To stop tip-toeing around race: what Arizona's battle against ethnic studies can teach academics

Abstract

A look at what recent debates over Mexican-American and ethnic studies in Arizona reveals about racial dynamics in the American academy and beyond. Author argues that academics have much to learn from activists challenging the current ban on ethnic studies.

Key words:

• Arizona
• ethnic-studies
• Mexican-American studies
• global studies
• US universities
• race

Notes

1. For a longer discussion of these issues, see Davila (2008), especially how they affect US Latinos in academy and in other institutional contexts, such as museums and urban planning.

2. See Lovato 2008 for a discussion of the term Juan Crow, which he coined and has since become popular among activists for highlighting commonalities in systems of US racial segregation pre and post the end of Jim Crow.