Ethnic Identity and Power: Cultural Contexts of Political Action in School and Society. Yali Zou and Enrique T. Trueba, eds. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998. 452 pp.
DOUGLAS E. FOLEY
University of Texas at Austin
The latest volume edited by Yali Zou and Enrique Trueba on ethnic identity and power is an interesting mix of articles that address various political issues surrounding the education of ethnic minorities in the United States and abroad. Theoretically, Zou and Trueba have briefly restated what is emerging as a new type of critical ethnography based on a non-Marxian framework. For those unfamiliar with this perspective, the authors have combined ideas from Vygotsky on learning, Spindler on identity and cultural therapy, and Freire on critical pedagogy. Their new framework moves away from structuralist reproduction and psychological deficit explanations of school failure by exploring how to build culturally relevant pedagogical practices that are rooted in strong ethnic communities and families. These authors practice a decidedly upbeat form of cultural critique that tries to document ethnic agency and successful programs rather than structural and psychological systems and forms of dominance. Most who have lived through the latest round of anti-immigration hysteria and right-wing racism can attest to the crucial need for such empowering perspectives on ethnic minorities.
Although the case studies in this volume do not always flow neatly from the aforementioned conceptual framework, they seem to be kindred political spirits, if not practitioners of Zou and Trueba’s new critical perspective. The chapters by Wagner, Constantino and Faltis, and the Shackelfords and Trueba all detail the instructional practices that some educators in the United States are using to address the needs of linguistically and culturally diverse students. Wagner chronicles how one experimental school is detracking students, resocializing and reassigning teachers, and collaborating to transform the school culture and curriculum. Constantino and Faltis document how a deeply committed group of teachers is using unconventional Spanish discourse and curricular materials and openly opposing the transitional bilingual education policies of federal agencies. Finally, the Shackelfords and Trueba critique the dismantling of successful affirmative action activities and demonstrate how fragile and politicized progressive educational reforms can be.
Three other related chapters continue this exploration of successful programs in a comparative analysis of what is happening in Mexican education. These studies range from the U.S.–Mexican border and its maquilladora plants to the indigenous communities of conflict-torn Chiapas. The case studies of what is going on in the state of Chiapas are particularly interesting. Robert DeVillar and his associates provide a powerful portrait of the Zapatistas fighting back against state power and media propaganda. The case study of the Nahnu Indians resisting and creating their own identity representations through an organized video project to document their alphabet and writing and their lives as shepherds is particularly inspiring. More than some of the other articles, this one helps illustrate the critical pedagogy dimension of the editors’ conceptual framework.
The second part of the book focuses more directly on questions of ethnic identification and equity. Suárez-Orozco’s piece on state terrorism, immigrants, and refugees is an interesting psychoanalytic explanation of American reactions to downsizing and the influx of new immigrants in what he calls “postnational” spaces and communities. He highlights rising anxieties and xenophobia in the mainstream populations of postindustrial democracies. Subsequent articles by the Limas and by Macedo and Bartolome focus on how these new immigrants are consistently denied adequate instructional pedagogies based on their cultural experience and language and, worse still, are subjected to high levels of overt racism, violence, and anti-immigration rhetoric. Similar problems of prejudice are reported in extended case studies of Alaskan schools for native Alaskans and of Netherlandian schools for Moroccan immigrants. Sadly, the new postmodern trends of globalization do not seem to be lessening old racial and ethnic hierarchies and inequalities.
Educational anthropologists and sociologists will generally find a good deal of interesting case material in this volume. They will also find some new ways of conceptualizing ethnic schooling. The text should work well for a variety of multicultural and foundational courses at both the undergraduate and graduate level. It will illustrate how a critical ethnographic perspective implores educators to ask passionate, relevant questions about improving their policies toward ethnic minority populations. The volume clusters together a number of scholars doing a more politically aware style of educational anthropology, but the theoretical perspective articulated in the introduction is not utilized very systematically in the case studies. This is, of course, the fate of many anthologies of independent scholars. All scholars tend to march to their own drummers, thus the editors’ overarching theoretical statement is more a broad ideological umbrella than a guiding framework. Because Zou and Trueba have developed a complex, interesting view of doing critical ethnography, this is unfortunate. Readers will have to consult other studies by these authors for a fuller theoretical explanation of how a pedagogy based on Vygotsky’s learning theory and Freire’s critical pedagogy empowers learners.
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Updated 2/26/00