This paper is a methodological study using critical discourse analysis to interrogate the assumptions underlying critical race theory in educational research.
Abstract This paper discusses critical discourse analysis (CDA) as used to analyze a Critical Race Theory (CRT) case study, which investigated reflective discourses of three co-directors of a Canadian summer institute on multi-culturalism and diversity. The author points out that CDA analysis of the discourses was undertaken using Clegg's six criteria of language-power discourse within groups and organizations as variables for the analysis: (1) Values, (2) rules, (3) power, (4) discretion, (5) organization and (6) paradox. The paper concludes that CDA, when used in its pure form for CRT analysis, represented a very slow and painstaking task; however, using Cleggs criteria was efficient and yielded flaws in the methodology of the case study approach.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Purpose of the Study
Research Question
Hypothesis
Null Hypothesis
Assumptions
Limitations
Delimitations
Literature Review
Introduction
Literature on Educational and Qualitative Research
Differences between Qualitative and Quantitative Research
Definition, Types, and Uses of Qualitative Research
Overview of Critical Race Theory (CRT): Its Purposes, Assumptions, and Limitations
Descriptive CRT Literature
Origins of Critical Race Theory (CRT)
The Power of Storytelling
Descriptive Literature on Race and Multiculturalism
Enter "CRT-Light": Public Education Trends of the 1970's and 1980's
The 1990's and Beyond
Review of Critical Race Theory (CRT) Case Studies
Case Study 1: 'Thinking the Practice': Academic Adult Educators' Reflections on Mediating a Summer Institute as a Multicultural Learning Journey for Graduate Students'
Patti's Reflections: 'Walking on Quicksand'
Shahrzad's Reflections: 'Marginality of the 'Subject'; 'Subjectivity' of the Margin
Andre's Reflections: 'The Personal is Pedagogical'
Case Study 2: 'A Critical Race Analysis of Latino(a) and African American Advanced Placement Enrollment in Public High Schools'
Case Study 2's Methodology
Case Study 2 Results
Discussion, Recommendations and Conclusions
Case Study 3: 'Understanding Cheating in Nepal'
Case Study 4: 'The Acceptance of a Multicultural Education among Appalachian College Students'
Survey Instrument Content and Methods
Survey Distribution Methods
Case Study Survey Results
Other CRT Case Studies, Briefly Described
Conclusion
Research Methods
Introduction
Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as a Method
Origins of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)
Conclusions
Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) Used to Interrogate Two Critical Race Theory Case Studies
The Case Study: 'Thinking the Practice': Academic Adult Educators' Reflections on Mediating a Summer Institute as a Multicultural Learning Journey for Graduate Students'
Values
Power
Rules
Discretion
Organization
Conclusion
From the Paper "The researcher for the present study also believed that ethnographic research elements were strongly present within secondary data for the study. This was because various pieces of both descriptive and case study literature, used as data for the present study, consisted of analysis and interpretation of other researchers' observations of day-to-day activities, over time, of particular groups that were observed first-hand (e.g., graduate students attending a summer institute on diversity; middle school students in Nepal; students in university basic writing and college composition courses). In addition, results of previously-conducted (by other researchers) ethnographic research, e.g., participant observation accomplished by the researcher over time were used, within the present study, as secondary data."
Abstract This paper presents an introduction and discussion of classroom discourse. The paper discusses the types of discourse situations in classrooms and analyzes current thinking about classroom discourse.
From the Paper "Teaching is a demanding profession in which no two students are alike and no two days are alike. Teachers are responsible for motivating, liberating, educating and inspiring their students. Ira Shor, in "Empowering Education", suggests that good teachers do not talk at their students they talk with them. Similarly, a good teacher will not impart information unilaterally to students but will dialogue with students and encourage students to share their opinions. Ideally, such discussions will be simultaneously spontaneous and structured. David Reynolds, in "Educational Review" disagrees with..."
Abstract Discourse analysis is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of language. This paper explores the role of power in discourse analysis in terms of the discourses (language) and investigates the hidden power behind different situations and the power placed upon the analyst themselves, their ability to affect the conclusions drawn from the discourses and the problems they may cause or create. It looks at examples of previous discourse analysis work and tries to identify the position of power within them. It then tries to discover, if any, problems which may arise from power. Moreover, the paper tries to provide a method of discourse analysis that tries to avoid any problems that may occur or arise due to power. In this respect, by including specific resources into the discourse analysis, the paper attempts to show that the extra uncertainties associated with power may be reduced or eliminated altogether.
From the Paper "Wetherell and Potter provide an analysis of passages taken from people whom were connected to a scene of violence in 'Narrative characters and accounting for violence'. Their account of the police preventing a riot shows the conflicting powers within the situation. On the one hand, there is the power associated with the general public. Their urge to display their unhappiness or opposition is shown by rioting. Their collective power is very immense. However the police were forced into using force to control the power. The police now have control of the power by controlling the crowds. Their power is more of a physical power which they use to overcome the social power. Their use of force within society is justified as the speaker explains or pushes the point of "severe violence" if they did not disband the collective power. Even in society, violence is unacceptable; their use of violence was part justified since they were using violence to control a greater violence. In this respect, they are using the alarm signal of a potentially threatening and more violent situation to justify their behaviour. "
Abstract This paper analyses the role and presence of Foucauldian discourse and power in sexual and social relations in J. M. Coetzee's "Disgrace". It looks at some of the existing discourses and power relations in "Disgrace" in order to see how the characters are dominated by the power and discursive representations as the controlling forces found in the novel. In addition, the paper also studies the reactions of the antagonist and the protagonists to the social codes which are defined, legalized, and applied by the forcing discursive systems and power relations.
Outline:
Introduction
Power And Discourse: A Foucauldian Analysis
Postcolonial Power Relations And Discourse Conclusions
From the Paper "The study of power in sexual and social affairs in Disgrace promotes making a paradigm in which the modality of colonizer/colonized binary opposition is destroyed. Petrus is not a colonized Negro, but a man who "has a vision of the future in which people like Lucy have no place" (156). This sentence shows that the power shift is still in progress, because Lucy lives in the vicinity of Petrus, and she may marry him and submit her land to him. This alteration in power relations causes the formation of the specific discourses which brings about the blacks' reaction to the white's presence. These discursive collections do not eliminate David's pessimism to Petrus. He thinks that "Petrus engaged three strange men to teach Lucy a lesson, paying them off with the loot" (157). If so, David's unconscious signals the growth of the postcolonial power transition from colonizer to colonized. Lucy is aware of the reason for the blacks' hatred of the whites. She "acknowledges that whites are on the debit side of the ledger and henceforth will live as intruders in South Africa" (Bonnici 90). "
Abstract "Christian Discourses" shows a gentler more forbearing side of Kierkegaard's nature than some of his other works. One week before publishing it, during Easter, he underwent a strong religious experience, perceiving that God had not only forgiven him his sins but forgotten them too. "Christian Discourses" is divided into four parts:The Anxieties of the Heathen, Joyful Notes in the Strife of Suffering, Thoughts Which Wound from Behind for Edification and Discourses at the Communion on Fridays.
From the Paper "Christian Discourses was published on April 26, 1848 yet the final draft had been completed by the end of the previous year. Also in 1847 (March), Edifying Discourses in Various Spirits was published, which declares that through suffering we are moulded for eternity. In September, Works of love, Some Christian Considerations in the Form of Discourses was published, describing our duty of love to God and neighbour. SK had also completed the first drafts of Sickness Unto Death and Training in Christianity."
Abstract The discourse analysis approach to understanding human communication is used to examine the discourse that takes place in a computer-mediated forum. An overview of the forum is followed by a review of how discourse analysis works and how it can be applied to this research project. A description of the analytic technique is followed by a discussion of the findings and a summary of the research in the conclusion. Relevant appendices with original research findings and explanatory notes are also provided.
From the Paper "The amount of empirical work employing the discourse analysis approach has increased in recent years, as organizational researchers have embraced the methods established in other domains of study to explore organizations (Hardy, 2001). The discourse analysis approach to understanding human communication described by Wood and Kroger and others is used in this research project to examine the discourse that takes place in a computer-mediated forum."
Abstract This paper discusses the issue of discourse and knowledge. The writer examines the works and views of five different philosophers in order to study the subject of discourse and knowing. In this article, the writer discusses the beliefs of Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, C. L. R. James, Audre Lorde and Edward Said in order to examine the relationship between discourse and knowledge.
From the Paper "Several different thinkers, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, C. L. R. James, Audre Lorde and Edward Said all undertook an analysis of the nature and value of discourse and the relationship between forms of discourse and such variables as knowledge and the location of the knowing or the speaking subject. This essay drawing upon the works by these philosophers will examine these relationships, arguing that not only is discourse shaped by knowledge on the part of the speaker and the listener but ... "
Tags:discourse, knowing, philosophy, Derrida, Foucault, C.L.R. James, Lorde, Said
Abstract The paper shows that while most people are familiar with the adjective "machiavellian", very few are actually knowledgeable about the political philosophy of Niccolo Machiavelli. It discusses how, in fact, Machiavelli has a great deal to teach us and we should be careful not to dismiss Machiavelli's thoughtfulness and acuity as an observer of human society by relegating his contributions to a single, uncomplimentary adjective. The paper shows that especially in his "Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livius" , we see in this writer of the Italian Renaissance a man who was truly engaged in the intellectual work required to create a system of government that was based on ideals and yet that also acknowledged the realities of human society as he understood them from his particular historical perspective. This paper examines the particular suggestions that Machiavelli outlined in "Discourses" for a well governed republic.
From the Paper "Among Machiavelli's pieces of advice to royal rulers was a judicious use of force (while this may sound barbaric to us, in fact many royal rulers of Machiavelli's time used force unrestrained by any sense of mercy) along with a respect for the private property of individuals and local traditions and customs. Machiavelli did also argue that the same standards of morality cannot be applied to rulers as to those that are ruled because the conditions of their lives and the extent of their responsibilities are so different from each other that a single set of standards for behavior cannot obtain."
Abstract While the age of empires is apparently long past, this essay will argue that the racist discourse that came into being to reinforce this imperialism remains in existence today. This issue of imperialist/racist discourse, it will be seen, is important, since it functions just as powerfully, yet more subtlety, as the racist colonialism of the past in casting people of non-European backgrounds as inferior.
Abstract The following paper explores two central questions. The first is how Machiavellian argues and supports, in both "The Prince" and "The Discourses," the idea that the welfare of the people is the highest law by analyzing Machiavelli's doctrines and the second is what evidence there is in both works that Machiavelli's ideas were a product of Renaissance humanism.
From the Paper ?One of the most believed scholars in history, Machiavellian, wrote "The Prince" as a part of a larger work which was later known as "The Discourses" According to this work "Discourses", Machiavellian made a great statement of this belief of the political state of the French Empire. His understanding was bolder then that mentioned in The Prince where his argument was more tentative and a bid for a position in Lorenzo's court. Although this view is much merit, it was nevertheless a point of view that was similar in both the works. Both book was intended to inform the ignorant state of self interest aspect of life, and the conviction that man acts through self-interest only when he feels like it.?
This paper discusses Rousseau's "Discourse on the Origin of Inequality", a philosophical work that explains how society came to be and how inequality emerged and existed in the society.
590 words (approx. 2.4 pages), 1 source, 2002, $ 21.95
Abstract This paper discusses Jean Jacques Rousseau's "Discourse on the Origin of Inequality of Man", that focuses on how man came to be different from other animals because of two characteristics: Pity and the need for self-preservation. The paper points out that a careful study of Rousseau's work shows that man's natural tendency for survival and self-achievement will drive him to want to dominate others, and that inequality will become the product of humankind's selfish and self- achieving nature.
From the Paper "Rousseau defends his primary claim about inequality by explaining how inequality came to be. Of course, Rousseau discusses the nature of man prior to the establishment of the society. Prior to Rousseau's society, humankind is egalitarian in nature, and survival is only the main reason why people live (self-preservation). However, as time passes, and as man become more acquainted with other people, the need to achieve betterment, or perfectibility, arises; man thus aspire to attain superiority above the others ("In proportion as the human race grew more numerous, men's cares increased. The difference of soils, climate and seasons, must have introduced some differences in their manner of living"). Through this kind of thinking and objective, man becomes unfair individual, and the society that Rousseau talks about is created through the inequality of man."
Abstract The paper looks at the ways the law defines women's rights and sex equality. The paper explains that despite the growing numbers of female lawyers, current legal discourse remains sexist in its continued reference to "man" as the standard. It also shows how the courts consistently refer to women by their biological disposition, which affects the social perception of females as a whole.
From the Paper "A feminist oriented theory of discourse must explain how social identities are constructed, how power is contested by the marginalized and how to formulate strategies for social change (McDorman, 1998, p. 27). A feminist perspective of legal discourse challenges our history of gender construction and destruction, which can only be examined for the benefit of society as a whole. One of the greatest goals of feminist jurisprudence is to overcome the "separation between women's socially constructed identities and their unrecognized and undervalued potentials" (McDorman, 1998, p. 27). Because despite the significant advancements made by women since the rejuvenation of the women's movement in the 1970s,the law continues to limit women's rights when compared to those accorded to men based on women's perceived limited physical capabilities (McDorman, 1998, p. 27)."
Tags: sexism, phallocentricity, inferiority, pregnancy, space, power
Abstract A close analysis of Rousseau's 2nd Discourse on Inequality, basically a history of man's social evolution and the development of governments, which places private property at the root of all conflict between humans.
Abstract This five-page paper discusses the importance of academic discourse with reference to articles by three renowned scholars. The students are required to learn a particular form of communication in order to merge with the distinctive fabric of a discipline or academy.
Abstract This paper looks at the Habermasian theory of social discourse and whether or not Bob Dylan fits in its mode. Habermasian is identified and outlined to understand this theory. Bob Dylan's song lyrics are looked at so as to understand whether or not Bob Dylan fits into this theory.
