Educating Our Black Children

New Directions and Radical Approaches

Richard Majors

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2005
• ISBN:
  9781135700225
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Exclusion and miseducation of black children is endemic in the US and UK. This book takes a long, hard look at the two countries and uncovers what they can learn from each other in their approaches to tackling this problem. The material in the book is the result of extensive work with educators, researchers and scholars working in the area of education and disaffection in the US and the UK.
Richard Majors and his contributors are at the vanguard of research into this topic and this book is one of the most important titles published on the education of black children in recent times.
Gathering together the issues and looking at real-world approaches, this book does not simply advance the debate: it tables some serious solutions to serious problems.
This is a ground-breaking book based on cutting-edge research from writers and experts recognised the world over for their expertise. People will take note of what this book has to say.

Part I
Tackling historical and contemporary education problems

1 Racism, policy and the (mis)education of Black children

David Gillborn

Whereas the Queen’s majesty, tendering the good and welfare of her own natural subjects, greatly distressed in these hard times of dearth, is highly discontented to understand the great number of Negroes and blackamoors which (as she is informed) are crept into this realm . . . who are fostered and relieved here, to the great annoyance of her own liege people who want the relief which these people consume . . . hath given especial commandment that the said kind of people shall be with all speed avoided and discharged out of this her majesty’s dominions . . .

Royal Proclamation of 1601 (File and Power 1981, pp. 6–7)

There is a common assumption that Britain was somehow ethnically homogeneous before the major post-war migrations from the Caribbean and Indian subcontinent in the mid twentieth century. In fact, Britain has always been ethnically diverse and, as the quotation above demonstrates, racism has a long history too. In this chapter, my focus is upon the most recent part of that history; specifically, how has education policy sought to respond to Britain’s ethnically diverse population?¹ My aim is to identify broadly the changing landscapes of education policy: unfortunately, the continuities are strong. Indeed, I will argue that despite changes in terminology, even the most recent policy moves give little or no cause for optimism that racism is finally to be addressed seriously in education policy.²

Sally Tomlinson (1977) produced the first serious attempt to chart the position of ‘race’ issues in British education policy. Since then numerous writers have produced their own versions, almost all borrowing terms from Tomlinson’s original.³ This approach typically categorises changing perspectives and actions via a series of ‘models’ or ‘phases’. This has its dangers, not least glossing over contradictions and resistance in an attempt to describe (create?) neat categories. The problem is visible in the wide variety of terms used by authors, sometimes choosing to highlight different trends and periods. As with previous attempts, my policy map is necessarily incomplete: the start/end dates are not precise and there are points of opposition and counter-developments where national trends contrasted dramatically with local practice in some areas. My hope is that by looking back, we can better understand current approaches and future possibilities.

HISTORY OF POST-WAR ISSUES OF RACE AND EDUCATION

Ignorance and neglect (1945 to the late 1950s)

The term ‘ignorance and neglect’ is James Lynch’s (1986: 42) description of the early post-war period. The initial education policy response to migration from the Caribbean and Indian subcontinent was to do nothing. Others have variously referred to the same period as one of ‘laissez-faire’ disregard (Massey 1991: 9) or ‘inaction’ (Rose et al. 1969 in Massey, 1991).

Assimilation (late 1950s to the late 1960s)

In 1958 ‘riots’ in Nottingham and Notting Hill, London, saw white racist attacks on migrant communities misrepresented in the press as demanding action on the ‘colour problem’, while politicians on both sides of the House of Commons sought to excuse the actions of convicted whites (Ramdin 1987: 208–10). ‘Racial’ diversity was, therefore, presented as a threat to order and the migrant communities (victims of white racist violence) were projected as a ‘problem’. Policy responses at this point were characterised first, by action to severely restrict Black and Asian migration; and second, by the policy goal of assimilationism. Tomlinson, for example, points to the view of the Commonwealth Immigrants Advisory Council, who in 1964, stated that ‘A national system cannot be expected to perpetuate the different values of immigrant groups’ (Tomlinson 1977: 3). This view fuelled attempts to assimilate minorities into the majority culture (or at least the official version of it) and can be seen most clearly in the policies that prioritised teaching the English language and the physical dispersal of ‘immigrant’ children to minimise their numbers in any single class/school – a policy that left many children and young people especially vulnerable to racist attacks (cf. Dhondy 1982).⁴ The overriding policy objective here was to protect the stability of the system and placate the ‘fears’ of white racist communities and parents: a circular from the then Department of Education and Science (DES), makes explicit the priorities of the period:

It will be helpful if the parents of non-immigrant children can see that practical measures have been taken to deal with the problems in their schools, and that the progress of their own children is not being restricted by the undue preoccupation of the teaching staff with the linguistic and other difficulties of immigrant children.

(DES circular 7/65, quoted in Swann 1985: 194, original emphasis)

Integration (1966 to late 1970s)

Roy Jenkins (then Labour Home Secretary) famously advocated, in a 1966 speech, ‘not a flattening process of assimilation but equal opportunity, accompanied by cultural diversity, in an atmosphere of mutual tolerance’ (quoted in Mullard 1982: 125). This was important symbolically for acknowledging the contemporary existence of marked inequalities of opportunity, and for apparently withdrawing support for assumptions of white cultural superiority that had argued the need to ‘absorb’/destroy ethnic differences. This period saw some important steps forward, not least the passing of the Race Relations Act (1976) and establishment of the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE). Nevertheless, educational work tended to assume a patronising and exoticised approach to teaching about ‘race’ and assumed the need to build ‘compensatory’ programmes to make good the supposed cultural deficits of minority pupils (Massey 1991: 11–12). It has been said that during this period ‘emphasis was on life styles rather than life chances’ (Lynch 1986: 41, emphasis added), a statement that draws attention to the publication of curricular materials that frequently reflected and reinforced crude stereotypes of minorities as at best exotic and strange, at worst as backward and primitive, and always as alien. The ‘problem’, therefore, was still seen as residing in the minority communities themselves; a position that continued to absolve the education system of responsibility. ‘Tolerance’ and ‘diversity’ emerged as new watchwords (that are still in vogue today) but essentially, protection of the status quo remained the key driving force in policy (just as in assimilationism).

Cultural pluralism and multiculturalism (late 1970s to late 1980s)

This period saw the rhetoric of cultural pluralism assume widespread support (across political parties). Like the other ‘phases’ there was a borrowing (in more or less altered forms) of some of the key concepts and terms of previous periods. So, for example, ‘diversity’ and ‘tolerance’ continued to feature prominently in the discourse, but importantly notions of liberal pluralism were at their height and began to find expression in official policy. An official committee of inquiry was established to examine the education of ethnic minority pupils (cf. Rampton 1981; Swann 1985) and its analysis traded on a ‘radical’ or ‘strong’ perspective that used differences in group outcome as indicative of inequalities of opportunity. The recommendations of the Rampton and Swann reports were highly criticised, from the political right and left. Nevertheless, the reports marked something of a watershed in public policy on ‘race’ and education in Britain by first, rejecting IQist notions of innate intellectual differences between ‘races’, and second, stating that teachers (in their expectations and actions toward pupils and parents) might actively be implicated in the creation of ‘race’ inequality. These advances, however, were highly constrained: not only did the Conservative government of the day reject the committee’s most important recommendations (see below) but its chairman, Lord Swann, prepared a personal summary that barely even mentioned ‘racism’.

Despite the changed nature of the public policy debate at this time, in education much work continued to trade on superficial ‘positive images’ stereotypes of the type Barry Troyna devastatingly described as the 3S’s – saris, samosas and steel bands (see Troyna and Carrington 1990: 20). As the phrase encapsulated, the concern was with a shallow ‘celebration’ of difference, in a context where issues of power and racism were conspicuously ignored or silenced. This was the very point pursued by anti-racists who sought to place issues of power at centre stage.

ANTI-RACIST COUNTER-CULTURAL DEVELOPMENTS

I noted earlier that a danger of labelling the past via a series of ‘phases’ is that counter trends and points of resistance can be glossed over. One of the most important such ‘moments’ in British education policy concerns the development of anti-racist analyses and pedagogies. Against the wider thrust of public policy, this period saw key developments on the anti-racist front, symbolised by the establishment of several prominent pressure groups (including the National Antiracist Movement in Education and All London Teachers Against Racism and Fascism: see Gaine 1995: 42–4; Massey 1991: 15–17). Despite its presentation in the media and parts of academia as a Marxist ideology of revolution (cf. Flew 1984; Palmer 1986), anti-racism was never tightly defined as a single theory or pedagogic approach. Much anti-racist work traded on a critique of previous approaches, only rarely venturing into the realms of suggested classroom practice. Godfrey Brandt’s The Realization of Anti-racist Teaching (1986) stood out as a distinctive attempt to synthesise anti-racist critique and pedagogy. Brandt’s work, as much as anyone’s, captured the spirit of anti-racism at this point. He positioned liberal multiculturalism (with its fascination for ‘positive images’ and curricular change) as ‘the Trojan horse of institutional racism’ (p. 117) and argued that anti-racism differed fundamentally. In particular he argued that anti-racism should accord a central role to the ‘experience and articulations of the Black community’ (p. 119) and be characterised by an oppositional form. This involved an analysis that focused on power and the need to challenge dominant conceptions of knowledge and pedagogy. Nevertheless, anti-racism took a dynamic and varied form such that ‘there was no body of thought called anti-racism, no orthodoxy or dogma, no manual of strategy and tactics, no demonology’ (Sivanandan 1988: 147).

In many ways anti-racism reached a zenith, so far as education policy was concerned, with the work of the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA). Several local authorities, mostly serving large metropolitan areas, adopted anti-racist policies but the Greater London Council (GLC) and the ILEA (London’s education authority) were at the forefront of public campaigns to advance anti-racist issues. In hindsight it is certainly true that the GLC and ILEA made mistakes. This version of ‘municipal anti-racism’ (Gilroy 1987) has subsequently been subject to numerous critiques, including those of left intellectuals who question both the conceptualisation and execution of public anti-racism for trading on essentialised notions of difference and for oversimplifying the complex politics of ‘race’ and racism (cf. Gilroy 1987, 1990; Modood 1992; Modood et al. 1996). Nevertheless, the GLC and ILEA led the way so far as anti-racist public policy was concerned; ILEA’s Research and Statistics branch, for example, made concerted efforts to analyse and understand racialised patterns of success and failure in the capital’s schools. Ultimately both the GLC and ILEA paid the price for their counter-cultural stance in their abolition at the hands of a Thatcher government.

An inquiry into a racist murder at Burnage High School in Manchester (Macdonald et al. 1989) also became entangled in the wider racialised politics of the time. The report’s authors, all active in combating racism, argued publicly that ‘the work of all schools should be informed by a policy that recognises the pernicious and all-pervasive nature of racism in the lives of students, teachers and parents, black and white, and the need to confront it’ (Macdonald et al. 1989: xxiv). Nevertheless, this message was lost amid a torrent of distorted press coverage that misrepresented the particular criticisms that the panel had made of anti-racism as practised at Burnage. Rather than being recognised as a vital step forward in the attempt to identify workable and critical anti-oppressive strategies, the report was falsely presented as an attack on anti-racism per se; as ‘signalling the failure of the anti-racist project in education’ (Rattansi 1992: 11). Although anti-racist school practice is far from dead, therefore, the late 1980s and early 1990s witnessed many attacks on anti-racism (from left as well as right) and it undoubtedly suffered a retreat in many areas (cf. Gillborn 1995).

Although anti-racist initiatives were a vital part of this time period they never reached a widespread position of citation (let alone genuine influence). While multiculturalist and anti-racist advocates fought it out in meetings, on committees and in the pages of books and journals, it was only ever a modest version of multiculturalism that achieved the status necessary for characterising the period as a whole. The peak for liberal pluralist multiculturalism was the publication of the Swann Report (1985) which, despite attempts to integrate anti-racist sensitivities, remained largely wedded to (and stands as an exemplar for) the cultural pluralist/ multicultural sensibilities of the period. Even as this period reached its peak, however, its destruction was in sight: signalled most obviously in the dismissive response of the Conservative government of the day. Speaking as the Swann Report was presented to Parliament, the then Secretary of State for Education, Keith Joseph, repeated the historic refusal of British governments to take serious targeted action on the inequalities endured by minority communities and their children:

under-achievement is not confined to the ethnic minorities . . . [Our] policies apply to all pupils irrespective of ethnic origin. As they bear fruit, ethnic minority pupils will share in the benefit.

(quoted in Gillborn 1990: 166)

It was Joseph’s rejection of the report’s principa...

Table of contents

• COVER PAGE
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• EDUCATING OUR BLACK CHILDREN
• LIST OF FIGURES
• LIST OF TABLES
• PREFACE
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• INTRODUCTION
• PART I TACKLING HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY EDUCATION PROBLEMS
• PART II RADICAL BLACK APPROACHES TO EDUCATION
• PART III REFLECTIONS ON SOCIAL EXCLUSION AND INCLUSION
• PART IV RITES OF PASSAGE, MANHOOD TRAINING AND MASCULINITY PERSPECTIVES
• PART V MENTORING AND EDUCATION
• LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS