Critical Race Theory: What Makes It Crucial in Colleges?

When you go to college, you’ll find yourself amongst a diverse student body. Every individual with whom you share the space with carries a different set of ideals and beliefs, cultural values, and lived experiences. The diversity of races, ethnicities, gender orientation, power and privilege all intersect when talking about identity. If you yourself are a non-white and/or non-American student, it might be jarring to find yourself in classrooms where the majority of the curriculum and students reflect white experiences and values. That isn’t to say you need to play catch up with your peers and assimilate to the American lifestyle and way of thinking.

This is where the Critical Race Theory comes in.

Legal scholars Derrick Bell, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Richard Delgado, among others, developed a framework for legal analysis in the late 1970s and early 1980s that gave rise to the fundamental ideas of critical race theory, or CRT. Academically speaking, critical race theory has been around for more than 40 years. The basic thesis is that racism is a social construct and that it is ingrained in legal frameworks and governmental regulations in addition to being the result of personal bias and prejudice. The theory argues that racism is enforced institutionally and socially, and not something that develops on its own.

An example of such a bias was when in the 1930s, government authorities drew lines around places they considered to be poor financial risks, specifically because of the racial makeup of the population. Following that, banks declined to give Black residents in particular neighborhoods mortgages. This example shows how racial segregation is perpetuated throughout society (and classrooms) by legal figures and regulations.

Today, CRT is heavily debated. Some scholars argue that CRT created a unified space that generalized the experiences and hardships of minority communities. However, it can also be argued that CRT creates a unique space for victims of institutional and social racism to share their experiences and create dialogue for change. You’ll soon realize that CRT has many arguments that defend and oppose the theory.

Keep in mind, it’s easy to assume that CRT labels all white individuals as racist, especially when this theory is heavily linked to the United States. However, that isn’t what this theory is based on. The theory tells us that we experience racism on a daily basis in one way or the other and we, white and non-white individuals, are just as capable of being racist knowingly and unknowingly. Any small thing we may do has the potential of perpetuating racial beliefs, whether or not we intend to.

So, what does this have to do with your college classroom?

CRT is currently under heavy debate as to how policies might or might not take it into consideration for elementary, middle and high school. But that’s a topic for another article because CRT has many and multiple branches of implementation and obstruction.

CRT also calls in notions of intersectional identities. When we think about it, we aren’t just one label, we don’t identify as just one thing — we’re male or female or non-binary, we’re also heterosexual or homosexual or identify as something else in terms of sexuality and gender. Then we have our culture, race, ethnicity, religious beliefs and personal ethics. Believe it or not, we bring these identities in the classroom, and when classrooms tend to be dominantly white, it becomes challenging for you and your peers to engage in meaningful and interactive discussions.

There are systems of power prevalent in society that influence classroom structures across all levels. For some of us, we fail to recognize the privilege we grow up with and certain advantages we have of earning a good education. Oftentimes, privilege is something most people shy away from and refuse to admit. But acknowledging one’s own privileges and understanding how lack of such privilege can affect lives is a good way to identify problems within your student body — do you see a lack of non-white students? If so, why? Are there benefits that don’t cater to non-white students? Do you feel a certain institution is racially biased? What can you do about this?

While CRT has many models to promote a racially inclusive and intersectional teaching, the pedagogical research on this is not yet practical, and lacks a model that can be implemented in classrooms that accommodate all existing cultural values and identities within a student body. This is challenging to do for educators, but that doesn’t mean that you as the student should not be perceptive to these aspects.

Racism affects all of us, regardless of where we come from and what we look like. It’s easy to think and convince yourself that you’ve never been a victim of racism or that since you come from a community that is the majority, racism isn’t your battle. But keep in mind that racial diversity can only add to your learning and an inclusive teaching environment offers more discussion, perspectives and new ideas that can only be generated through collaborative efforts.

Written by Puja Sarkar, Press & Written Media team

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