Racism in Relation to Education

2031 Words5 Pages

There have been significant strides to deconstruct the explicit forms of racism such as segregation within education through historical instances such as Brown v. Board of Education, integration attempts post Jim Crow era, and a variety of others but there is a hesitation to talk about the roots of origination for this issue. Why is it easier to continue the negligence of race rather than address it, maybe even solve for inequality in privilege? Ideally, our education system constitutes a free space to nurture thought. What is racism? Where does it come from? How does it affect us and where all is it present? It would be interesting to note the diversity of responses one would get if such questions were asked– what forms are visible to some of us versus others? Race should be an integral part of discussion within education. A possible starting point is participating in a thought experiment of the outcomes of abolishing slavery in the modern state through the abolishment of prisons. By tracing historical issues of the past within education and comparing it to present conditions of the institutional negligence of race, the pragmatic solution of increased dialogue emerges. Such a solution will attempt to create empathetic free-thinkers to reform the structural violence that occurs outside of the education system within the state due to racism.

The era post-passage of the thirteenth amendment abolishing traditional slavery continued to grapple with equality within integration. Rodriguez points out that it only ended slavery of the traditional sense for laboring African Americans since it allows for involuntary servitude “…as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted...” (Rodriguez 15). As a result the l...

... middle of paper ...

...lve. There have measures to go outside of the black and white binary such as Michigan having measures such as an eighteen page application which delves deeper into personal information, even a questions challenging students to explain how they would contribute to campus diversity (Whitt, Bland 337). Ignorance is not bliss, it come at the price of others. Positivity towards the future is a great attitude, but it shouldn’t quench the desire to fight for equality for all. The current time period is an opportunity for all of us to enlighten ourselves within the relatively less constricting confines of the university which lets us be creative. As students, as peers, we can learn to guide one another in the path to understanding and reorienting our privileges to contribute to a society which echoes that sense of equality from education to the operations of the states.

Open Document