - . . oorer (Bernstein McNichols, & knowledge of the oppressors. For example, Hernandez-Sheets (2000) critiques
· · I • , tile poor are gcttmg P ' h
the rich arc gettmg nc 1cr. , ble of roducing sue the use of this "nice word" in relation to race as a "benevolent and socially imposed
Nicholas, 2008). Though some may defclenda syrdsstc1:~l1:ardpawork "~!us kind of gap prerogative of Whites ... (that] can reinforce feelings of superiority and help con-
· racy t 1at rewa .. •
wildly d.ispar.itewcaIt Il as a mentoc . Wilki ?009} It is struct personal and group identities based on the devaluation of others" (p. 19). To
. . s. • and fundamentally unstable (Pickett & nson, - .
1ssocially corro ive . • .. ducation, he.11thcare, and energy avoid the use of a term that reinforces injustice, critical race scholars recommend
1
also unlikely to change soon given steep y n~m_g e cial safety nets.
.I h t privJtize or elnumatc many so a discourse of"supremacy" that acknowledges privilege, but only, in the case of
costs coupled wit t a pus o I I • ·ry least whether or not race, as a "function of whites' actions toward minority subjects and not as mysteri-
These worrisome statistics den~onstr.itc ~ l~t: at; :~l~~ren is ~ot an irrelevant ous accumulations of unearned advantages" (Leonardo, 2009, pp. 89-90}. [fit
we should care about the educau~n ~f ~nv1l~g:rticularly with regards to their weren't so cumbersome, I would rather identify elite or privileged students
topic: such students exist and thctr pnvt _ege_ ~ l c indeed ought to care as those positioned by power rel:itions within systems of supremacy that are
economic security) is intensifying. Before JUsttfymg w 1y w
•
Why the Educationof PrivilegedChildren Matters 7
6 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory

. . 1 . 1 litical and economic factors and that Privileged groups, on the other hand, are those which maintain cultural
. l I d by h1stonca soc1a • po • l b and institutional domination by creating structures and systems that reflect and
continuous y s ,ape d. . 'bl consciously or not, to those w ,o en -
when rendere mvm e, . ·1 d
are ma d e stronger d f. . I wever l use the tenn pm•r t'J!C promote the internalization of privileged values, normalize their values and beliefs
efit from them most. To prevent rea e_r au~e, 10 ' by supporting particular policies and practices, believe in the superiority of their
ti · I winded clanficauon.
as shorthan d or t 1us ong- f rivile as a set of unearned advan - values, and actively grant material and psychological benefits to their peers at the
Tr.1ditionally, scholars have made sense o ~ (. ge race gender, sexual orien - expense of subjugated groups. This process does not require nefarious intentions
. ll constructed categones e.g., '
tages based upon soc1a y 1 .. ble to avoid benefiting from regardless to work; in ways both subtle and explicit, these systems condition people to think
tation) within which people are la~e ~ una b • t'ng to tally privileges in an of themselves as normal (Goodman, 2000b; Johnson, 2006) and to make small
. s Wlule it may e temp I
of their level of conmousnes.. .. balance sheet in which one can allowances for critiques in order to silence them (Buras, 2008).
· " ial 1denunes are not a
additive fasluon, our soc . .. I d minant side and the number on Ultimately, all ofus embody traits by which these forces oppress and pri vilege
1ber of idennnes on t lC o I "
just compare t I,e nun h .vilege or freedom one ,as us based upon aspects of our personhood deemed important for membership in
. .d d know how muc power, pn ' . 'I
the subordinate st e an d'fi d understanding ofpnv1 egc subordinate or dominant groups . Though these identities are complex, fluid (to a
(Goodman, 2000b, PP· 32- 22). Such a coann~o l i;scholars focusing less on the point), and relationally situated, it is important to recognize that there do exist
b . licated by a new generauon o
is rightly emg comp " . il d" people and more on the unjust pro - people who, in general, gamer unearned advantage in most situations and who
unequal benefits enjoyed by pnv ege d' d 'd t'ty fonnation and its related more often than not can claim association with elite groups . These people , and
. ·1 . io culturally me iate a en l
cess~s of_pnva egmg as soc - ward 2008; Khan, 2011). I would include myself in this category, are net ben~daries of privilege who,
distnbuuon of resources (e.g., Ho ' . . then privilege represents a "because of their positioning within the dominant group at both a local and / or
f )ear cut fixed charactensucs, '
I
Rather t ,an a set o c - ' b I . l fl . d dynamics produce complex, global level, attract privilege of different sorts [granting the] ability to act without
context-dependent, mediat_eddpr_o_cess(By wtl~1ncg1eru1?003· Johnson, 2006; Curry - consequences and as if one had the right to set the rules" (Choules, 2007, p. 461,
. di I enuues ran • - •
sometunes contra ctory, d ?00") Such a situated process of 472). In other words, these are people who have the "luxury of obliviousness "
· M Kay ?007· Leonar o, - 7 •
Stevens, 2007; D e1us- c ,- , d . . s values perceptions, thoughts, Qohnson, 2006). Conversely, there are people who dominant groups consistentl y
l t hapes an mamtam ,
privilege serves as a 1ens t l~ s , If . I· n· 11to others. Rather than some - marginalize and whose actions are severely constrained regardless of context-net
. rdmg one s se Ill re a o
feelings, and acuons reg.t . . " .. . ·1 •d" writ large, what is more mal~ciaries.2
one simply identifying as "margtnahzcd ordsp"n0v01£:e)ge r "modified binary frame• It is important to note that acknowledging the ways in which one is not
· 'd · " (Edwar 1 0
likely is an "intersectmg ' entity 'd , .-. . teract in concert with others' permanently privileged does not justify a relativist stance whereby all people
. f one' s multiple 1 ennues m
work" wherem aspects o . I .. oderate or exacerbate an experi- oppress and are oppressed so chat everyone is equal in a sort ofinjustice wash. On
· ·on at hand to e1t 1er m
identities an d t l1e s,tuao . the other" (Curry -Stevens, the contrary, there are individuals who claim membership in certain groups that
. ·1 one hand and oppression, on .
encc of pnv1 ege, on ' he abili to claim membership in domm ant tend to be unjustly favored by hegemonic forces at the macro and micro levels in
2007, P· 37). In my case, for cxa~ple,_ t. hi tystatus and physical ability groups ways chat make a deep and lasting difference. To claim otherwise is arrogant at
racial, social class, sexual identi~, c1t1ze~s . ~ . c:nversely my gender, home worst and ignorant at best, especially if one's "knapsack," as Peggy McIntosh
. rfi l ways m most s1tuanons, • d
positions me m powe u d . ( d ·n relation to certain people) ten (1990) would say, is very full. For the purposes of this project, then, these net
region, and religious backgroun at u~1es an i beneficiaries are referred to as privileged people while net maleficiaries (those
.. tside the margms of power .
to pos1t1on me more ou f I. . il ·ng / maroinalization process to whose experiences in the aggregate tend to deny them access to resources
tiinc ·1spects o t llS pn v egi · r-· •
Severa 1 scI101ars ou • . .nalized in 3 given situauon, and opportunities) are referred to as marginalized people. These experiences of
'd 'fy Io is privileged and w 1,o is margt . ·1 d
help 1 enn w I di . . I s among the char.1ctcristics of pnv1 ege domination and oppression take a variety of powerful fonns including sexual
Goodman (2000b) helpfully snngu1s_l~l d . d. . duals are those who lack orientation, physical ability, and gender. 3 In American society, however, there are
. il d ,,oups Pnv1 ege m iv1
individualsan d pnv egc .~. . d . b. tit who easily deny or avoid the few ways in which this process of privileging operates more powerfully than by
. d. ng pnvalege an its ene • s, I
consc10usness regar 1 . . f · ority and entitlement t 1at tile racialization of people and their stratification by social class.
. d who mamtam a sense o supen
privilcgmg process, an I . . t the expense of oppressed peop 1e.
their needs should be met even w ien it is_:entities ,fourinauls as people who
Similarly, Hackm an's (2005) tax011o~nilyt I bet1·eve that their life and it5
Race
ti cir pnv egc, w 10
are actively taught not to see . l dI . and who have done nothin g to Recent advances in genetic technologies prove beyond the shadow of a
privileges are the nonn for society a1_1 . 1umaruty,
doubt that race is not a biological truth (fempleton, 1999), but rather a social
cam the benefits that accompany pnvalcge .
 Why the Education of Privfleged Children Matters 9
8 The Education of Privileged Youth in Theory

. . . ut of a desire to distribute power based upon hier- We live today with the result of these efforts: the United States is among
cons~ruction that ongn~ated o Black identities. For as deeply embedded as it is in the wealthiest of nations in the world yet struggles with a history of indigenous
arclues that favored Wlute over_ 1 efarious category that has grown genocide, slavery, segregation, and increasingly high numbers of people living
. "WI "teness" is a relauve y new yet n . .
society' u . I . I ti n and deliberate actions begmmng below tJ.!epoverty line. It has also produced a fairly fixed class structure: a small
more powerful through conscious . egis al o laws <>Miltingrights distinguished yet extremely rich capitalist and corporate managerial class, an unstable middle
· ti n of the Amencas w 1en o· -
with the coIomza o I d. d red servants of European heritage class whose position is tied to training in technical skills for jobs with particular
d African peop e an m entu
between ensIave Tl . . hand complex: history ofimmigr,mts credentials, a large working class rapidly losing any former protections they may
. . ?OO?·Johnson ?006). 1ere is.a nc ..
(L1psttz,- -, •- . I . b tween Whiteness and c1ttze11- have had through unionization, a segment of this working class with little to no
struggling with how tonegottat; t 1e ~o;;:;t1~1~e:e Italy, India, and a range of job security, and a thoroughly marginalized poor whose living conditions make
ship, partic~larly amon_gthoosfiete:opt:opr;e fro:n these ;egions have been compelled it virtually impossible to acquire the skills and education needed for jobs to
Lan·n Amencan countnes. • d
. I Bl ck peoples in or er to gam so
· c1'al lift them out of poverty (Wright and Rogers, 2010): 1 Throughout American
to distance themselves r.ither th~n ~y ;~~) ~istorically legislation has encour- history, varying degrees of regulation, taxation, and other policies have attempted
and economic advantages (e.g., o ey, - - . of wiute supremacy (Lipsitz, to address these issues, but rarely has capitalism itself been questioned (Mattick,
aged such divisiveness in order to support systems b . "American" has 2011).
?00") Throughout the history of the United States, econunft d. ?00?)
-, - .fi b ·n conflated with becoming "White" (Barrett & oe i_ger, .- -: al. When thinking about who is a net beneficiary of racial privilege, those who
t 1us o ten ec . . t Whiteness as a soc10-lustonc- can claim Whiteness are clear candidates for such a status. Thinking about people
t1 .rty years growmg attentton o b
In t lie past u ' b d" . 1· f"White studies "There seem to e who are privileged by capitalism, on the other hand, is a bit more complicated
I suited in a su - isc1pme o .
phenomenon 1asre . d u· e analysisof Whiteness from yet clearly important in that class distinctions create "unequal possibilities for
h ches to tlus field- a econstruc v
at least t ree approa . · 1988) a call for the total abolition of flourishing and suffering" (Sayer, 2005, p. 218). Scholars thinking about social
0
a social and historical pcrspecove _(e.g.{ 99;~r, d th; advocacy of a re-articulation class are not in agreement about how to describe an "inherently indescribable
Whiteness (e.g., Garv~y & lgnaaev,. b • aln998 Leonardo, 2009). In dunking concept" (Conley, 2008, p. 367). It is not simply a matter ofhow much income a
. ( Kmchcloe & Stem erg, • . .d
ofwl uteness e.g., . . all rivileged by their racial 1 en- family generates (Lareau, 2008) nor whether someone is an employee or the
.al . . edagogy with peop 1e typ1c y p
about soc1 JUsttcep . . d d constructive analysis that "examines employer (Wright, 1997), though clearly how much money people have, how
tity'. I adv~cate re~artaculaoo;s!;;~ a:: ~o:Unation and as a viable, progressive, people earn their money, and what people do with their money are all important
wluteness m relatton to op~ . 2000 . 16). This position rejects calls aspects of social class (Hout, 2008).
and contradictory category (Rodnguez!, ds' p ·gnore how deeply embedded For the purposes of this book, I focus on those children from funilies who
.. . ti t such an approac l ten to I
for abolmon given ta . . I. Whiteness (e.g. the marginali- identify themselves at the top tiers of Wright and Rogers' (2010) taxonomy: the
. . · erlooks the differences wit un '
race 1sm soaety, ov . ,. d ·roru·cally may strengthen the capitalist and corporate managerial class and those in more stable upper-middle-
fi d "Wlute eras11 ), an , 1 •
zation of people re erre to as I ich can unwittingly lead to the classpositions. I also take into account Conley's (2008) "folk concept" of class, the
flawed position that race does not matter w l
ways in which laypeople think about class that include the trajectories related to
srengthening of White supremacy (Rodriguez, 2000).
someone's education, occupation, and income. It should come as no surprise that
this approach can produce complex:identities for people (e.g., the factory foreman
Social Class without a college education who owns multiple rental properties or the attorney
. . - I h' history of racialization in the with little disposable income because of large student loans and alimony pay-
In addition to and often in conJuncaon wit l t is . . ded in
. fl f an econonuc system groun ments). My focus, however, is on those individuals in "clear classpositions" whose
United States are the deep m uences o ital.ismis rooted in the racial and classstatus most ofi:en align and who tend to leverage them as a means
the principles of a competitive market system. Modem ~ap . ngaged
. O fWestem European profit-shanng corpor.inons e for moving into homogenous "good" neighborhoods filled with similarly classed
six:teenth•century nse tural and human resources and raced people (Pattillo, 2008).
in high- risk investments to compete for control over na . stem depended
. Tl wth of such an econonuc sy Whether focusing on race or social class, we are wise to remember that the
in Africa and the Amencas. te gro 1 b . the fonns of indentured and two are intimately bound (in both historical and contemporary tenllS) in what
upon the exploitation of cheap and free a. or I~ con uest of indigenous Johnson (2006) calls a "matrix of domination" and what Pattillo (2008) refers to
enslaved peoples as well as cheap resou~~es,mcludmg :1~ ~ li t political agen· as "inflection" in that class "inflects" race. Leonardo (2009), too, poetically con-
peoples and their territories through mibtary means an impena s
nects advanced capitalism with Whiteness (and patriarchy) as "the hour and
das (Marx:, 1990; Wright, 1997).
 Why the Educationof PrivilegedChildren Matters 11
10 The Educationol PrivilegedYouth in Theory

. bl • it should not surprise the critical educator Meiners, 2007). In no way am I advocating that the actions of activists and
minute hands of a clock so pred1cta c, l ·l b I . d" (p. 182). Historical teachers, the gaze of researchers, or the efforts of policymakers ought to ignore
ti d the other lurks c osc y e un .
that where you m one, . ' l ·ct1·ons· the enslavement of Afncan these issues.
d f ti ·se categones com c . b
examples ab oun o le . f ·cy among working-class peoples y I do._ however, claim that students from communities of privilege face
i: c: Ib the prevention o um d b
people lOr ,rec a or, . . l/ I . groups and current c ates challenges that merit further investigation. Very few scholars have empirically or
k fi competmg racta et m1c •
hiring strike b rea crs rom " I " taking "our jobs." theoretically looked up the social ladder to understand the education of these
. . . tering around those peop e
about mmugrat1on ccn . I I focus more on rJce or more on youth. The work of Anyon (1980), Bourdieu (1984), Lipman (1998), Brantlinger
· b k there arc tunes w 1en
Throughout t lus oo , l I 11cases I acknowledge that t 1ic (2003), and Lareau (2003) are notable exceptions that provide important insights
. 1 I l p the two togct 1cr. n a ,
class and umes w ien um b .. d diffcrendy in relation to both catego- into the way privilege is reproduced through, inscribed upon, and experienced by
. hich someone may e pos1t1one
ways m w . . • of"privilcgc." people from dominant groups. 6 Recendy, there has been a burst of ethnographic
rics no doubt influences their cxpene~1ccs r tcd beings whose multi-layered activity studying elite private day and boarding schools (Howard, 2008;
I want to reitcr.ite that we are ~ comp tea_ , ·ecy of contexts. Though Gaztambide-Femandez, 2009; Khan, 2011) foUowing in the footsteps of Cookson
r rymg degrees m a van
identities influence our ives to :a . . I ti d nor binary we cannot ignore & Persell (1985), as well as an attempt co understand the mechanisms at work in
· ·1 d ·dentlty 1s nclt 1cr ixe •
it is clear that a pnv1 cge I • ·-1 , d class lines as a powerful Ivy League coUege admissions (Karabel, 2006; Stevens, 2007). Building on
, .l c along evolving racta an
the existence o f pnvi cg . . . . st consequences, particularly the work of King5ton and Lewis (1990), Howard and Gaztambide-Fern:indez's
. avoid addressmg its unJU
process. Ne1t 11cr can we b d I haracteristics that make them net (2010) edited volume, Educati,igElites: ClassPrivilegeand EducationalAdvat1tage,is
· d ho tend to em o Y t te c fi
with t 1tose stu ents w l . WI ·ceness and who come rom a particularly useful compendium.
beneficiaries (i.e., students who can c aim u What this recent scholarship tells us about the education of privileged youth is
middle -/ upper -class fumilics). that they are often cultivated to appear capable ofindependently juggling multiple
responsibilities and to engage in intense competition with the aplomb of a profes-
What Do We Know about the Education sional. Parents and teachers in privileged communities tend to "concertedly cul-
of PrivilegedChildren? tivate" their children (Lareau, 2003), which results in students rarely feeling safe to
. . . • . .nd I want to clarify what I mean by an make mistakes or take the risk inherent in creative and critical thinking (Howard,
With this concepaon of pnv1lcge mknu 'b t ' ts effects on privileged children. 2008). In his recent ethnographic work exploring schooling at St. Paul's Academy ,
. d cl' e what we ·now a ou 1
elite cducanon an ou m . . f . il • I define an elite education as the for example, Khan (2011) found that teachers and White students naturalized
In keeping with my defimuon o pnv egc, oftl1e benefits granted them social hierarchies as artifacts of a meritocratic ladder system, Students pointed to
.d · cc and expect as one
schooling that clul rcn expen~~ d 'al For example, children from their diverse range of experiences rather than their heritage in order to justify
· · . pnvilcgc soc1 group.
by their mem b erslup m a . l d t social class, have parents/ their position near the top, actively ignoring the deep relationship between the
k ds especially those re ate o . I
privilege d b ac ·groun ' . I b I dswith access to safe, stable, lug 1- two. As a result, successful students expressed an embodied sense of ease and an
guardians able to move them int~ ne1g l or l~O • •putable private school. In articude of radical egalitarianism in tenns of their cultural tastes rather than a sense
. l l or simply pay ior a re
achieving pu bl ic sc 100 s . . rivilc ed schools have barriers to entry of entidement marked by cultural distinctions of"high" culture. Not surprisingly,
other words, whether pubhc or pnvate, p ~ b th as markers of and makers upper-class straight White male students succeeded more frequently in this system
(explicit and implicit) that help them to serve o
than did students who identified as working class, LGBTQ, female, or from a
5
of privilcge. 1 attend private and public schools racial background other than White.
By most conventional measures, srodcntsbw d10. •ll· in generJl they tend to Regardless of their demographic descriptors, what we know from the
.. f . ilcgc appear to c omg we ' '
serving commumtics o pnv . l . t't t1·ons of higher education. To small body of empirical work about these students is that those who excel within
d d te and mamcu ate to ms 1 u d
get good grJ cs, grJ ua , . n le resources and attention and arc indee privileged school serting5 tend to be those who embrace hierarchies, ignore struc-
be sure, these children have received a, p b rd to idcntif.y them as an tural inequalities, and demonstrate egalitarianism and politeness on the surface
. · f ways (t may seem a su
likely to succeed m a vanety o . d '1tl1students from marginalized groups with a streak of independence and competitiveness just below. Denis-McKay
. · way when contraste w d
at-nsk group 111any k ow on standardized tests, are pushc or (2007), for example, describes a poignant example of one litde boy in her class at
who struggle to demonstrJte what thefiy n ll • etc These are students whost an international school in Mali and challenges his "successful" identity in school
d t graduate rom co egc, · .
drop out of sc I100 1s, . o n~ . • demand inunediate attention in when he refuses her assignment to write a thank you note to someone who had
schooling is dearly 111 c~s~s and whose n~e-~ d not (e.g., Valenzuela, 1999i helped him:
ways that students in pnv1leged commumues o
 Why the Educationof PrivilegedChildren Matters 13
12 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory

d . all talented and demonstrated Grimke sisters and Freedom Rider Jim Zwerg exemplify the ways in which social
Although this student was acal enuc y ble to critically reflect on his capital and power granted to people through unjust systems can be wielded on
. over and over 1e was una
academic success '. . . 1·r 11dhe was certainly unable to behalf of groups working to upend them .7 More cautionary tales, like those of
. d d I .s own posmon m uc, a
own culture, 11l ec u . A hild of great privilege in a land of m:ed, he middJe-f lass White feminists m:irginalizing working-class women and women
connect or fonn commuruty. c k b cl rs and guardians His parents of color (Thompson, 2002), underscore the importance of caring about the edu-
had been cared for by nan_rud·es,_co\~~eyuw:r: unable to buy ~aring, how- cation of privileged students as part of a larger strategic move to create a more just
. d . ny people to prov1 e care.
lurc fl .
and humane society for all people.
ma ed . hi bility to be critically re ccove
. d this student was stunt m sa ..
ever, an .. ll ral" ground of his privilege, as well as his ability to It is important to note (and will be addressed in more depth later) th.it students
about the mora Y neut are unlikely to come to the same conclusions about how to solve social problems
form connection and community. (p. 31) or whether or not to participate in social justice movements. To demand they
do so would be indoctrination and anti-democratic at its very core. To expose
. . I beliefs that are undesir.ible to students to the realities of an unequal world, to raise questions about how best to
Additionally, this schooling perpetuates olt ter. . l1t way of knowing address that inequality, and to ask students to think about their complicity and
. . · d ogy· that t 1ere 1s one ng
advocates of social Jusace pe ag .. . to others that one should do obligations, however, is not beholden to one's political affili.itions and critically
· I cess comes from bcmg supenor ' ·
and d omg, t tat sue . . d by accumulating possessions, important for a functioning and healthy democracy .
whatever it takes to win, that fulfillment ts game d ?008) Last, but not least, an interest in privileged students' education represents a
that others are too different to relate to, etc. (Howar ' - .
concern for them as participants in oppression given that an unjust society dehu-
manizes not only the marginalized but also those who benefit from its inequality
Why Care About Privileged Children? . . (Freire, 2000; Luthar, 2003). Though benefiting from oppression clearly manifests
. . ort an affinnativc answer to the ongtnal itself in increased m:iterial and social power for net beneficiaries of privilege, it
There are three d1sonct reasons to supid • bout (and by extension, study) also significantly hinders people's ability to build fulfilling lives (Choules , 2007)
question of whether or not we shou care a '
and frequently produces feelings of alienation, meaninglessness, randomness ,
privileged kids' education. d . of unequal opporcunities and isolation, pain, and dysfunction (McLaren, 1998; Goodman, 2000b; Dennan-
First, if we are s:ou1\1~t:::~ ;~::e:~:e:u;nnot just about p_oor people but Sparks & Ramsey, 2006; Denis-McKay, 2007). According to Wise's (2008) memoir
outcomes, we _mu . • co le of all social classes. Focusmg only on the of Whiteness,
about the relaoonslup b_etween p . pil d "unchancnng and unproblematic
. 1· d . ks making the pnv ege an i:,· di d
margma 1ze ns t1· (?00J) refers to as the "unstu e To define yourself, ultimately, by what you're not, is a pathetic and heart-
. ,, (B tt 1996) or what Bran mger -
locaoon onne • . om Others are favorably com- breaking thing. It is to stand denuded before a culture that has stolen your
.. 1 . .ned control group '.lgamst w 1t
but posmve y unag1 d . . 'legcd students' schooling helps birthright, or rather, convinced you to give it up. And the costs are fonni-
,. ( 10) In other words, stu ymg pnvi d.
pare d P· . l . ·1 d chools are inherently good an m dable, beginning with the emptiness whites so often feel when confronted
to demystify the assumption t tat pnv1 cglle s "d wn" tl1us enriches our under- by multiculturalism and the connectedness of people of color to their
S d · "up" as we as o
no need of change. tu ymg . . . / . ' nalization and how oppression , various heritages. That emptiness then gets filled up by the privileges and
standing of the consequences of pnv1leg1ng margl
ultimately forces us to become dependent on them. It's hard to deny th.it at
operates. . c • 'I d communities are very likely to the end of the day, this self- imposed cultural genocide has cost us more,
Secon d ' gi·v e·n that clnldren I lrom pnvi Ider ege
ensuring that these students are in the long run, than it's worth.
·· f wer as t icy grow O ,
occupy pos1aons o po . . f . . d encouraged to orient themsclv~ (p. 171)
· ·cal exanunanon o society an
expose d to a cnu . li cl understood) str.itegy in the larger
towards justice is an unportant (though t e_ kb u'ng "misled miseducated In addition to these more philosophical concerns, there are tangible physical
. . . tic • If not they ns econ • .
project ofintcrrupung lllJUS c. .: I d . I . t n'cal realities" (Gorski. and mental health issues that may be unique to communities of privilege. This
. ciopohnca an socio us o
citizens when it comes to so .. . le from dominant group! includes higher rates of drug-induced deaths, binge drinking, and suicide (for
2006 pp.165-166).Historically,cnocallyconsc1ouspleopl ,. ( (:0) in liberatiOII
' F . (?000) called "a fundamenta ro c P· l which the only group with higher rates are Native American men) (Centers for
have had what reire - I fi 1.onal class like che Disease Control and Prevention (CDC] Report, 2011), as well as lower levels of
mGovcmentsd. SMto n' ca~t~~;~:~~~!~:;i~:r::v~~o~;,:~ea:~:i:: likc the abolitio~ happiness than their less affluent peers, and particular fonns of anxiety, depression,
uevarJ an 01 1
14 The Education of PrivilegedYouth in Theory

L I ?003· Levine 2008). For those committed to the principles

and drug use ( ut iar, -:
of a critical, democraoc, social Jt
' . . ~ce education our compassion and concern
I . al social' moral/spiritual, intellectual,
2
should thus include th~ talpsyc 10 o~~ .' tice f~r privileged youth (Goodman,
material/physical, and soc1e costs o lllJUS
DISCONNECTED, PARALYZED,
2000b). . b .al justice and we believe that schooling can
Ultimately, if "".e care a ou: :~:uld care about how students of privilege are AND CHARITABLE
help transfonn s~~ety, ::;e ':d students' experiences with schoo~ing can help
educated. Exanurung p .g . d nalize elite educaoon, gener.ite SocialJusticePedagogywith
to illuminate how_ inequality pers~sts, -~no:vements working towards justice,
strategies for including these people m ~oc1 1_'1 of o rcssion ultimately PrivilegedChildren
and to elicit compassion for the ways m wlu~h-systems pfp rse is only the
I I d tage Dec1dmg to care, o cou
dehumanize even t iose t 1ey a van .' . . H w should these students
first step. We now tum to another vex.mg quest10n. o
be educated?

A lot of my studenlS have cultural capital and moH of their families are
doing pretty well economically. I'm therefore trying to look at the way I teach
about social justice issues and see if I am enabling studenis to use knowledge
about oppression to their own advantage rather than take it permanently into
their hearts,
(Aiul, a 1e,ul1trin Nortl,'sstudy;Nortl,, 2009, p. 165)

There are many ways to think about how students in privileged communities
ought to be educated. One approach that no doubt drives many parents' decisions
about where to enroU their children is to think about which school will best
prepare them for prestigious universities and job opportunities. In many ways,
this is understandable: most parents want their children to have access to a
high- quality education and successful futures. Yet only considering how best to
prepare students for universities or jobs does little more than preserve, if not
enhance, the forces that privilege elite students (Swift, 2003) .
Another way to think about the question of how we should educate privileged
c hildren (or any children, for that matter) is to consider the needs of a democracy.
What kind of citizens and community members do we want and need privileged
people to be? What kind of education will best prepare them for embracing these
responsibilities? These are loaded questions with inherent nonnative qualities
(What is best? What ought to be?), as well as a range of possible and legitimate
solutions. In their influential examination often civic educational programs in the
United States, Westheimer & Kahne (2004) highlight how educators' pedagogi-
cal choices reveal three very different visions that are helpful here of what kinds
of citizens are needed for a healthy democracy. These perspectives include person-
ally responsibledtiz e11sliip,participatorycitize1isl,ip,and justice-orienteddtize11ship.
 Disconnected, Paralyzed, and Charitable 17
16 The Education of Privileged Youth in Theory

. f pe-onally responsible citizenship equipping and empowering them to work for a more socially just society
. b · the perspccuvc o ,,
Civic educauon cm racmg . . f .. with good morJl character who themselves. This composite definition includes intrapersonal development
teaches students that the cu_luvanondo c1t1ze1d1Sob ·d1'ence will solve social prob- in the teacher, pedagogy and dispositions that support equitable access
'bT depen cnce an c
demonstrate rcspons1 'ity, m . . '. . I ·p on the other hand, empha- to learning for all, a curriculum that can empower all students to
oting paroc1patory cmzcns u ' I become agents of social justice themselves, and activist teachers engaged in
lems. P~ogrJms ~ronl1.. d I . role within established community structures t tat
stze taking an acuve ca ers up . oc·1cty Lastly educational efforts challenging and transfonning inequitable structures and policies in schools
" · der to improve s · •
serve the "less fortUnate m _~r . I d ts that good citizens question and society.
. . · t d ciuzcnslup teac 1 stu en •
rooted in Jusucc-one~ ~ . •dly reproduce injustice and actively (p. 285)
hen it is shown to repcate
the status quo w . • throu h social movements.
work to change those estabhshcd systems! t tl1ogughthere is some overlap among This approach can trace its roots to myriad influences: Jesuit priests working
, d K hne (?004) assert t 1a , ..
Wcsthenncr an a - . . . · · " They cnuque t 11c within a liberation theological framework, critical theorists working within the
I •s present "co1161cung pnonues.
them, these three approac 1e d. . Uy responsible or participatory Frankfurt School tradition, and popular educators like Paolo Freire working
. d . I prom-Jms rootc m persona
many civic c ucauona ,,,.. . I b I . . ns dangerously depoliticize within a "pedagogy of the oppressed"--all actors who mobilized scholarship and
.. l. . I the dann t iat ot l v1s10
fonns of cmzens up ~1~ l . . . al idios ncrJtic acts of kindness over social education as a means to fight against the deep social and economic inequalities in
democracy by emphas1zm~ md1v1du • . y d ·11·tyover demands for change. their communities.
· f" t c • and cncourJgmg oci
action in the pursuit o JUSI e I lly responsible and participatory It is worth noting that any conception of social justice education means very
k wl ·dge that bot l persona
Though t I1ey ac no, e . b I found that attempts to educate little if not linked with the rich philosophical tradition of nonnative theory
.. k d commumty mcm er., t iey
c1ttzens ma ·e goo . . ffi ·ent for a robust democracy. exploring why we should value equality and justice and what a society that values
.I I ·nds m nund are not su ,c1
students wit l t iese. c . I e (?004) call for democratic educational equality and justice should look like (e.g., Leistyna & Woodrum, 1996; Fraser,
Ultimately, Wcstheuner ~nd_ Ka I~ -d tions of citizenship linked to 1997; Gutmann & Thompson, 2004) . Hopefully, the following description will
I size JUst1ce-onente concep . I
programs t Itat emp ta . d I •· . ti at is also known as soc,a appease readers whose visions may differ in important and reasonable ways. ln
. . . . . a type of tcaclung an eanung l
civic part1c1pauon, brief. my conception of the "more just world" towards which education ought to
justice pedagogy· orient itself is one that recognizes and affinns difference (e.g .• cultural, sexual,
political) while maintaining a commitment to fundamental human rights and
democratic principles (e.g., freedom of speech and freedom of religion). It is also
Social Justice Pedagogy ..
• I ·d with the multiple cducationJI tradinons one that challenges the current distribution of resources in order to secure
It is easy to become ovcrwhe m~ I in an attempt to cultivate this kind of the basic needs required for human flourishing (e.g., safety, food, shelter, water,
that inter.ect and borrow from eac lot l~r / ,· (Kumashiro 2004), aitical love) (Nussbaum, 1992; Fraser, 1997) •
·ustice•oricntcd
.·
c1t1zc11S
Inp.
· • 1ti•opim·ss111c
a, c, uca
T
'"" & B-ttodano' ?002 · Apple,
J I recognize tl1at this description is loaded with loaded terms; indeed, shelves
, M La 1998· Oarder, orr~-s. .u '- '
pcda~o,l!y (Shor, 19 !>2 ; c ren, ' · Kahnc 1998· Apple & full of books have been written to think through the finer points and inherent
Au,· & Gaudin, 2009), ,lcmoaati~sclw11/i11,I! ~(McstGhc.m1&crB~nks 19;5), m,:/ticulturall tensions in what is meant by "human flourishing," "democratic principles," and
• ? . P· kcr 2003), cq111ty pcda.~o)!y c cc • .
Be.me, _QOO, ar ' ks & B· k ?006- Sleeter & GrJnt, 2007, "human rights." To be as transparent as possible, my understanding ofa more just
. . . (N' ?000· Ban . an s, - ' . .
a11tr-rac1s1
cduC11t11111 ieto, - ' . (I ks 1994) tcad1i11~ for equity a,11/ JUSlllt world is rooted in a critical theoretical framework that assumes unequal power
Pollock, 2008), tcachit1,I! '" tr1;:.~w ,~;) 'and tca~/1i11)!s11ci11I Ji,; actio11
(Schultz, relationships and challenges the belief systems and social relations that (re)produce
(Bigelow, Harvey, Karp, & .' er, - ' • t1'011ssl1·•re are the fundameneli power differentials . Ultimately, this understanding of a more just world asks what
. · ·t t •rrclated conccp ..
2008). What these d istmct y~ •_nc fi k of social justice ctlucatio11 (Ad,uns, sorts of transformation are needed to eliminate oppression and exploitation. "This
principles and objectives w1thm a rJmc".'or t • B ks ?004) question implies not simply an explanatory agenda about the mechanisms that
'ffi 1997· Ayer. Hunt & Qumn, 19 !>8 , an ' - · ,,_1
Bell, & Gn Ill, ' . • ' .' . . •ducation that is perhaps most usellll generate economic inequalities," Wright (2008) says, "but a nonnative judgment
The workmg dcfinmon for social JUsace e f tl1e aforementioned trJditioOS, 3bout those inequalities-are fonns of'oppression and exploitation-and a nor-
. to incorporate many o
here is one thdatzatte1bnplts (?008) cast a wide net when they define it as mative vision of the tr:msfonnation of those inequalities as part of a political
Chubbuck an cm Y as - project of emancipatory social change" (p. 334).
. , d • t cdagomes that impro\lC Burin (2002) wonders if unequal conditions can ever be overthrown given that
. I • ·ffort to transfom1 policies an cnac p o· J-'i.
A tcac 1er s c .
1
d ·d students w 111' oppressive structures seem to be so deeply embedded in society that they are
the learning and life opportunities of typical y un er.;ervc
 Disconnected, Paralyzed,and Charitable 19
18 The Educationor PrivilegedYouth in Theory

. . ·s mind the goal of social justice pedagogy for According to North (2009), this age-old debate between critical and func-
immutable and mevttable. In _lu f'· d pc from 'oppression', we are all tional literacies does not, however,
. .. t resistance o an esca
privileged peop 1e ts no a . f I . of power. The goal is rather the
. . d structl ve o re auons
constructed wit 1un an con . . 1' ducti·ve' understood as providing Ad_equately capture the development of additional competencies for social
. f I1 r relanons wtt 1 pro
P roducttve use o sue powe . . ' k If' (pp 14-15). Goodman justice that require more than a bundle ofknowledge and skills. These com-
ti tialines to rema e onesc .
greater rather than ewer poten 'd . . s ~nd alteniatives that change petencies include cultivating solidarity, working through difficult emotions
.. e need to provi e v1s1on ..
(2000b), too, notes t 11at, w . db 1 . In this sense, the aim is not Qike shame, fear, and guilt), and publicly acting up--that is, directly chal-
eople's ways o f I · ki ng, actmg ' an e iavmg.
tun. b
· ··
I ange the very nature of lenging the status quo-when called for. Deep-seated dispositions toward
P 1 who has power ut to c 1
to change roles or c 1ange I . . 1 I elpful and quite pr.igmatic in that social justice rarely if ever emerge from the efficient, scientific planning of
.. (p 195 _ 196) I find t 1ese ms1g 1cs 1
the system P· · . k b l w best to mobilize their resources people. . . . Instead, poignant experiences and interpersonal relationships
. il d pie to dun a out 10 . d
they ask pnv ege peo . Id F while it is unlikely that pnvtlege often incite people to work collectively for a more just and peaceful world.
in order to build a more JUSt worl . orl entirely from the contexts that (p. 75)
Id uld extract t 1emse ves .. ,.
students wou or co . . . ducation that asks them to clmu-
. · ble to 1magme an e
privilege them, tt ts poss1 d I t c\1·•t vision requires of them Keeping in mind Noddings' (1984) "ethics of care" and Antrop-Gonzalez &
. d f . ty they want an w 1a .. .
about what kin o socie k . ·nd l1owever that while radical de Jesus' (2006) "critical care," North (2009) thus recommends the concurrent
·· W must ·eep m nu '
in their current positions. e I . m1ediate or viable of goals, it is development of a relationalliteracy.She notes, however, that, "even an education
· not be t 1e most m .
social transfonnanon may
. . .
d
d ogy eman e uca
els d tors ~nd their students consider
..
that develops critically enlightened and caring citizens does not always realize
one that social Jusoce pc ag vibrant, just democratic communities. We also need communication skills that
(particularly if they are privileged~. . gfi I way a socialJ·ustice pedagogical allow us to expose and ;iddress conflict and controversial issues nonviolently"
dd I · es m a meamn u ,
In order to a ress sue 1 issu . . 1) xposing students to multiple (p. 109). Building upon the work of Westheimer and Kahne (2002) and Parker
.I thr ·e pnmary tenets. e
framework re ies on c f . . d copies ") a democratic class- (2003), she establishes the need for just such a democratic
literacy.Finally, inspired by
. I d th • voices o margma 1ize p '- .
perspectives t I1at me u e e . d 3) portunities to participate m the work of Greene (1995), she calls for a visionaryliteracythat asks students to
I . . lues student vmce, an op . f
room structure t tat va . b d social action that address issues o practice imagining a better world. This literacy relies heavily upon the arts and
· . nd conunumty- ase
project-base d Ieanung a ks pping out the key elements students' creative faculties to complement the analytic, rational modes of thinking
. • • I •. • •ral helpful fr.imewor ma .
nuustice. • T 1ere are seve ti . .de11tifiesfive .. essential com- emphasized by functional and critical literacies.
H kt . ("005) or mstan ce, 1 .
of such a classroom. ac nan - . • I des ex osure to multiple perspecuves, In summary, social justice pedagogy attends to the following three elements:
ponents" : (a) co111e11t ,uasterythat idncu pesn·onsuch infonnation, (c) s,,cial
· I I t \lo w stu ents to qu
(b) criticala11alys1 s IM st ia a ti b . hopeless or complacent by 1) a curriculum that includes multiple perspectives (co11te11t masterylfu11ctiot1al
. t tudents rom econung
tools that I1eIp preven s
c/11111.~c . l ti both students and teachers and criticalliteracy)grounded in an assumption that systemic, institutional
. · (d) se[f-rejlectu>11 too s or .
eng-.iging them m acuon, . . I . ti k and (e) an arvarcuess of ,uu/tr- oppression exists (criticalat1alysistools/criticalliteracy);
I
to make sense o f t 1eu ives
. r wttlun
1
t us ramewor ,
. 1 . stice teachers approach the prevt-
.
2) a democratic classroom where students' voices are valued and lives reflected
cu/tura/~roup,ly11m11 ics that affects 10w soc1a JU (awaretiessof multiculturaldynamics/democraticliteracy)with opportunities to
. . 1. di •rse groups of students.
ous four dynanucs _wit m~ ~ v:Un North (2009) outlines five "literacies" derived engage in individual critical self-reflection (awarenessof multicultural
Morerecently,andquitc use y, I ~•i·ng with what it mean s to dyttamicslseif-rtjlcctiontools/relatio11al
literacy);and
f ki rroup of teac 1ers strugo'
from her study o a wor ng g SI 1pl1·•s1· zes that none of the literacies 3) practice participating in collective action at the micro and macro levels (social
be enaaged
.m soci·a1JUS • t'i cc• pedagogy. 1e. en ..
.,,. k lll concert wit. I1 .an d i' ntionn each other. changetools/democratic a11drelationalliteracy)in order to build a less oppressive
alone are sufficient but rat 11er must _wor 1 k f Ladson - Billings ( 1994) society (soda/cha11ge tools/visionaryliteracy).
. I 1. dr.iwmg upon t 1e wor o f
The first is a jimct,01111rteracy . ' ("008) conception o
. I t be likened to young s -
and Delpit (1995) t I1at nug l . ti . d skills from the dominant The hoped-for short- and long-term outcomes of this pedagogy are that
... osure to 111 onuauon an .
"powerful know Ie d gc · exp · · Tl ·s kind of literacy 15 students will (a) be aware of injustice in the world and understand its root causes,
. cess to more opportunmes. u
culture that trans Iates mto ac . . . I /'tcracypractices that (b) feel empowered to address that inequity as agents of change, and (c) ultimately
d must also eng-.ige 111 crriwr 1
not enough, howeve~; stu ~nts kill d knowledge from multiple perspecuves act in ways that help to create a more just and equitable world (Ayers, Quinn, &
enable them to exanune these s s an Stovall, 2009).
(Gutstein , 2006) .
 Disconnected,Paralyzed,and Charitable 21
20 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth In Theory
from districts, as exemplified by recent legislation in Arizona against ethnic studies
programs (Orozco, 2012) and the opposition to teaching "critical thinking skills"
Complications . in "social justice as part of the GOP party platform in Texas (Republican Party of Texas, 2012).~
fi K-12 classroom teachers engaging . Despi!e the overwhelming odds, however, many narratives exist of teachers
ln recent years, resources or . ead and accessible (e.g., readers like Ayers,
~gogy" have become more w1despr . . Ed ,· ('>009) publications from finding ways to bodt satisfy and critique the demands of an audit culture without
pe d d ,rs . I) treeIII uca,0,1 - ,
sacrificing their committnent to engaging in content that values multiple and
uinn, & Stovall's Handbooko; oo11 us . . like NYCoR.E, curriculum
Q ts teacher orgamzanons . .. ·al marginalized perspectives, student-centered practices, and democratic social
Rethinking Scliools,gr-Jssroo . . d 1 education programs with soct
. . . cines an teac 1er .
conferences m many maJor .' . f 1 tem1 however, should not imp 1y a action working with students and the larger community to address social injustice
.ustice" in their mission). The ~b1q~1tyr.o t 1e_ts ,fii:cacy or its goals. Rather, the (see Ayers, et al., 1998; Apple & Beane, 2000; Wade, 2001; Cutstein, 2003;
J . f. mng its lonn, t e , . d Hackman, 2005; North, 2009). A largely anecdotal body of evidence about social
unified concepuon o its mea ' d tion raises important quesnons an
increased attention to this approach to e uca lutions.2 For example, how justice pedagogy paints a picture of students, teachers, and community members
. b . us answers or easy so 1 engaged in academically rigorous, personally satisfying, and socially transforma-
exposes tensions with no o v10 ' "teachin for social justice" a process, a goa '
should this pedagogy be enact~\ ls 1 rs r!cus on increasing opportunities for tive teaching and learning (see Ayers, et al., 1998; Apple & Beane, 2000; Gutstein,
or both (Bell, 1997)? How nug t teac l~ us curriculum to students' cultures 2006; Au et al., 2007; Schultz, 2008; Ayers, et al., 2009; North, 2009). I cannot
marginalized students by conn_ecti;~9~ n:;1:e also promoting anti-oppression state clearly enough that, while most public school teachers fuce standardizing
(Ladson-Billings, 1994; Oelptt, . _) .. al curriculum (Apple, 1993; Ayers, curriculum, larger class sizes, fewer resources, more narrow conceptions of
activism through an inclusive, ann-rac1s_t,c~~~- Wade, 2001; Kumashiro, 2004; accountability, less autonomy, and stiffer penalties for "failure" (a depressing state
998· Apple & Beane, 2000; Freire, - ' of affii.irsif ever there was one), such a climate does not make social justice peda -
et a1., 1 • ?009)?
Au, Bigelow, & Karp, 2007; Anyan, - e ~n social justice pedagogy, it is als~ gogy impossible. If anything, it cries out for a deeper commitment to teaching
Beyond how teachers should enga~ ... ti "about redistribution, recogm- that critically analyzes society, connects to students' lives, and urges students to
undear to what ends it should be ~on~- is b!~:eceen the two f{ oung, 1990; Fraser, act on what they learn.
It is worth noting here that some scholars bemoan the slippery vagueness
n·on , or a more sophisticatedl rclanons ?006)? Shou Jusnce-
tp Id. . on'ented discourse be one of
of the term "social justice" and warn of its becoming an irreversibly empty buzz-
1997·• Gewirtz, 199H; Nort 1,· -il .
(Chou es,
1 2007)' What keeps th.is pedagogy
· ·
charity' human rights, or p~v e~e . . or another fonn of oppression word despite its proponents' best intentions (Hernandez-Sheets, 2003; Hackman,
from being Leftist ideological mdoc~~n~t00107n· Applebaum, 2009)? Should "jus- 2005; North, 2006; Chubbuck & Zembylas, 2008; Boyles, Carusi, & Attick, 2009).
llsworth, 1989; B utm, · '>002·
- • Au ' eta.i.,. - . ' d ~ct·1ons present an dti uture, Its dilution is not only confusing and frustrating to those who align themselves
(E · di ·d al ' onentanons an
tice" goals focus more on m vt ~ s k
d ' •

embers of a collective society with the tradition, but is potentially counterproductive to the aims most social
· d acnons ta en as m "009)• justice educators promote by asking too little of those in power (Choules, 2007;
or on the orientat1ons an ki 2006' North 200H; Leonardo, - .
v .., e "004· Gars ,
.
(W estheuner & ""'m ' - ' . .' ' -hegemoruc· c I·assroon u
unter Leonardo, 2009). Butin (2007), for example, draws attention to how such watered-
. st m creanng co d
Ft.nally • how might teac 11ers mve 1· . t the school district, state, an down definitions tend to serve those who would find it most unpalatable
. . . · ·table po 1c1esa • by avoiding the "very difficulty originally meant to be engaged" (p. 2). From a
while also orgamzmg against mequknt 2005· North 2006)?
2005· Hae . \an, • ' . . 1 . ·s postmodern perspective, Ellsworth (1989) critiques the vagueness of social justice
national levels (Anyon, ' I. . d "pproach to teachmg is t 1at it t
. . . I , dy sop usttcate (and its cousin "empowerment") as ahistorical and depoliticized. Using a more
Compb caung t 1us a rea
d
k b d managerial conunon sense
rr ·nt mar et- ase , . .
attempting to counter t 1\e cu c t"ves neoliberals, authontanan critical theoretical lens, Hackman (2005) recognizes the benefit of multiple
tf,.l' · f neoconserva 1 , entry points created by a broad definitional range, but concludes that dilution
promoted by a loose a . iauon o "ddle class (Apple, 2006). What results ~rom
opulists, and the professional new lnub . w1·th dosing the infamous adueve~ "ultimately does the field a disservice by . . . weakening the call for teachers,
P . fi • · tiona o session l I
such a hegemmuc orcc is a na . . d 1 ·ously affecting urban sc 100 s schools, and communities to be true vanguards for change" (p. 103). Gorski (2006)
. f pohc1es e eten I and Buras (2008) go further in suggesting that this vagueness leaves too much
mcnt gap and the creanon o . 1 k 'ds and students of color.' T iese
. . •. . nts working -c ass t , d ~
that pnmanly serve mmugra ' b ucrJtic requirements an pres room for Rightist interpretations that purposefully maintain the status quo of
. . 1 burdensome urea
well-documented, mcreasmg y der social J. ustice pedagogY a inequity (e.g., Hirsch, 1988; Payne, 1996).
. l ublic schools seem to ren of Loosely defined and disconnected from its roots, then, it is suggested that
sores on teachers m t 1e p ) l ddin'on some of the successes
· & w od ?004 . n a • l e perhaps social justice pedagogy should be retired from the educational commu-
utopian dream (Meiers . o ,- . 1 . tice pedagogy into schools \al/
integrating a critical, mult1cutlur~, soc1~ JUIs 1' " (BurJ s 200H) or banished nity's evolving lexicon. While I acknowledge these concerns, I believe the term
. b pted into a "righust mulucu tur.i ism ,
either ecn co-o
22 'The Educationor PrivilegedYouth in Theory Disconnected, Paralyzed,and Charitable 23

. . I be set aside ju st yet. ~ Ultimately, the dominant culture also can learn ofinjustice and embrace their own role as
has a history and potential too nc ldto .. r debates about its possible
allies in the creation of a more just society.
d . • rchcr an practmonc
tensions surface m rcsea . have been quite productive and
(pp. 282, 285)
and desirable meanings, though not con e1us1vc, ?
rd ?006· Chubbu ck & Zembylas, _OOH).
important (e.g ., N 0 1• - '
Such attention to group dynamics and the social context of students' lives is
surely good practice for all teachers (Hackman, 2005), though it may be particu-
Social Justice Pedagogy with Privileged Children larly salient when considering these implications within a classroom implementing
, ditions ofliberation movements with oppressed a social justice framework.
With roots firntly planted m tra . . f I unts '-"'ocus on the possibilities Frustratingly, there are few empirical studies that specifically address teachers
. onty o t 1esc acco 1'
peoples, the fact t Itat t 1le vast maJ . r d groups makes histori-
. , da gy with students from margma izc engaged in social justice pedagogy with privileged K-12 students (Hernandez-
of socialJusucc pc go . . A ?0oo7 ,. Erickson, 2009). Given that Sheets, 2003; Curry-Stevens, 2007). Those that do exist tend to focus on a critique
· I • (Giroux 1992 u, -
cal, even et Iuca' sense •
•
' ' I I w'1th a critical consciousness of service-learning with privileged students (e.g., Wade, 2001; Himley, 2004;
'Id , likely to enter sc 100 s
privileged clu ren arc u~ handful of scholars advocate for the theorization and Gorski, 2006; Butin, 2007; Swaminathan, 2007), a description of multicultural
already formed, however, a I . ttuned to their unique needs. education with White students in undergraduate classes (e.g., Gannon, 2004;
. f · l · tice pedagogy t 1at 1sa
implementation o soc1a JUS I d . ant culture relies on unques- Chizhik & Chizhik, 2005), an examination of privileged people's discourses
7) I t "because t 1e onun
Denis-McKay (200 notes t 1a_'. name critically reflect, and act are equally around privilege (e.g., Choules, 2007), or an analysis of adult learners from priv-
tioned privile~, the opportumues !~ 27 •. According to North (2008), "when ileged groups (e.g., Goodman, 2000a, 2000b; Manglitz, 2003; Curry-Stevens,
denied the pnv1leged and the other'-"' (pd. )d l It. while others arc debating the
A1· 1g to find ,oo an s 1e er 2007; Heinze, 2008). The majority of existing literature that connects social justice
some students arc strugi:;,11 I t e we cannot expect a single pedagogy with non-marginalized populations focuses on White, middle-class,
f I . d d placement class over t 1a on ' ,.
ments o t us a vancc . b «- . '-"'r all students in all contexts. pre-service teacher-education students considered to be the "first significant
. 1. . ducauon to e cuect1ve 10
approach to socaa JUsuce e I d • tl1at tl1ose students with the most privileges audience" ofsocialjustice pedagogy (Chubbuck & Zembylas, 2008) as they learn
· "We can cone u c ·
She continues: ' I . pie's sutfering if they are gomg to how to teach students of color and/or students from high - poverty urban com-
need to do more than 'learn about ot 1er peo
· t "(p 1"00) munities (e.g., Cochran-Smith, 2004; Gannon, 2004; McDonald & Zeichner,
effect real social c 1ange · - · . . l ·d '-"'or
a ditferent approach 2009; Zeichner & Aessner, 2009).
d (?009) surular y notes a nee ,,
1n tem1s of race' Leonar o - L , ' b lief that the proletariat must In the late 1960s, Miel and Kiester (1967) conducted a study of suburban
, d I1en he references emn s e
with Wlute stu ents w / . . d In addition he contests the schools showing a need for the curriculum to include challenging social issues
. I b ·sic rcvoutwmzc · '
be educatedwlule t 1e ourge01 I b fi o-d1scoursal White students to expand affiuent children's "life-space." Twenty years later, Howard (1981)
. I tional schoo s ene it mon .
assumption t 1at conven I I ...:ten by default immersed m advocated a "multiethnic curriculum for monoethnic schools" with Project
. d \ts of co or w 10 are 011 , •
when compare d wit 11 stu e1 "al" al . knowledge· "By contrJst, white REACH (Rural Education and Cultural Heritage), a four-phase curriculum
"and "unoffica- . ten1anve .
"counter- di scourses ,uc racial understandings framework focused on human relations, cultural / ethnic self-awareness, multi-
. d fi ge these same counter- 11egen10 . d
subjects o not or . d. lopment, that is, color-bhn cultural/multi-ethnic awareness, and cross-cultural experiences. Building upon
because their lives also depend on a cert:1111 ev~, H3)
his work, Peoples-Wessinger (1994) also wrote about her time as a physical-
strategics that maintain their supremacy as_~gr~uiJ ~~der~served youth" as the
education teacher exploring multicultural education in a monocultural (White)
And though they expli~itl~ re_ferenc~ typ1c~l;ubbuck and Zcmbylas (2008)
targeted population for social JUStacepe gogy, . I. I school in Vermont. Examples of more recent work include Derman-Sparks and
call for educators and scholars to think about the ways m w uc l Ramsey's (2006) book What if All tl1eKids Are White?, which offers research
reviews, case-study vignettes, and voices of teachers in the field in their guide to
. a1· d or from the dominant culture, need to anti-bias/multicultural early childhood education of White children. Drawing
All students, whether margm ize .. d redistribution as
upon the literature of adolescent psychology, Seider (2008, 2009) identifies a
leam and respond to the demands of b~th recogi_1monan . alized students
, f , stice In socially JUSt teaching, margm b decrease in affluent students' levels of empathy for economically disadvantaged
expressions o JU · ··· . ta! · · · are to e
.. d as obiccts of soc1e U>JUSnce... people after participation in a social justice pedagogy English class. And Denis-
who have been posmone -.J • • bl . and
. b' ts who challenge meqmta e status qu 0 McKay (2007), a teacher-researcher working at an international school in Mali,
•1npowcred to act as su ~ec I f the
ework to create a b etter soc1c. •ty [while] ... those students w 10 are part o explicitly focuses on the social justice teaching and learning ofK-12 privileged
 Disconnected, Paralyzed,and Charitable 25
24 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory
. t based curriculum brought students metaphors used for privileged students' ignorance of injustice (e.g., "sheltered",
outh in theorizing about how _her plroJelc- of people native to the region. "in a bubble"), hers is one of my favorites. She says that privileged indi viduals
Y · with a oca group ·
into J. oint cultural pro d uct1on . d . I ·n Rctl1i11kin.J? Sc/,o()/srcflccung (who are privileged, she notes, whether they admit to it or not) have worldviews
I ubhshe aruc es i d
Additionally' teachers iavc p . I ffiuent and suburban stu ents that "eaj_stin protected cocoons" (p. 74). What I like mo st about this is the hope
. I . . pedagogy wit 1 a
on their attempts at socia JUsuce that is embedded within it; one is meant to emerge from a cocoon as a stronger
(e.g., Frewing, 2001; Staples'. 2~05). • oints to three common reactions of and wiser, transformed being meant for broader horizons.
When read together, dus hteratun: ~ 1 . . . d~gogy First though they When it comes to thinking about privileged students' capacity to be aware of
d to soc1a JUSt1ccpe .. . '
privileged children when expose ld . ·teged students are likely to frame injustice, Leonardo (2009) quite helpfully distinguishes between racial undcrstat1d-
may well \cam of injustices in the wor 'dpnvp1unawareness of their root causes. ing and racial knowledge,claiming that most Whites have little of the former and a
d demonstrate a ee l . '
these issues as ab stract an to feel empowered by eammg lot of the latter. This distinction holds for other fonns of privilege as well: stu-
. 1· d cudents may come db
Second, whereas margina ize . s. d likely to feel overwhelme y dents from wealthy fumilies, for example, certainly know that poverty exists, but
. pnv1leged stu ents are . . .
about systemic oppression,_ Tl . d '[students choose to paruc1pate m their understanding of how poverty and wealth are intertwined and experienced
guilt or anger and resist tlus pedagogy. ur ' • . I . tice pedagogy' privileged
f heir exposure to soc1a JUS I
is likely to be weak at best. Knowledge about injustice can help students keep an
social action as a result o t . h r. e themselves as savior figures w 10 abstract, impersonal distance from oppression; it is something that happened "back
'k ct m ways t at 1ram d.
students arc more l• eIy to a . . rficial way. Instead of expan mg then" or "over there" to "them." Underst:inding, on the other hand, requires
. .. " · a patrontzmg or supc . ·
help a deficit Ot 1ier m d ·n=mng them m acnon as empathy and a willingness to implicate oneselfin the issue at had--a much more
. . ng them to act, an c .,-.,- • .al
their worldv1ew, empowen 1· ult'i1natcly wams of the potcnu difficult t:isk. When exposed to social justice pedagogy, privileged students, then,
I pe the iterature ll ·
social justice pedagogues to . ' . ·1 d students to backfire. What fo ows is are likely to focus on knowledge of injustice rather than understanding its root
•_1 •
for soc1ai • •
JUst1cc pc•dagogy with pnvi ege . d ·d consequences ·m t c•n11sof causes and connections to their lives (Howard, 2008) as it is "often easier to
. . f each of these umntcn c
a deeper exanunauon o . deplore [oppression] and its effects than to take responsibility for the privilege
awareness, empowennent, and action. some of us receive as a result of it" (Rothenberg, 2002, p. 1).
Even if teachers (or parents) set out to challenge this conception by engaging
in social justice pedagogy, privileged students may still find ways to "capitalize"
Awareness .. f privilege will have ha muc
d h on knowledge of injustice as a way to increase their marketability (Goodman,
lt is unlikely that students from commumuesl o ·111011ic content at the heart of 2000a). A student may integrate their new knowledge about "diversity" as a way
explicit exposure in their ives o
• r t the counter - 1ege
f living it every day. Because to write a much more attractive college essay, for example, or leverage required
. . I ugh they arc, o course, •di
social JUsnce pedagogy, t to b b" messages through exposure to me a, community-service hours in order to gain entrance into more competitive
. . -1 "I d" by a sor mg . ··
Privilege is pnman . y • c:earne oplc .m their . li . d growing up m conunumues universities. Though her study does not focus on privileged students, North
ves, an b
interactions with s1g1U11cant pc . r. l privileged youth tend to e (2009) expresses great concern for (and not a little frustration with) these students
I d11fcrentlrom t tem, 6)
physically isolated from peo~ e . . o them (Demian-Sparks & Rams ey' 200 . who incorporate their new critical literacy into what Lareau (2003) calls a
sheltered by forces rendered mv1S1ble_ t ge of all: to preserve an aura "repeated performance of entitled selves" or Khan's (2011) "ease" of the new elite
. h ost unportant messa ali
Included in their lessons is t ~ 1~1 Tl . ... . 'b1'lizing" need not be of m - that continues to legitimate the social order. Ultimately, she worries that "teaching
I . v1leges us mv1s1
of inevitability about t ietr pn . ?007) <,For example, it is not uncmn- students the rules of a social system that already benefits them could have the
r. • (Curry-Stevens, - · p II k unintentional effect of strengthening that very system" (p. 126). Social justice
cious intent to rnnctton . ki • 1· ·t1y about race- what o oc
. I· . v01d cal. ng exp ict . .
mon for Wlute peop e to a " . uch situations, however, is playmg a educators in communities of privilege thus face a difficult challenge as they
(2004) calls being "colonn~te : . Race• n.1s . ·t" 1ever comes up" simply bcc:1use struggle against norms of competitive individualism that encourage such inter-
. I as an mvtS1blepresence, I '
deeply unportant ro e · · ·rrelevant pret:itions of their pedagogy (Goodman, 2000b).
. .di · - not because tt ts 1 • . • • •
people are actively avo1 ng It I re roduction of incquahues, it IS
When privileged people do challenge t 1el . p. to be "color blind" rather
I - ds (e g c amung Empowerment
often only when it serves t ieir n~e I .. iives and the ways in which they arc
than critically reflecting on ~ace mft tel~ cial structures) (Hurtado, t 996; Because social justice pedagogy asks teachers to expose privileged children to
. . . I production o racist so d ell~
comphc1t 111 t 1e re I 'd ·~ that ignorance an :1war perspectives that often challenge the status quo, few expect these students to jump
I · (1995) presents t 1e 1 c~ dy
Applebaum, 2010). D e p'.t. I• I . t "those with power arc frcquen on the social justice bandwagon as willingly as might those from marginalized
likely co-cXlst · wit· 1un · pnv1legcd peop c, t tad . • 'stence" (p. 24). of· aUthe groups. Rather than feel empowered by knowledge or understanding ofinj ustice,
. • (.-o r least willing to acknow\e ge--1ts cXl
1cast aware o
 Disconnected, Paralyzed,and Charitable 27
26 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory
fi d angry or challenged (Rothenberg, disrupt oppression. As White studies scholar Tim Wise (2002) admits, "pri vilege
privileged students are lik~ly to fed_ con u~~) or deny complicity in the repro- tastes good and we're loath to relinquish it" (p. 108). With regards to race privilege ,
2002), immobilized by giult {Rodnguez, - ?00;) "This makes pedagogy for the Berlak and Moyenda (2001) claim that, ultimately, "White people are going to do
· fomu (Applebaum, - · ,, c rry- what th~ damn well please" (p. 136). Hernandez-Sheets (2000) notes that , " the
duction of oppressive . eda o of the oppressed, says u
privileged significandy d1ffer~nt fr~m ~ a~t ~ dear and direct and the process
Stevens (2007), "where the h:era;:~:
typically marked by ease·a~d reel
~:x relatively unscathed by resistance ~nd
that this fom1 of change engenders resist-
.
connection from the process of White racial identity development that potentiall y
creates change agents committed to social action to effective pedagogy, is unclear ,
undocumented, and unrealistic" (p. 19). In fact, attention to race may encourage
denial. We need to renun ourse ves tion with students' opposition to these White students to "create solidarity" in their racial identity rather than w ork to
ance" (p. 41). A not-so-subtle frustra_ . . students from dominant groups rearticulate it (Rodriguez, 2000). Privileged people are thus "politically unrelia-
. li ture pos1uonmg ·
changes abounds Ill t 11e tera . ' . h hich to attempt this work. Agam, a ble"; they may change their hearts and minds , but refuse to act on these changes
· populauon wit w · t:: to
as the most c hallengmg .. I n1ention here is not m re1crcnce either individually or colle ctively (Goodman, 2000b; Curry-Stevens, 2007 ).
. , , . the opposition d ·I For those privileged students who do choose to act, the literature is clear that
note about mdocmnauon. . b wltat ought to be one wit l
. d rspecuves a out I .
mdcnts' diverse an d vane pe they should do so as allieswith oppressed peoples' struggles rather than patroniz-
S • r ' with systems O oppreSSI. on ' but rather about t 1e1r
f
ing or colonizing saviors swooping in to aid the Other (Kivel, 2002; Ed wards,
regards to their comp 1c1ty I . k bout those issues at all.
.. b . asked to t un a difti l
otential oppos1oon to emg . l dose of realism about how icu t 2006). Privileged students can be valuable to social movements, especially with
P , . d however wit l a d l
Exasperation is tcmpere ' ' d l held worldviews an iow regards to their powerful fonns of capittl they can mobilize (Goodman, 2000b ;
· · ds about eep Y
it is for people to change t 11e_1rnun .h h e (Heinze, 2008). Resistance, Curry-Stevens, 2007). A conception of alliance rather than service can help focu s
ill cnce loss wit c ang ·
likely it is that they w expen . . al tl1e consequences for answenng attention on root causes of injustice and long-term solutions , For instance,
d nor ,rrauon as .
then is neither unexpecte . beliefs and practices have senous Wise (2002), urges people from all backgrounds to unite "against their common
' d ·ally adopung new . iki
new questions an pot.en~ also hi hlight the fact that we are tlm . ng . problem: the mostly white lawmakers who prioritize jails and slashing taxes on
implications for pe~ple s lives. ~:ust ildren ;om into poverty or to fumilies from the wealthy over meeting the needs of most people" (p. 109) rather than engage
bout privileged cl11/,lrc11, who, ecl . • by choice and have very in more superficial action addressing only the symptoms of injustice.
a . d come to such a posmon . K·
marmnahzed groups, o not . t::onns themselves (Dcrus-Mc ay, These alliances between the privileged and the oppressed, however, cannot
• .,. ., , ting oppressive •• . d l
little culpab1hty Ill pe~etua . called for. If the hope is that privilege peop e come at the expense of the oppressed. An ethos of charity is, frustratingly , a
2007). A bit of compassion here is . stl rivilege them, then any process perhaps well-intentioned but all-too common framework in the edu cation of
work to dismande the systenlS that unJU d y ~ lot of pain uncertainty' and grief privileged youth that frequently descends into a type of voyeurism or what
ki towards such ends is sure to engcn er a ' Hernandez-Sheets (2000) calls "helperi sm" which is "platitudinous and no lon ger
wor ng · cknowledge .
that educators would be wise to a brace social justice pedagogy, peers viable" for marginalized peoples (p. 19). Such an approach can be disruptive and
Even if privileged students choosedto em rage a resistant response. There is distracting when privileged students are briefly dropped into an organization
cem an encou l
and families may express con . . • w1·thin their communities for peop e when what is most needed from them is financial support or a comminnent to
. ort onncenuvc . . ·al
likely little opportunity, supp ' I I . ' dentity and cxanune its soc1 build long-term relationships with a movement over time. Such shallow fonns of
· · lly exp ore t 1e1r I k
from dominant groups to cnnca . . l su ortive students may thus revert bac service learning can obscure underlying causes ofinjustice, rcify privileged norms,
implications (Goodman , 2000b). lrunal y PP d by examining themselves and excuse privileged students from critically reflecting on their lives, and reprodu ce
. d " ti e fear ge nerate
to their "original bhn ncss as l . l I . soci·at networks appears coo great a false sense of"Us " and "Them" (Burin, 2007; Choules, 2007).
. · hips wit 1 t 1e1r
the risk of damagmg re 1anons . l . l the literJturc that students can To avoid this trap, scholars advise privileg ed people to become involved in
(Heinze, 2008). Ultimately , the.re so~1e
o embrace social JUSUCCpc g
I~ 10:: i:gy with a patient , supportive social movements not simply to help others but in order to liberate themsel ves
b e persua ded t (Denis-M cKay, 2007; Wise, 2008). Th ose who focus on " humanization" warn
teacher at the helm . against demonizing or punishing the privileged , focusing instead on how their
privilege can be mobilized to help abolish oppressive structures and conditions
(Goodman, 2000b; Hein ze, 2008). Though focusing such attention on privileged
Action hcther .. b children may "re-center " them at the expense of marginalized youth (Hernande z-
. tli• a heJlthy dose ofskepnc1sm a out w
-
Along with hope , the hterature ~ _ers d l 's worldvicws is actually poss1b~: Sheets, 2000; Curry-Stevens, 2007), addressing a pedagogy of privileged students
· f pnvile gc pcop e WJII
or not the transfonnauon o . l l d tl1en1 to act in ways that rooted in an "analytics of the oppressed" is markedly different than the historic
l l will ulmnatc y ca
and whether or not sue l c ,ange
28 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Theory

centering of Eurocentric tt·.iditions in which privilege itself was immune to

crinque and trJnsfonuation (Leonardo, 2009).
With these potential "backfire" responses to the hoped-for goals of social
JUStice pedagogy with privileged children in mind (awareness, agency, and
action), I now tum to examining the practices of two teachers workmg with
different groups of privileged students. One taught in a suburban public school,
PART 11
the other at an elite urban private academy. How were their students different?
How were they alike? What challenges did students' conceptions of them-
selves and the world present to thl!se teachers? And, importantly, how did these The E~ucation of Privileged
teachers try to overcome them?
Youth 1n Practice
 3
SHElTEREDAND EXCEPTIONAL
PrivilegedStudents'Conceptionsof
Themselvesand Their Communities

By allowing white America to rcm.1in in the bubble of unreality, white privilege

ultimately distorts our vision, and makes it difficult for us to function as fully
rational beings. ft protects us from some oflife 's cruelties, and allows us to w,mde r
around, largely oblivious to the fires that, for others, bum all around them. In tht
end ... this bubble of unreality can be a dangerous place to reside.
(Wise, 2008, p. 60)

In Part I of this book, I justified why the educition of privileged children

ought to be of concern and laid out a theoretical framework to help guide those
interested in such work. In Part II, I now rum to examining what social justice
pedagogy with privileged children looks like in practice. My findings are not from
a large random sample data set from which I can make broad, sweeping claims
about privileged children, the longitudinal effects of social justice pedagogy on
privileged students, or their subsequent impact on the world. Instead, these
two instrumental ethnographic case studies (Stake, 1995) represent my questions
about what social justice pedagogy with privileged youth looks like in practice in
order to provide interested educaton with an intimate look at the challenges and
possibilities of this work in the field. Any claims I make are thus intended to
lay the groundwork for future studies and action research projects rather than
inform policy decisions. 1 For those interested in reading more .tbout my research
methodology, please see Appendix B for a more detailed description . A quick
note: all names and identifying characteristics ofloc.1tions and people have been
changed or omitted to protect their anonymity.
If we are to investigate how best to teach privileged students about social
responsibility within a social justice framework, then how they think of them-
selvesin relation to others becomes an important place to start. This first chapter
 Sheltered and Exceptional 33
• . ed Youth in Practice
32 The Educationol Pnv11eg
graduate degrees. Politically, West Town is less conservative than its neighbors, but
·trerent ways that students in the suburbs and
of Part ll thus focuses on the d1 . . ties The ways in which the is still an assumed victory district for Republicans .
. alized their conununt . I. I In other words, the community is a realtor's dream touting itself with familiar
students in the city conceptu h . b rb for instance, and the ways m w uc 1
__ 11. d about t e1r su u , buzzwords: "safe," "beautiful," and "clean" with" excellent schools." Of the several
suburban students wu-e rivile d reinforced the idea that they were some.-
the teacher called them out as .P . .:;: aradoxical dystopia/ utopia . On the other high sch~ols in town, West High is one of the oldest and enjoys positive reputa-
how separate from the world living. I p 1 1 tudents thought of themselves as tions for its arts, athletics, and academics including an honorable mention in recent
. lass pnvate sc 100 s f I Time and Newsweeklists of "America's best high schools." It boasts more th:m
hand the primarily upper- c "dst tl1c diversity and chaos o tic
' b d llers at ease amt twenty Adanced Placement (AP) courses and over one hundred extracurricular
sophisticated, savvy ur an we . f tl1e suburbs as a "bubble., set apan
'ty Ultimately, what emerges • is a picture o . . "enclave" set above t1lC activities in which more than half of its 3000 students participate. The majority
ct . . ci school as a pcnpateuc . of its two hundred staff members hold Masters degrees. And with a mean score of
from the world and the pnv~t~ ty se ve different perceptions of commu1uty
world. l now tum to exammmg tdil~etlint~pproaches to social justice pedagogy 25 in the standardized test ACT, 98% of its graduates go on to post-secondary
of two very ere bl ., education and most attend four-year universities around the country. 5
that are at t11e I1eart . I b bbl id Jisturbi11.11 tlicco11iforta
c.-
with privileged students: burstr11)! t ,c u c a1 The two-story school building, which sits at the center of a sprawling campus
amidst sports fields and parking lots filled with newer models of expensive cars,
was constructed in the iconic aesthetic of a mid-century suburban school. Several
The Suburbs wings house a large auditorium, gymnasiums, two cafeterias, a media center, art
studios, labs, and dozens of classrooms. The main doors are kept locked to the
West T, OWn High School . 150 000 residents outside during the school day; visitors must buzz to enter and then check in with
. . . . own right with close to ,
Suburban West Town is a city m Its y from urban life. It boasts a friendly staff' woman at a welcome center outside of the main office. Every
. 1 t carry commuters awa . all day I visited, she would scan my license to make a temporary ID badge with my
living between interstates t ia . ,._ de possible by aesthetic: y
. ent city a ,eat ma .
more miles of streets tItan its p~r '. ds a11dhundreds of trec-hned photograph and destination printed on the front. Once inside, I would walk
1 fi ng) curving roa . d through wide, tiled halls lit by overhead Auorescent lights and covered with post-
leasing (yet pcrpetua 1y con us1 . ry l1omcs and large, maiucure
P . 1 . t spacious two-sto 1 .
cul-de-sacs around w Iuc l s1 1 1 burb to offer up rows of c iam ers for events and clubs that hung above bright blue lockers. Before classesstarted
. A few major arteries cut throug l t 1c su and during passing periods, the halls filled with crowds of kids dressed to fit in
Iawns. . . d ho ping malls.
box stores, car dealerslups, an s . ~ I r "White flight" are clear; less with discernible cliques beyond which there was little visible diversity: a handful
. fli fits ongms as a iavcn ior . 1 3"'- of Black students talked and laughed around an open table, a group of Latino boys
The segreg,mng c ccts o . d f 1 f color compared wit 1 6 ,.
- .s constitute o peop e o dE in uniform headed to soccer practice, and a few girls wearing hijab linked anns as
than 20%,of the commuruty I . 1d oress·,onal-class South an ast
f 1 - oup me u es pr '' f they gossiped on their way to class, but otherwise the vast majority of students
in the cicy.3Two -fifths o t us gr I ld dominate West High's wall o
. . . d doctors whose c u ren . La . were White.
Asians, engineers au . - ti1rec-fifths is split evenly between tmo
·
National Ment c io ars.S 1 1 The remauung W t Town in the past r,cw years
.. f I om have come to es .
and Black fanubcs, most o w l . ·n previously low· mcome areas. The Students
. . fli - 1 c ty drove up rents 1 . of
after gcntnfymg e orts '.n tic i_ isiblc in tcnns of the school's vanous halls .
These students arc nouceably i~v d tl1e ,naiority of National Ment After a week of informal observations of his three sections of Urban History,
I A ,an stu cnts are :.i "
fame: while East an d Sout l s f: r •. h year's "Student of the Year Vernon Sloan introduced me to the class we had chosen for the study and allowed
. d e the only aces ,or cac me to make a brief presentation about my work. Of the thirty students in his
Scho\Jrs, Wlute stu cnts ar . udent's face appears on either wall. .
award. Not one Black or Latmo st - ·n these public fonns of rccognt· class, thirteen upperclassmen (seven boys and six girls) returned consent fonns
In contrast wit . Il tI1eir
. u ndcr•rcpresentanon 1 • t d1' nWestTown ' spovc·""' .. , (see Table 3. 1). Of the thirteen, all but two identified as middle or upper middle
d · ally ovcr-represcn e .
uon, Blacksand Latinos arc ramauc 1511 1 of tl1e population, 28% of fanuli~ class:Xavier identified as being from a working-class family and Patrick identified
. d 1 r •present 7" b is
r.itcs. Though comb me t icy c d 15n1 Lat·1110In general. the subur as only recently and partially upper middle class because of his working-class
1 Black an .,., arc · rtY mother's remarriage to a much wealthier man. All but three students identified
under the poverty Jevc are 3 3¾ f 1 • community falls under the pave
solidly upper middle class: only . / 0 lt ;;sidcnts is close to s100,ooo, and~ as White. Luna told me halfway through the semester that her mom was from
line, the median inc~me for We!t N:a7i1 all of its residents went to high scho 'le Mexico and that few people knew she was "half Hispanic." Mel was the son of
avcr.ige home value is $400,000 .
. ds (Tr.\duatedfrom college' an c ose o
J I t a quarter of its residents h:t inunigrant Chinese engineers and Henry was the son of two affluent Black
two •t 1ur t,·-
 Sheltered and Exceptional 35
The Education of Privileged Youth in Practice
34
The bubble was widely regarded as a place where "nothing bad happened. "
TABLE3.1 Vemon Sloan's Students When asked to give examples of injustice in West Town, for instance, Brian
A,li1m1I,!l7ili,11i<1u noted that:
Eco11<1rui
c sMIIIS \'cdrs ju 1/rcdisrrict
S1uJcnl R,,cc
Undecided
Elementary' Middle. High I'm getting the big end of the stick, but it's like I'm not knowing that. It's
White Upper Middle Libcral
Bri.111 Elementary , Middle, High
White Upper Middle Conservative just natural to me. It's seems like everyone's getting that. But I don't know ,
Claire Middle, High
W11ite Upper Middle Conservative like, in West Town-injustice? I don't know any good examples of that
Emma Eletnentary , Middle, High
White Upper Middle Independent in West Town. I feel like everyone 's getting a big end here.
Fred Middle, High
Black Upper Middle Liberal
Henry Elementary, Middle, High
White Upper Middle Liberal Students seemed well aware that growing up in the bubble afforded them
John Elementary , Middle, High
White Upper Middle Undecided certain advantages. For example, Luna was not alone in the way she categorized
Jude Middle, High
White Middle Liberal her education:
Luna Elementary, Middle, High
Asian Upper Middle Liberal
Mel Elementary, Middle, High
White Upper Middle Undecided I'm pretty glad I came out ofWest Town' cause when they're, like, looking
Patrick Elementary, Middle, High
White Upper Middle Undecided
Taylor Elementary, Middle, High at your college transcripts they're gonna take a look at that school and
White Middle Liberal they're gonna be, like, "Oh, West Town High. "
Teeg;in Elementary, Middle, High
White Working Class
Xavier
Xavier echoed this assessment, but wondered about its veracity and expressed
f the articipating students bad attended schools in concern for students who were not native to the bubble:
businesspeople. All but ~ne o . p b rbs since elementary school (Henry had
West Town or the ne1ghbonng su u Someone coming from the outside might not be able to adjust correctly.
moved in junior high school). l 1 .. a variety of reasons. Mel and Like, the standards are higher,' cause, I mean, we talk about how our school
. d t take t 1e c ass LOr ' k
The students s1gne up o . . b ls who enioyed Vernon s ta ·eon or our district is, like, number one in the world and stuff like that.
.b d "l . t ·r" artistic re e ~ .fi d
Patrick were sclf-descn 1e ups c .
d Teeg.m were quieter gir
. ls in classwho idenu ie as
.
history. Others, like Tay or an ' d d had simply been interested m Occasionally, students expressed a bit of shame or embarrassment about Iiving
. f popular crow s an , ·
being on the fnnges o more . dJ I a football player, for Ins reputauon in the "bubble." Some of this seemed to stem from a frustration about being
· · v . on recru1te
the course descnpaon. en 1 .
O m,
l d E nma sim1edup for the class pnma y
· ril misrepresented and a belief that people outside of the bubble have the wrong
'al kid Supcr- mvo ve I c,· 1 . od idea about people on the inside. Most of the White, middle- and upper-class
as a congem 'smart . . 1-=• y others J'oincd after ieanng go
.. l city w uie man 'd f students were quick to tell me that West Town was more diverse than its reputa-
because of her love ior t 1e .. f I tudents were friends outs1 e o
. Tl ugh a Lew o t 1es . fh
things about the field tnps. 10 ub utation given the large size o t c tion as a "rich, White" place implied. Taylor noted that:
class, most of them knew each ot~1erOJ • y l y r:tion of the course not by choice
ere laced into tlus parncu ar s Whenever I say I'm from West Town, people are, like, "Oh. Stuck-up rich
school; they w P d. lass schedules.
but because of their correspon mg c White kid." You know? Even though I think it's pretty diverse--not super
diverse, but more diverse than that.
d St d ts· "It'sNot Likethe Rest of the World"
Sheltere u en . . ni est Town and its high school) during These students did not want to be considered a "dumb uppity suburbanite," in
When asked to describe their conunu ty ~ d • t . mmediately used the word Emma's words. She went on to say:
, . nearly every stu en I " d
our first one-on-one mterv1ews, e. uently described as "safe an
, "b bbl " was most 1req
"b bble" in response. T lus u e , kids" Said Enuna: You know, people think you're someone who is ignorant of things and
wa~ almost universally celebrJted as a "gceat place to raise . _J
completely self-centered and just worried about materialistic things
. bl' have turnev and stuff like that which, I don't know, I feel like you find that everywhere
. · . l wa that me and my si mgs 0
This sounds weird, but l h~e t le h' yk l'k "Okay, 1kind of, like, want I you go and it's just one of those stereotypes that I don't believe in, but I'm
, k --s omemnes I t m , 1 e, ,,
out. I don t now did o make my kids be the same. still self-conscious about it so I don't tell people where I'm from.
do exactly what my parents t
 Sheltered and Exceptional 37
. f PrivilegedYouth in Practice
36 The Educationo . "
dh "West Town is really beige. To Henry, West Town is:
Claire told me candidly that she re~e=~dlinoe:" of city kids colllpared to the
lone in her envy of the w A nice place to grow up, but it's not real. If you go out into the real world,
She was ~ot a I . l burban kids are sheltered:
degree with w uc l su pe_pple will look at you and you will get knocked out for it or they just
1. It would be cool to won't give it to you because this is a bubble.
. . valved in !llOre worl dly t ungs. . • I•
Kids in the city are m ld 't be so one-tr.ick nunded. Peop e
· · · s because you wou n d WI • Several students focused on the fact that being within the bubble an
be in their s1tuat1on d . ' ot tl1e end of the worl . .. . 1cn
b d grade an 1t s n I warp someone's perception of reality in disturbing ways. Patrick noted that, in
here cry if they get a a ll I , like a wake-up call w 1cn
to co ege, t 1ere s, ,
kids from the sub urb s go the city,
' o·1ng to have to be instantly adults.
ney
I reg
· f burban residents gave There is a lot more stuff in front of your eyes. I don't think anyone should
ern that this shcltenng o su
expresse d Collc be sheltered in any way-a lot of people don't have a choice . There is this
Emma, too, "·
c., w chances to d evelop "c 11aracter . quote from a song I love: "My eyes have been pried open and I can 't look
I
t 1ellllC • ,
.· occer moms • their mm1 away." If you live in the city, you can't unlearn stuff that happens . Here,
. • · s and they I1avc t I1c1rs .
They have their block part1e ' d ti •ir kids off and pick them people rationalize that stuff away because they have one Black friend.
. . I ls where they can rop ie . . I·
vans, their ruce sc 10? •· arks where they can let their kids go p .ay
up afterwards, and, hke, their p . l stuff like that. So, like, they re In Henry's words,
. . bout v10 ence or ,
without havmg to worry a I. l' descn'bing Why wouldn t some-
I· the t ungs Ill • · I Everything here is so nice and kept clean and it's not like the rest of the
not really neg.1uve t ungs, I . ' J'ke l guess there are other dungs t tat
one want to live here? Butt ~en It s, I ' person . Like if you never world. The people that live here-they know what they want and try to
. · shapmg someone as a l
arc more unporunt m I d like if you never have tie keep out what they don't want.
'f •v ·r see people w 10 nee , ' . I
sec poverty' I you nc e ryonc already has everytlung, t 1en
. I l people because eve . 'f ' Interestingly, many of the students mentioned "West Town moms" as the worst
opportUtuty to 1e P 1' l don't know. Like, I you re
· 't affected as muc 1 • d
maybe your character ,sn . l d things don't seem as goo . offenders of trying to create an artificial reality in the bubble as a way to shelter
. t to hke the bad dungs, then t ,e goo their children. 6 According to Taylor, West Town is
1gnoran , • .
bubble students noted that its
t be a benc fi1t o f the ' b I Filled with a lot of giant houses with moms who are worried about every-
Though it may seem o , .. l !'ties" may not ultimately cw 1at
. ,, I tside world s crue rea 1 .. _ 1 Id" thing, getting all flustered about the slightest changes. They're uptight and
"siuelding froan t ie ou . ds o re acing to leave the re.u wor
. c. k'ds
1 ,
particularly with regar t p p rich. It's not what I want it to be.
5 best 1or •
I " "According to Xavier,
when they grow up.
. I . Id tl1c·1rkids from the realities, The most frequent example students gave for how people in the bubble
. ts trymg to s uc .
The bubble is bas1ca11 y paren id l I . k there's a lot of kids that consciously try to create an illusion of perfection regarded the city's treatment of
r · f the real wor · .. · t un . G
like, the cruel rea tttes ~ ltercd b their parents' money and, hke, ~r a rather infamous homeless man in town . According to Jude,
grrow up here and they re she ly I . 1,- like their p,1rents will
. roubk - lcga or anyt m " ' . al
example, if they get m t f . . • d of them having to, like, deal with re I keep asking questions about him and I get the impression that people are
just pay their w-.iyout o It mstea uncomfortable by the poverty of others.
world situations.
Luna similarly noted:
Jude agreed:
vc one through their · enttre· cIu·tdl10od who
. We want to maintain this image as like a West Town suburbia like, "Oh, we
I know a lot of people wh o ha g . ded like they are a111,1zu1g, don't have homeless. Oh, it's not a problem here," you know? But, like, you
d 1 · nd they are rewar
have never had to o a tung a l 1 Id and their parents let go, have to open your eyes and, like, see that it's there. We want to maintain
• when they get exposed to t 1e rea w~r '
And then I dl. . d their laves fell apart. the image that there are no problems so we try to, like, hide it, so basically
they didn't know how to mn e it an
 Sheltered and Exceptional 39
38 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth in Practice
to get rid of the the bar. Like, people expect everyone to be above the bar and they don't
. b l"k there are no problems so we try
we want It to e, 1 e, b ne time get rid of them. understand how hard it actually is to, like, get up to that point. They're
problems, to try to hide them, ut at tIte sa1 .. just born into that so they don't really understand the working class
ki class were more consistent cnucs of so_much and what it is like to work long hours for low wages. Just,
Students of color and from the wor ~g . t articulate how uncomfortable like, being here you have a lot more privilege than a lot of the world
the bubble. Mel, for example, wasjust begmmn:~c:lor despite his family's upper- but seeing like my difference in privilege than other people who are
. "difference" as a perso b d·
he felt because of Ius . ,n West Town, he remem ere · more affluent has influenced me .... I just see the standard as unrealistic
middle-classstatus. When asked about grow mg up t
so I don't really follow it. I feel empathy for people on the other side who
. ' who were friends and who arranged are struggling.
l think back to all the ~ds . mothe7 think there are certain kids who l will
' play dates that I was not mv1ted to. tl eir par- whose mothers
ds . l because I am not up to t M In addition, he was one of the only White students to explicidy address racism
never be frien wit 1 l l"k to decorate and volunteer. y in West Town:
have maids to dean the house, w 10 Bl-~ immirrr.int people always
f those moms. emg an i:,·- ' 'l
mom was never one o . y realize these things unu Because this is a sheltered community, there's problems with race and stufE
. h h · saymg ou never
have to ask twice w at s e is . d All the kids that have befriended People don't understand what it's like. I remember my freshman year, like,
you're older, why you feel the way yo~ oj t more crap They were more
I had never even met Sloan and I was in the hallway and people were telling
me are misfit kids who w~~t tl~rougdtba o hat life sho.uld be. This leads
. l d less dmllus1one Y W . b jokes-racial jokes, like Black jokes. Sloan called us in, I wasjust listening,
down-to-eart 1 an . ut with more mediocre, ut and he called this whole group of people into the room and gave them a
. l l may forever be 1tangmg o .
me to bel1eve t 1at k. nuch money- just hangmg giant lecture of what it's like to be Black in West Town and how like it's a
ho may not be ma mg as ' f I '
more re al'peop le w . k d the floors are dirty. l nat s completely different cultural dilference and they're so out of their element.
l . smells hke smo •e an r
out where evcryt ung . ' I • l b •I g then it's hard to be ieve I never thought ofit that way before, how hard it must be for them to try
where I have always felt hke that s w 1er~ e on '
to live in West Town.
that l will ever be a part o f tIte upper nuddle class.
d t . class exposed a similar feeling of Otherness ln general, most of the students described positive attributes of the bubble
Henry, the only Black stu _en m d' ts coming to West Town.
when l asked him to give advice to stu en with more than a little pride and gratitude with an awareness that having been
educated in West Town will serve them well in the future in tentlS of college and
IH r cople just be yourself and try to fit
l would say don't change yoursc o p 'f, ' • like from some other job opportunities. As they used it, the "bubble" in which the suburban students
ti . ' cause people-even I you re, ' h ' lived was particularly good at keeping out undesirable elements as a means
in where you it m, b fi. d with other people because t cy re
country, you'll still be able to ~ nen ls '11 make little jokes, say snide to maintaining order and cultivating a lifestyle that was more comfortable
accepting around here. Sometimes t te~ ·ust Jiving life I don't really titan other places with much harsher realities. They framed the bubble as a
remarks. But that just comes witlltthl~nktc_mtory[~;ty:How do ~ou think you place where injustice was made invisible, the voices of those suffering muffled.
I b t what peop e t u , · · · · It seemed that few people in the bubble were aware of. or curious about, issues
care too muc 1a ou . ]' C s. I live around predonu-
. t not care about au e ofinjustice in their community and the world.
got to be like that- to JU~ k WI11'te people just say what's on
. le thatJUSt-you now, l I .. · Students thus described themselves as sheltered and, though they expressed
uantly Wh ite pcop d l . I ·1t because that's the WJY rea uc ,s.
. d d 1 . st have to ca wit l all gratitude for certain aspects of this sheltering (namely its comfort and safety},
their nun an JU . . 1 ld probably be really angry
1
And ifl cared about every smgle t itgi rou But there's no use in trying they ultimately felt frustrated by not being more "exposed" to the "real" world.
the time and be upset about every ttt e t ung. Overall, the students (and especially those who were White and from the middle/
to do that. . . ed upper class}characterized living "in the bubble" the following ways: 1) there
. I I student who 1dent16 are many good things in the suburbs that anyone would want (primarily safety,
When asked about fitting in at school, Xavier,~ tc on; that· "good schools", and cleanliness};2} the bubble is more complex than its reputa-
himself as being from a working-class backgroun ' note . tion may imply; 3) bubble residents are separate from the "real world;" and
, . . . cc in like the bar is set so 4) ultimately, this sheltering has undesirable consequences and is a potential
ln West Town, specifica~y, t1;ere_5. an :~~:ause 'they ~re already abo\lC source of shame for students.
high that, like, people dunk t tat it s ca
 Sheltered and Exceptional 41
40 The Educationof PrivilegedYouth In Practice
hear, if you can hear them at all. [n addition to this obliviousness, your home
is positioned as "artificial" (it is as inauthentic and unnatural as a greenhouse is
In the Bubble . 'ty it is important to think through what when compared with a rainforest) and what is outside the bubble is subsequently
· ofthe1r commuru ' 'k' 1g positioned~ "real." Rather than seen as a place deeply connected in historical,
Given this percepuon • . "b bbl "What was perhaps most stn ·u
f ' hfe as m a u e. · political, cultural, and economic ways to the rest of humanity, then, the bubble is
J.t means to perce ive o one s . l . tl e students were about the ways m
. . was how arucu ate l t dangerously framed as an apolitical haven from the "real world."
in their descnpuons . . d dystopian elements. Venion, oo,
which the bubble combm~d ut~p1an lan I asked the students one day: "How Though this· divorce from the "real worJd" may have garnered benefits for its
fthis tension w 1en 1e l I d residents, it has also meant a great loss in tenns of cultural and intrapersonal
expressed an awareness o . id llic world while, on the ot 1er 1an '
do you help the poor und~rclass mt~ an y f the suburbs, British cultural resources that prevents relationships from developing between those on either
e this world isn't idyllic?" In lns assessment o side of the bubble's wall (or, on some level, within it). For instance, many students
.• may~ h l D vid Chaney (1997) contends that:
studies sc o ar a mentioned how "bland" and "boring" their middle class, suburban existence was
. . . . he reference to describe suburbs as uto~ian compared with the lives they envisioned of their peers in the city. Especially
While it may be tnv1ahzm~ t h . s harbouring utopian asp1ra- afi:er field trips into the city, students talked about feeling as if their community
.nk . . propnate to see t em a .
laces, l du . it is ap 1 l . ·s·1onis sustained by precise was "sterile" and "lifeless." ln Luthar's (2003) review of psychological research
P point out t 1at t us v1 .
tions .... Of course, one can b di tricts and powerful mythologies investigating the experiences of suburban residents, he notes that modern living
social differentiations between subu.r labn skd w~ articulated in frightening
.fy. d ngers of soc1a rea o . 1 Presents relatively few threats to physical well-being .... Ironically, therefore,
of ever- intenst mg a . . . al d particularly racial v10 ence
disinteor.1.t1on cnnun an . .
narratives o f ur b an i:,·- ' • • • • of the polite commumty is the greater the availability of amenities of modem living in a community,
.. The pos1ove vision li
and soda l parasmsm. . .. nightmare visions of impo te the fewer are the occurrences of critical events that indicate to people
therefore dependent upon complementary which of their friends are truly engaged in their welfare and which are only
disrespect. (pp. 139-140) fair-weather companions.... In essence, therefore, the rich are the
... least likely to experience the security of deep social connectedness that is
•
;l "bes suburbs as contra dictory P
laces whose routinely enjoyed by people in communities where mutual dependence
,..., Chaney (1997} ultimately dcscn f " u·c intimations of authenticity in is unavoidable (Myers, 2000a).
. earch o roman h (p. 1585)
residents are m constant s H d tl1e students understand that t e
. .. (p 146} e an · d
the midst of confornuty . . "O l " outside world that is perceive
. . 1 tion to an t 1er . d Indeed, the luxury of choice and autonomy associated with the suburbs can
"bubble" can only eXJstm re a d Tl1ough they appreciate
I · d more angerous.
as simultaneously ~ore aut 1.e~~c ~~le" world, students' desire for "rc..-al"lives and lead to depression and a lack of intimacy (Schwartz, 2000).
the safety and secunty of their ~u rfi l
"authentic" experiences was quite po~e; . . / utopia other research indicates
Burstingthe Bubble
Beyond the philosophical paradox ob a ystopd1~veway/large yards, little public
- _1 f subur s Qong n ' d As a consequence, the task of social justice pedagogy with these students seems to
that even the phys1c.u nature o h . 'd ts set apart from the world an
. · li rally keeps t e1r res• en . . f
transportauon) qmte te p ·n (?008) notes in her descnpuon o be about highlighting the ways their lives are inextricably connected, both to
. D ?000) As atu o - .
each other (Wilson- oenges, - . . . . . I b l10ods "boundary mainte- people outside and within the suburbs, and examining the ways in which the
. f pie bvmg m ne1g 1 or , .,
social class as a producuon o pea . . . " (p 266}. The "bubble bubble is an illusion. When asked about his vision of social justice pedagogy,
. .dell 1 commumty orgaruzmg . . f
nance is a mainstay of m1 e c ass . I tapl1or but a literal manifestauon o Vernon correspondingly described a need for students to "cross the line"
fi · s not s1mp Y a me ·d
for these students, t I1ere ore, l da . 1 t isolate them from those cons• - that divides the rich from poor and Black from White. On many occasions he
. d w clear boun nes t 1a . . rt
the suburban desire to ra . s these students see themselves as hvmg llJJll referenced Jonathan Kozol who, according to Vernon,
ered dangerous or less deserving. Thu • li . .. al" lives
t from those vmg re · . tp
from the world, as separ.i e what they contain, they inevitably wa Talked about that artificial line that separates the poor from the affluent that
While bubbles protect and preservle d d convex nature of their enclosure, the media presents us, this image of poverty being bad and then the people
. f · ·d <rivent 1e ome , e
the perspecuve o t 11ose ms1 e,,,.. . d lik c.unhouse mirror, if you can se are bad so we have to protect ourselves. That goes back to the White
· ill be distorte e 1
a ' d co
If you look out, t 11e image w 1 .d f the bubble are much bar er flight of the 50s and the sociological models like the "toilet syndrome,"
the image at all. The sounds on the ot ,er s1 e o
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down the river soon, at least as soon as there should be water
enough; at present they were arrested by the shallows. The white
men, according to our informer, were French like ourselves.
The armed men have now increased to five hundred, and the
white officers to eight, who are waiting for the rising of the river.
Really these rumours were beginning to make us anxious. The
barges began to assume in our imaginations the appearance of
properly manned vessels, and we wondered if there really was
anything of importance in the wind. Perhaps a party had been sent
out from Timbuktu for Say to make sure that we had plenty of
provisions, perhaps even to found a permanent post at the latter
place. It would be good policy, but bearing in mind the temper of the
natives, the probability was that we should not know anything for
certain till we actually saw the French flag at the bend of the river,
unless of course Madidu should inform us officially beforehand.
Suppose, however, that a French party had followed us, would
they be able to pass? It would indeed be a bold thing to attempt to
pass the rapids as we had done, aided as we were by the natives,
and with such a skilful captain as Digui, who was used to coolies and
knew how to manage them.
May 17.—The river is still falling, and above our island a little
sand-bank is now laid bare, where we were able to leave the
Davoust for the repairs the damage done to her at Labezanga
rendered necessary. Aided by Abdulaye, I undertook the task of
patching her up, and found it a simple affair enough. Fortunately we
had a sheet of aluminium in reserve, one only, it is true, but it was all
we needed. We bent that sheet to the shape required, we bolted and
riveted it all in a few days, and until the water rose again the Davoust
remained high and dry in her dock on the sand.
 THE ‘DAVOUST’ IN HER DRY DOCK.

The sand-bank was very useful to our coolies for bathing from,
and was also turned to account by the women who came to our
market for doing their washing. The deck of the Davoust became the
rendezvous of everybody, and no doubt some strange episodes took
place on and in the stranded vessel. The flesh is weak, and it was
perhaps as well that the chaplain of the mission and his aide-de-
camp, Baudry, who had charge of the police department, did not
inquire too closely into what went on in the siesta hour.
May 18.—No storm at Fort Archinard, though it is pouring with
rain all round. One would really suppose that we had a grisgris or a
fetich which enabled us to control the elements.
Three men came from Galadio to ask us to send him the treaty
already alluded to. We gave them two copies of it, one of which was
to be returned to us after being signed by Ibrahim if he approved of
it. This treaty was a league of friendship between the French and
him, agreeing to give mutual aid and protection throughout the whole
of the districts subject to him or to the French to all who came in
peace, whether as travellers or traders, whether actually the
subjects, or only aliens under the protection of either of the
contracting parties. Under all circumstances, in fact, and by every
means in their power, Galadio and the French agreed to assist each
other. Both would do their very utmost to make the road between Uro
Galadio and Massina safe. Lastly, Ibrahim promised to make no
agreement with any other European without having first consulted
the French resident at Bandiagara.
Later the duplicate of this convention came back to us signed in
beautifully clear and firm Arabic writing, after having been read and
discussed at a general meeting of native notables. This valuable
treaty had not been obtained by lavish presents, for we had already
begun to practise economy, in view of the probable heavy expenses
of the return journey, and we had warned Ibrahim that he must not
expect costly gifts.
The convention was simple, direct, and easy to be understood by
all. It was in my opinion the most complete treaty which could
possibly be drawn up in these parts, and after its signature we had a
right to rely upon the absolute good faith of the other party to the
contract, and to consider him our friend and our ally. You will see
presently how much it was worth, and judge from that of the value of
all treaties with negro chiefs, especially of those left with them, the
contents of which have never been explained.
Another great piece of news! A Messiah has risen up, by name
Bokar Ahmidu Collado, who is winning converts on the Liptako to the
west of our encampment, between Say and Bandiagara. He has
already had considerable success, and has received investiture from
Sokoto with a banner, giving him the right to make war on the
French. He went to Amadu Cheiku to ask for reinforcements, but that
chief only gave him his blessing in a very frigid manner, saying,
“Believe me, the time will come, but it is not yet come, for driving the
white men from the Sudan, the land of our fathers. There is a country
in the East bounded by a big creek (the Tchad?), and they must
spread there first. As for me, I know the French too well to care to
rub shoulders with them.”
 Bokar Ahmidu Collado then went to Niugui, chief of the Cheibatan
Tuaregs, and asked him to give him some men, but Niugui said to
him, “Madidu will make war on me if I help against his friends the
French.” “You have no faith,” answered the Messiah; “I will make you
believe,” and he gave him a consecrated drink. Then they say Niugui
saw, in the air above him, crowds of combatants armed with rifles
and swords, with many mounted men, all following the Messiah and
the triumphant Crescent. He still hesitates, however, on account of
his salutary fear of Madidu.
Bokar Ahmidu Collado comes from a village of Farimaké, near
Tioko. One of Galadio’s people from Wagniaka (Massina) knew him
when he was quite young. “A poor fool that Collado,” he said to us,
“who has not even been to Mecca, yet sets up for being a Messiah!”
Moral: No man is a prophet in his own country.
Something special seemed to be going on all through the latter
part of May; all manner of news pouring in, some of it really seeming
very likely to be true. The barges at Ansongo constantly increased in
number. The Toucouleur chief Koly Mody was about to abandon the
cause of Amadu. Diafara, a man from Kunari, which had remained
true to Agibu, was on the west of our camp to levy tribute in
Hombari, to found a post at Dori, or to lead a very strong force of
French and their allies into the district of Mossi. The people of
Bussuma had been defeated and driven away, they had taken refuge
at Wagadugu, which last-named rumour seemed to us most likely to
be true, for it behoved the French Sudan to avenge the injury
inflicted on French troops the previous year by the so-called Naba of
the Nabas. What, however, were we to think of all the contradictory
rumours which sprung up like mushrooms and grew like snowballs,
to melt away almost as quickly as they took shape?
May 20.—A new visitor to-day, original if nothing more. Like every
one else, he has his budget of news, and told us about the French
column which is to operate in Mossi. We are beginning to attach very
little importance to all this gossip. Our guest is a heathen, or, as
Suleyman translates it, a Christian, explaining that he must be a co-
religionist of ours, in that he has customs peculiar to the Christians—
drinks dolo and gets drunk on it, of which he is very proud. He
therefore belongs to our family, and that is why he has come to see
his big brother, the commandant!
He calls himself a sorcerer, and seems a little off his head.
Anyhow he talks great nonsense. Whilst we were questioning him he
kept fingering a little goat-skin bag, out of which, when we were quite
weary of his stupid replies, he drew a small phial full of oil of
pimento, and a number of tiny little pots—the whole paraphernalia of
magic, in fact. Having set out all these odds and ends on the ground,
he proceeded to make some grisgris to protect the hut in which he
was from bullets.
He began by smoothing the sand of the floor with his hand, to
bring good-fortune, he said, and he then skilfully drew with his finger
in the sand four parallel lines forming parallelograms. These he
combined two by two, three by three, four by four, and so on, reciting
invocations all the time. He then rubbed all the first designs out and
began again with fresh invocations, making the lines sometimes
vertical, sometimes of other shapes.
With a very solemn face, as if he
were celebrating mass, he now drew
forth a little satchel of ancient paper,
written all over in Arabic by some
marabout, and muttered some words,
evidently learnt by heart, for he
certainly could not read. At last, with
an expression as serious as that of
the Sphinx of the desert, he
TYPICAL MARKET WOMEN. announced: “Hitherto you have had
none but enemies in the land, no one
in the whole country is your friend. Beware of the marabouts!
Beware, above all, of one particular marabout! There is a young man
ill here (this was Bluzet, who was just then lying down with an attack
of fever), but it will not be much. You must sacrifice a white chicken
for his recovery; have it broiled, and give it to the poor: this will
conciliate the favour of the great prophet Nabi Mussa, or Moses. It
will be best to give your charity to children. Then all the grisgris of
the negroes and the marabouts will avail nothing against you. But
beware, above all, on account of your men. If you cut away all the
roots of a tree it falls. In the same way, if they take away your
negroes, all will be over with you. Now I have come to give you a
grisgris for them, which will protect them from all spells, and even
from cortés and other evils. I can even give you a corté myself,
which will kill a man if you only throw the tiniest bit of it in his face.”
The corté is, in fact, the most terrible of all spells amongst the
negroes. It is said to consist of a powder which slays from a
distance. The natives say that if thrown from some miles off the man
it touches dies, and the truth seems to be, that the sorcerers have
the secret of a very subtle poison, which produces terrible disorders
in those touched by it.
As a matter of course, we did not accept the offers of a corté or
counter corté from Djula, but to give him an idea of the mischief we
could do if we chose, I gave him a five-franc piece in a bowl of
galvanized water, as I had the son of the chief of the Kel Temulai. I
then told him to go to Mossi and have a look round there to see what
would happen. He is a crazy old fellow enough, but I have been told
that sorcerers have more influence over the Mossi and their nabas,
as they call their chiefs, than those who are in the full possession of
their senses. He was willing to go, and when the Tabaski was over
he would come back inch Allah, with envoys from Bilinga or
Wagadugu.
Now Bilinga is eleven days’ march from Say, and eight days after
he left us the old fellow came back pretending he had gone all the
way. He had really never gone beyond Say, and brought us all sorts
of silly news only, so Digui took him by the shoulders and quite
gently turned him out of the camp.
May 20.—As the so-called Tabaski fête approached, our visitors
and the news they brought were greatly on the increase. Pullo,
Osman, and the minor ambassadors vied with each other in the
ingenuity of their inventions. The fact was, they all wanted to have
new bubus for the festive occasion, some money, some coppers to
buy kola nuts, etc., not to speak of new bright-coloured
undergarments for their wives. “What would the village people say,
commandant,” they would urge, “if I, who every one knows to be a
friend of the French, should cut anything but a good figure?”

THE MARKET AT FORT ARCHINARD.

Some few, however, were actuated by something more than a

wish for presents on their visits to us. They were rather afraid of the
column which was said to be operating in Mossi. Osman brought the
chief trader of the market to us, a Wagobé, belonging therefore to
the Sarracolais tribe, an intelligent man with a frank, open
expression. His pretext for coming to see us was that he had a slave
to sell, but he knew well enough that we never bought slaves. She
had been brought from Samory’s camp, where prices for such
merchandise were very low, there being a perfect glut of slaves in
the market, and at the same time a scarcity of grain. The young girl,
who was in good health, with all her teeth intact, had been bought for
the modest sum of 10,000 cowries, about 10 francs, or the value of
two sheep, or of a sack of millet. According to her owner, prices were
much higher at Say, where a first-class female slave, that is to say, a
young virgin, would fetch 200,000 cowries, whilst a strong young
man was worth 150,000. Less valuable captives were cheaper, and
some of the fifth-class went for as little as 100,000 cowries. These
are of course commercial quotations, but as a matter of fact now and
then a few are sold for as low a sum as 25,000 cowries.
The chief of the market brought us kola nuts, honey, rice, and
milk. He mourned over the evil days which had fallen on Say. “All our
roads,” he said, “are blocked on the north by the Tuaregs, on the
west by the heathen Mossi, on the south by the Dendi, and on the
east by the Kebbi and the Mauri. It is only rarely that a few caravans
with a strong escort can get as far as Sansan Haussa, by way of
Sergoe. A whole fleet of canoes, which went down to Yauri last year,
had remained there for fear of the Dendikobés. The boatmen had
founded a village there, and were now lost to Say. Then, besides
that, things were not going as could be wished by those of the true
faith. The Empire of Sokoto and its Emir were between two fires, with
Rabba on one side and the Serki Kebbi on the other.”
When Osman, returning to the charge, spoke to us again about
the column supposed to have gone to Mossi, I said to him—“You
see, the Naba of Wagadugu gave the same kind of reception to the
Frenchmen who went to visit him last year as Amadu Saturu has
given to us at Say. So the chief of the whites has given orders that
his village should be destroyed, and it will be your turn next year, I
hope.”
 A WOMAN OF SAY.

They then went away plunged in reflection.

Visitors are all the fashion just now. On Thursday, May 21, a
young man came to our market wearing a blue bubu trimmed with
blue and red printed calico, such as is made at Rouen. We had long
known the owner of this costume, and when we recognized him we
were ready to fling ourselves into his arms.
He at least was a genuine person, the son of the chief of Fafa,
who had been such a good guide to us when we were amongst the
rapids, the son of that old Fulah who wished to interpose his own
body between me and Djamarata to protect me from harm. He came
from Djamarata now, and we had no reason to doubt his good faith
at least. He came, he said, to inquire after the health of the
commandant, and to ask what state our boats were in after passing
over the terrible rocks, etc. Djamarata assured us of his friendship.
True, when we first arrived in his country the Tuaregs had been on
their guard, but now that they were convinced of our pacific
intentions, and saw that we molested no one, the Awellimiden were
quite on our side, and had full confidence in us.
When our friend left us his goat-skin bag was full of presents.
Here at least was one native who deserved well of us, for he had
made a twenty days’ march to come and give us his master’s
compliments.
May 24, Whitsunday.—It appears that the Mossi column is making
good progress, at least we gather that it is, from the improved
bearing towards us of the natives, but lies and all manner of false
reports are still the order of the day.
Yesterday the fête of the Tabaski, or the Feast of the Sheep, was
celebrated, which is not, it appears, of Mahommedan origin. The
village of Talibia sent envoys to make friends in our camp, and some
wretched-looking natives danced a tam-tam. Others came to beg,
and to all the poor creatures we gave something—a little salt, a
mechanical toy, a cubit of cloth, or some other trifles. I also
distributed a little money amongst our own men.
A regular descent was made on the camp by sellers of kola nuts,
grisgris, etc. A number of women also came, amongst whom was a
Toucouleur girl named Fanta. She said she had come to see if her
brother was with us, but I suspect her motives were not quite so
innocent as that. In the end, this girl became a dangerous enemy to
us. After warning her off again and again, we at last had literally to
drive her out of the camp. If we had not done so I expect she would
have persuaded some of our men to desert, so great was her
influence over them.
 ENVOYS FROM THE CHIEF OF KIBTACHI.

Fanta was really a very reckless person, and is supposed to have

poisoned a man whom she had persuaded to treason, but who had
failed to achieve the result she had hoped by that treason. The
native chiefs know only too well how easy it is to seduce men from
their allegiance to travellers with the aid of some pretty fellow-
countrywoman of theirs, and it is necessary to be always on guard
against this sort of thing.
In the present case the Tabaski fête passed over quietly enough.
We regaled our visitors with a little apparently impromptu fusillade,
which we had really agreed upon beforehand amongst ourselves,
giving the Koyraberos from Talibia a demonstration of the
penetrating force of our bullets on the branches of some trees.
“Bissimilaye! Bissimilaye!” cried old Suleyman Foutanké, hardly able
to believe his own eyes.
June.—No rain at Say yet! It really looks as if we had cast a spell
upon the place, the more so that the want of rain was accompanied
by a plague of locusts. We had invoked the aid of Moses against our
enemies, and now, like him, I had brought upon the natives of the
land of our exile clouds of locusts to devour all green things. The
people were in despair. A drought and locusts together meant
perhaps the complete destruction of the harvest. But there is always
some good in everything, and the Koyraberos flung themselves,
armed with sticks, into the thickest part of the swarms, beating down
the insects, which were picked up by the children, and stowed away
in their bubus. Fried and seasoned, the locusts made a very
appetizing change of diet.
Our men from Senegal, however, made great fun of those who ate
them; they were themselves much too civilized for such food as that.
“The Koyraberos,” Digui said to me, “are regular savages!” and it
was worth something to hear the tone of contempt in which he gave
utterance to this insulting remark.
The chief of Kibtachi, a big Haussa village down-stream, sent us
various presents and made many promises to us. He also begged us
most politely to visit him when we passed later. “Why,” he said, “did
you not come to Kibtachi to begin with, instead of stopping with
Saturu, who wishes you no good?” Talking of presents, Galadio,
when he returned the signed treaty, sent a wonderful collection of
gifts, including kola nuts, symbolic of friendship, with calabashes full
of honey, and bags of baobab flour, the medicinal effect of the two
being totally different, the honey acting as an emollient, the flour as
an irritant.
The chiefs of the Sidibés, Kurteyes, Sillabés, etc., all vied with
each other now in sending messengers to us to assure us of their
friendship, and yet another notable, chief of the Torodi Fulahs, asked
us to make just such a treaty with him as we had with his friend
Galadio. “Galadio and I,” he wrote to us, “are together like two teeth
of the same comb!” A happy metaphor indeed, a regular literary
gem!
Yes, indeed, they all belonged to the same comb, these native
friends of ours, and as yet we did not suspect how very dirty that
comb was.
 Presently we heard of a split amongst the Toucouleurs, and that
the Gaberos had had enough of Amadu. They sent, in fact, to beg
me to intercede for them with my friend Madidu, and to get him to let
them return to his country. There were more fresh quarrels too
between the Toucouleurs and the Sidibés. Amadu had put a Hadji
marabout of the Sidibé tribe in irons, and by way of reprisal the
Sidibés had seized three Toucouleurs at Yuli, opposite Dunga. The
hostile tribes were, in fact, snarling at each other from the two banks
of the river, and showing their teeth rather like porcelain dogs, only in
this case the dogs were jet black.
The Sidibés, according to Pullo Khalifa and the son of their chief,
who came to us with him, were disposed to throw themselves upon
our protection. If, they said, Amadu had not set their Hadji free in
three days, the Sidibé women with their flocks and herds would be
placed under the protection of our guns!
Would this be the spark which would set fire to the gun-powder?
Hurrah! If it were, our protectorate would become an effective one;
we should have a fine rôle to play; that of intervening in favour of a
native coalition against the parasitical Toucouleurs, the hereditary
enemies of French influence in Africa.
 A COBBLER OF MOSSI.

All, then, was tending in the direction of our hopes. A good job
too, for the river was falling, falling, falling. Our island was completely
transformed, for a big isthmus of sand and flints now united it to the
right bank. Hundreds of determined men, or of men driven in from
behind, might pour into the camp any night now, as into some
popular fair.
Reassured though we were by what we heard of the political
condition of the country, and by all these protestations of friendship,
we yet awaited the 14th July with impatience, and we celebrated its
passing as joyfully as possible when it came at last. No sooner was it
over, however, when slowly and quietly, and at first very doubtfully,
certain bad news filtered through, which gradually gained certainty.
For once, indeed, there was no doubt about the evil tidings, which
were diametrically opposed to all that the politeness of the natives
would have had us believe. The whole country, Toucouleurs, people
of Say, of Kibtachi, and of Torodi, with the Sidibés, the Gaberos and
others, had combined against us and were marching to attack us.
Naturally no one had thought fit to warn us. It was Osman, poor
fellow, who, in spite of himself, put us on the scent, and gave us the
alarm. He meant to play the part of an angel of light, but, as is often
the case, his rôle was really quite the reverse.
One fine day he said to us point-blank, “There is no cause for
anxiety now, you can sleep with both ears shut, for Amadu Saturu
and Amadu Cheiku are both most favourably disposed towards you.”
“Why do you tell us that, Osman?” I asked. “I feel sure you have
some very good reason, but take care what you say. You are lying, I
know. Amadu is really trying to pick a quarrel with us.”
“Bissimilaye! not a bit of it,” was the reply. “He is only getting his
column together to move against Djermakoy.”
I had never been told a word about that expedition, and the fact
seemed strange, so I said—
“Osman! you are telling a lie. What column is going against
Djermakoy?”
Then with much hesitation, and turning as pale as a negro can
when he has got himself into a hobble, he began to tell us how all
the people of Say, and the Toucouleurs, in fact, all the natives, had
united to march on Dentchendu, a big village of Djerma, the very
centre of the Futanké agitation, but that before actually starting they
were all coming to Say to receive the benediction of Saturu, who
would recite the Fatiha to the glory of the Prophet on the tomb of his
ancestor, Mohammed Djebbo, who had founded the town.
 FORT ARCHINARD.

I understood at once, and really the plan to surprise us had not

been at all badly thought out. “Well, Osman,” I said, “you will warn
Modido that if the Toucouleur column camps in or near his village, in
which he declined to receive us, it will mean war with us.” “Oh!” cried
Osman in his dismay, “the whole column will not come, only the
chiefs, with Ahmidu Ahmadu, the leader of the troops.”
Then he tried to undo what he had done, and told quite a different
story, saying he had been mistaken; Saturu would go and give the
benediction to the column on the bank near Djerma.
We were warned now; a big column really was assembled. We
made discreet inquiries on every side, and all the news we heard
confirmed the fact. Pullo himself now ventured to be explicit, and told
us to be on our guard.
The palm of deception and treason must be given in this case to a
Fulah from Massina, called Ahmadu Mumi, but we were the ones to
reap the benefit of his evil-doing. Born in the village of Mumi, near
Mopti, on the Niger, all his people had been killed by the Toucouleurs
when El Hadj Omar won his great victory. He himself had been taken
prisoner, and dragged behind the horses of his captors to Say,
where, bruised, bleeding, and in rags, he was sold. Of course, as a
natural consequence, he hated the Toucouleurs with an intense and
bitter hatred, but he was later bought by the chief of Say, who set
him free. He became the confidant and friend of his liberator, so that,
as he explained to us, he knew better than any one else what was
going on, and was therefore better able to betray Saturu.
He did betray him too, for a high price, revealing to us all the
preparations our enemies were making against us. Amadu, it
appeared, aided by the chief of Say, had rallied every one all round
to his standard, and to win over the lukewarm, vague hints were
thrown out of going to get slaves amongst the Djermas on the left
and the Gurmas on the right bank of the river. All would meet at Say
for the benediction, and then at the critical moment, Madidu,
pretending to be suddenly supernaturally inspired, would exclaim
—“Listen! what says the prophet? Leave the Gurmas and the
Djermas alone. It is against the infidels, the Kaffirs of Talibia, that you
must march. It is their destruction which will please God!” Then every
one would be carried away by enthusiasm, and urging each other
on, would rush in their fanatical zeal to the attack of our little island.
None but the chiefs knew of the plot, Ahmadu Mumi told us, but
he had been so placed that he could tell what they were all thinking
of. Double traitor that he was, he used to go backwards and forwards
from Say to Dunga, and from Dunga to Fort Archinard, spying and
taking bribes now from one side, now from the other. When with us
he would say all he wanted was revenge on the Toucouleurs.
Well, we merely said “All right!” and set to work with feverish
activity to double our abattis, which the tornados had somewhat
damaged, and to build new loopholed redoubts round the camp. On
July 14 we were all eagerly engaged in preparing for the defence of
our fort, and I don’t suppose any one gave a thought to the review at
Longchamps, or to the public balls going on in Paris at this festive
time. As in all crises and times of difficulties, our coolies rose to the
occasion, and showed themselves more full of zeal, better
 disciplined, more thoroughly in hand
under their French officers than they
had ever done before, so that when
we saw the smoke from the camp of
the allies rising up above Say, we
were all perfectly ready for the attack.
Ready to make the besiegers pay
dearly for their temerity at least, but it
would not do to count upon all of us
coming safe and sound out of the
affair: the forces were too terribly
unequal for that. Amadu had five
hundred guns with him, and the
Toucouleurs are brave, especially
when their fanaticism has been
aroused. A certain number of the
A MARKET WOMAN.
captives taken by the Tuaregs had
also come from Sorgoe to join hands
with them. Aliburi, too, the hero of Cayor of Yuri memory, was there,
and in a night attack all these auxiliaries would be very formidable
adversaries to us. We wondered how many warriors there were
altogether, including those armed with bows and arrows or spears
only. It was very difficult to form an idea, for negroes never allow
their numbers to be counted when they go to war. They think it
brings bad luck. There was, however, no doubt that at this time
Amadu could muster from ten to fifteen hundred combatants.
And to oppose to all this rabble, we were but forty-five, even if we
counted in our scullions.
The worst of it was, a good many of our cartridges had got
damaged, partly by the great heat and partly by the damp. The
damage was such that at the first shot the weapon might become
useless for the rest of the fight, a serious matter when we were so
few.
It certainly seemed as if we were in for it at last!
 Several nights passed by in suspense, and we all slept badly. On
the north we could see the gleam of many moving torches in the
forest, for from Talibia to Say signals were being made. Torches of
straw were lit and put out three by three, but what these signals
portended we could not tell.
July 17.—It seems that the attack on our camp is now decided
upon, for our spy tells us we shall be assailed from the right bank in
the night when there is no moon. The Toucouleurs are camped at
Tillé above Say. At the benediction to be given at three o’clock
Amadu Saturu will stir up the people. We might expect the first alarm
at about ten o’clock. Ahmadu Mumi spoke very positively, though he
explained that he could not be absolutely certain, and anyhow not a
woman had come to the market that morning. Osman, on the other
hand, stoutly denied the report, but this only made us more sure of
its truth, and we doubled our sentries in preparation for a night which
might perhaps be our last.
We waited and waited, but nothing
happened. We heard nothing that
night, as on so many others, but the
howling of the monkeys and the
murmuring of the rapids down-stream.
Everything remained quiet the next
day too, and gradually all the smoke
faded away, whilst the light of the
torches was extinguished. The
women, who had deserted our
market, returned as if there had never
been any reason for their absence,
and all went on as before. We knew
now that the column was again
dispersed, the warriors had drawn
back at the very last moment, and had
gone off in small parties to take slaves A FULAH WOMAN.
in Djerma, or to attack Dosso. All the
energy they had displayed with regard to us had been simply
wasted.
 It had been enough for us to assume a firm attitude, and for the
natives to know that we had been warned. To maintain a firm attitude
seems rather like a quotation from Tartarin de Tarascon, for we
should have found it difficult enough to defend ourselves. How
should I have been able to make good my threats that I would burn
Say on the first alarm?
It seemed, however, that Saturu really was rather alarmed, lest
harm should happen to his town. He would not let the column
camped near it enter Say, and the Friday benediction was only after
all pronounced on the chiefs. Their secret they knew had leaked out,
they had seen us strengthen our defences, and they hesitated after
all to attack us. The knowledge of the bloodshed which would
inevitably ensue had greatly cooled the enthusiasm of all not quite
mad with fanaticism, and many whose adherence had been counted
on as certain had failed to put in an appearance. Then the rain had
something to do with damping the ardour for war. The daily storms,
which had come at last, completed the demoralization of the rabble.
They had missed their aim, because we, who were that aim, had
been on our guard, and some went off one way, others another, to
hunt slaves instead of rushing upon our defences.
We had had a narrow escape, but it was a complete one, for the
new moon was rising now, and the river was rapidly increasing in
depth, adding each day to the efficiency as a defence of the ditch
which divided us from the mainland and our enemies.
We were saved! but for a whole week we had been face to face
with the melancholy prospect of ending our lives on this remote
island, and often and often as we watched we wondered whether, if
we were massacred, we should be better or more quickly avenged
than our predecessor Flatters had been.
We now understood all the false rumours which had been spread
of French columns marching in the neighbourhood, and of all these
columns were going to do. The reports were spread merely to induce
us to leave our tata, where we were in comparative security, and
which the Toucouleurs seemed to look upon as impregnable. Our
enemies wanted to decoy us to go and meet our comrades, so that