‘That racism thing’: a critical race discourse analysis of a conflict over the proposed closure of a black high school

Abstract

Using critical race discourse analysis, this study examines descriptions of a heated controversy over the proposed closure of the only primarily black high school in a large urban city. Participants included community members and the district and school leaders who were key in the controversy. Based on Foucault’s analysis of power we looked for conflicts in the narratives of the participants in their description of the controversy. Four strands of discursive conflict emerged: the purpose of school; the relationship of school and community; communication; and the issue of racism. Taking these four strands together, the themes found in the discourse of the community members enacted an emancipatory knowledge paradigm, while the themes found in the discourse of the administrators enacted a technical-rational, instrumental paradigm of knowledge.

Keywords:

• racism
• power
• epistemologies
• discourse
• critical race theory
• educational leadership

In 2009 a heated controversy erupted over a school district’s proposal to close Dubois High School¹ (DHS). The community exploded with cries of racism. Due to the community’s resistance, the proposed closure was tabled until some unspecified future time. In the US public educational system, overt racism by administrators and faculty is seldom documented and most administrators would vehemently object to racism as a policy or practice. The purpose of our study was to learn why the community members and school administrators interpreted the closure differently. Using qualitative methodology to gather data and content analysis, we critically analyzed the discourse of pivotal school administrators and community members; in-depth interviews were conducted with school administrators involved with the proposal to close the school and community members who led the resistance to the proposal. In our analysis we examined the dominant discursive themes and strategies used to describe the controversies, paying attention to the power relationships influencing and embedded in the discourse produced. Our analysis was informed by Foucault’s (1980a, 1980b) description of the operation of power; critical race theory in particular the concept of institutional racism (e.g., Blair 2008); and the relationships between different paradigms of knowledge and human interests (Habermas 1968).

Theoretical framework

Power relations and discourses

Michel Foucault claimed that power acts around points of conflict or potential conflict. Thus, examining the conflict described in this study should tell us something about the power relationships operating on and through the school administrators and community members in the emergence and management of this conflict. Foucault (1980a, 98) explained ‘Power is never localized here or there…[Rather it] is employed and exercised through a net-like organization…[Individuals] are always in the position of simultaneously undergoing and exercising this power.’ Foucault’s (1980a, 1980b) claimed that power operates through social practices, which act upon an individual even as the individual enacts those social practices. Further, Briscoe (2006, 2) explains, ‘Social actions and the power relations enacted through them are largely (re)produced and organized through discourse.’

Discourses draw upon and (re)produce particular knowledge paradigms and in doing so influence what counts as knowledge (e.g., Hill Collins 2000). Thus, different discourses sustain and challenge different knowledge paradigms. As Foucault (1977, 199) explains, discourses define ‘a legitimate perspective for the agent of knowledge and the fixing of norms’ with dominant discourses supporting and subordinated discourses resisting existing power relations. Likewise, discourse ‘both reproduces structures and has the potential to transform them’ (Fairclough 1992, 122). As van Dijk (2001) notes ‘members of more powerful social groups and institutions, and especially their leaders (the elites), have more or less exclusive access to, and control over, one or more types of public discourse’ (356). Thus, leaders, such as school administrators, tend to be the producers of the dominant discourse, supporting particular power relations and their related knowledge paradigms, while delegitimizing others.

Hermeneutic, technical-rational, and emancipatory knowledge paradigms

Weber described two different paradigms of knowledge: (1) sociological knowledge, which is interpretive (hermeneutic) and therefore inherently subjective; and (2) knowledge of the universe, which is objective and stands outside of value judgments (Author 1 1999). Weber (1992) claimed that a particular form of objective knowledge would come to dominate, creating an iron cage of bureaucratic technical-rationality based upon accounting. Later Habermas (1968) affirmed Weber’s two paradigms of knowledge, but added a third knowledge paradigm and claimed that human interests and values are also embedded in ‘objective knowledge’ (hereafter referred to as instrumental knowledge). Habermas (1968) describes instrumental knowledge as that which valued efficient control of the world. The third paradigm of knowledge, according to Habermas, is emancipatory knowledge. Emancipatory knowledge incorporates both instrumental and hermeneutic knowledge but such knowledge is aimed toward a particular value or end. Emancipatory knowledge seeks to bring to light and thereby end oppression, which causes pain, unhappiness, and despair (Pennycook 2001).

Critical race theory: institutional racism and counter-discourses

Today for racialized groups a number of imbalances or disparities exist: in achievement (Farkas 2003); suspension rates (Gregory, Skiba and Noguera 2010) and income (Wilson 2011); and crime and punishment (Alexander 2010). How do we account for these disparities? Critical race theory (CRT) provides an explanation: institutionalized racism. For over 500 years racialized groups have been enslaved and/or oppressed in the United States. Over these years, complexes of ideologies, discourses, practices, and policies were developed, to justify and maintain their oppression. When viewed alone, individual components seem innocuous, but together in complexes of policies, practices, and discourses, they act to detrimentally affect racialized groups. Patricia Hill Collins (2000) describes how these complexes act to oppress racial groups:

Domination operates by seducing, pressuring, or forcing African American women, members of subordinated groups, and all individuals to replace individual and cultural ways of knowing with the dominant group’s specialized thought – hegemonic ideologies that in turn justify practices of other domains of power. (287)

Blair (2008) describes how these domains of power have become both subtle and complex:

We are not talking about individual racism as the overwhelming reason for the negative effect of the education system on so many black children and young people. This is about systems – government institutions, school institutions, cultural institutions within which we work and with which we collude. What we are in fact talking about is ‘Institutional Racism.’ (251)

Hill Collins (2000) explains further that different ideologies and epistemological paradigms emerge, depending upon one’s positioning within power relations; those who do not experience oppression, ‘typically fail to see how their thoughts and actions uphold someone else’s subordination’ (287). Foucault’s analytics of power and the concept of institutionalized racism provide a useful lens for discerning power acting through these complexes as well as resistance to these complexes. Examining the conflicts and contradictions within and between community and administrative discourses helps us to see the operation of power shaping the different discourses and thereby supporting or delegitimizing different knowledge paradigms.

Methodology - Critical Race Discourse Analysis (CRDA)

In this section we describe our research methodology, the participants, the context, and our process of analysis. Our study combines critical race methodology with critical discourse analysis creating what we call Critical Race Discourse Analysis (CRDA). Our analysis incorporates essential aspects of Critical Race Methodology in that we focused discourses used in ‘the racialized, gendered, and class experiences of people of color’ (Solorzano and Yosso 2002, 24). We, then, chose not only to hear the words, but also to give weight to the words of community members. CRDA recognizes the experiences and discourses or narratives of people of color as legitimate. Thus, we establish and legitimize the voices, discourses and paradigms of knowledge of community-based participants that resist the status quo (Solorzano and Yosso 2002; Hill Collins (2000); Ladson-Billings 1988; Delgado 1995). Using CRDA, we investigated the discourses used in relation to the recent reversal of a school district’s decision to close down a high school due to community push back.

The data was collected during the 2009–2010 academic school year. In order to get a better understanding of the research context, one of the authors visited the school on several occasions, once attending a ‘Friends of Dubois High School’ support breakfast. While in these contexts, he informally spoke with a number of students, parents, teachers, administrators, and local faculty members about the event. He also attended a number of community forums, which ostensibly were to allow community participants a chance to express their perspectives to administrators. All newspaper articles covering the community forums were reviewed for this study. We read all the transcripts of forums, regular school board meetings, and newspaper articles surrounding the school closure. In addition, data was collected from state reports regarding the school and the district. The newspaper articles, field notes, and state reports to provide an understanding of the context and validate the assertions of the participants, but for the most part our study focused on the discourse used in the in-depth interviews of the selected participants. All of the interviews were conducted by one of the authors. As he is African American, community members were likely to trust and open up to him. Further, as a professor of educational administration and former district administrator, he was likely to be accepted and trusted by the school administrators as well. Before interviewing the principal of DHS or the superintendent of the district, he met with them on a number of occasions and we believe this built a level of trust. These interviews were conversational and focused on participant perspectives on the controversy over closing DHS. The interviews were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim.

Participants (community members and administrators). Five participants were purposefully selected during the course of this study. They were chosen because they were considered leaders or representatives in the controversy. Furthermore all participants were persons of color. The participants included: the superintendent (Latino male), the principal (African American male), the neighborhood city council representative (African American woman), an involved parent (African American woman), and a former student (African American male).

DHS Parent Activist Ms Jackson. Ms Jackson and a couple of other African American parents and community members who systematically mobilized parents to resist the closure. After living in other parts of the city, she relocated to Eastside to support the neighborhood and the local schools. Ms Jackson lives in the neighborhood of DHS; her children had attended DHS, and she was instrumental in starting the ‘Committee to Save Dubois.’ Largely due to her efforts, over 1000 community members showed up to protest the school closure.

City Council Representative Smith. Ms Smith had been a city councilwoman for nearly two years at the time of this study. As an African American woman, she represented the ‘Eastside’ of San Antonio and was vocal in the community dialogues around the proposed closure, expressing her opposition.

DHS Former Student and current community member Mr Irons. Mr Irons, an African American had recently graduated from DHS. At the time of this study, he was serving in the military. He had also played a vocal role in the protests.

Superintendent Garcia. Dr Garcia, a Latino, has been the district superintendent for the past five years, and had previously served as superintendent for a number of other districts with large numbers of Latino students. He assumed the district leadership at a time of low enrollment, low academic scores, and complex financial issues

DHS Principal, James. The new DHS principal, an African American, was new to the community and it was his first time to be a principal. He had been in the position for only a few weeks before the community protest over the proposed closure erupted and was beginning his second year as principal at the time of the study.

Participants (researchers) We were both professors at a nearby university and had worked together on a number of research projects prior to the current study. One author, in her early 50s is an Anglo associate professor. Her training is in educational foundations, particularly epistemology. Based upon gender, class, and race injustices she has seen and experienced for the last two decades, her research has focused upon racism, sexism and classism. Much of her recent research had used critical discourse analysis as a methodology. The other author in his middle 30s is African American. His training is in educational leadership. His research highlights aspects of culturally relevant school leadership, and he has looked extensively at how principals enact effective leadership in culturally nuanced ways. We came to the data with different perspectives – based upon our positioning within power relations, according to our race/ethnicity, gender, age, and rank, and upon our scholarly training. These two different perspectives provided a depth and richness to our interpretations and our discussions.

The national, community, and school contexts of discourse production

The description of the contexts is important as context influences participants and the discourse they produce (Rogers 2004). In this section we describe the national, community and school contexts in which the discourse was produced.

National context. Harvey (2005) stated that neoliberalism has ‘become hegemonic as a mode of discourse. It has pervasive effects on ways of thought to the point where it has become incorporated into the common-sense way many of us interpret, live in, and understand the world’ (3). Originating as a business theory (Ravitch 2010), neoliberalism has had a profound effect on national and local policies and practices, including those of US schooling. Hursh (2008) further explains that, ‘The current educational emphasis on choice, competition, markets and standardized testing is based on neoliberal rationalities’ (35). And neoliberal policies presume, an already even playing field for competition and an equal access to choices (Briscoe 2012). The past is invisible and only the present counts. Under the aegis of neoliberal state policies, test scores and other numerical data have come to dominate as the criteria for evaluating the success or failure of schools. Most of the schools judged as failures by these neoliberal criteria are located in economically disadvantaged and minority-majority schools (Briscoe and de Oliver 2012). The state of Texas adopted a high-stakes testing accountability system mandated in order to receive federal funding. Based upon this neoliberal accountability system, the state has formally labeled Dubois High School as a failing school for the past five years.

Community context. Dubois High School (DHS) is a public high school located in a large southwestern city (over 1,000,000). Over 900 parents and community supporters showed up to protest the closing of the school (with just over 800 students) the year prior to this study. This large-scale community protest – which helped thwart the proposed school closure – brought to light a host of community complaints, reverberating around the proposed closure. Many of the largely black residents voiced their belief that the neglect and marginalization of ‘Eastside’ – and by extension DHS students – were symptomatic of the racial discrimination to which the community had been subjected. City council representative Smith stated ‘the area has been underserved and folks feel marginalized.’ She cited as an example, the installation of toxic fuel tanks adjacent to the high school and the belief that black neighborhoods had been specifically targeted for this toxicity. The city council representative also mentioned a number of everyday offenses, such as the community’s insufficient trash removal, numerous vacant lots, and stray animals. Ms Smith described the effect of this neglect upon the parents, ‘I just think that there’s a lot of families out here struggling. That you know don’t have the time and space to be at the PTA meeting.’

Local community demographics at the time of the study support the community members’ claim of underdevelopment. State reports reveal that 43% of the population 25 years or older have less than a high school education. The unemployment rate was 12.1%, and the median household income was $26,909. Almost 29% of the families in this community lived below the poverty line. These statistics are symptomatic of a working-poor neighborhood (Wacquant and Wilson 1989; Sugrue 1998). A number of scholars have found that the types of employment and educational opportunities in an area are directly related to governmental policies of a municipality, county, or state (e.g., Wacquant and Wilson 1989).

Dubois High School. State reports provide student demographics: 93% of the students are economically disadvantaged; 6.5% of students have limited English proficiency; over 80% of students are labeled ‘at-risk.’ DHS is 57% African American. It is the only predominantly African-American high school in the city. Slightly fewer than 40% of the students are Hispanic. There have been five principals in the past nine years. DHS has failed to meet federal benchmarks every year since their inception in 2003. The results of the most recent state tests are presented in Table 1. In the last few years the district began to invest additional resources into DHS according to district administrators. This investment is reflected in a number of new educational opportunities for DHS students. In 2009, DHS opened the Manufacturing, Engineering, and Technology magnet program; all of which offer dual-credits, scholarships, internships, and industry certifications. The school is also beginning a school-within-a-school program featuring technology, project-based learning. In addition the district provided science and math curriculum coaches to help increase academic performance. Finally, according to the principal, during the year of the study DHS was provided 5–8 teachers above the district’s allocated mark. Reflecting these increased resources, based upon state reports there was a 39% increase in test scores from 2008 to 2010.

Table 1. DHS state test results on the percentage of students that met state standards.

	% in Math	% in Science	% in Reading	% in Social Studies
2008	34	39	68	76
2009	43	38	78	80
2010	53	62	82	91
2008–10	56% increase	59% increase	21% increase	20% increase

Process of analysis

In our analysis of the data we independently looked for differences, conflicts and agreements in the discourses in the interviews of community members and school administrators. Besides the obvious forms of discursive conflict we also considered silence about a topic extensively addressed in another discourse as a conflict. We found a general divide between the discourse of the community members and that produced by school administrators, which helped explain why they interpreted the proposed closure differently. This divide occurred around the following topics: description of the community, the real problem, the school-community relationship, solutions to the problem, purpose of school, relevant history, description of selves, descriptions of others’ perspectives, procedures, race, racism, communication with others, test scores, enrollment, racism, and so on. We then analyzed these various topics for their relationships to one another and four related strands of conflicting discourse emerged as detailed below. As we read through these organized data, we recognized that conflicting discursive themes by administrators and community members in the above strands exhibited characteristics that fit the different epistemologies as described by Weber (1992) and Habermas (1968), although there were some few exceptions. Finally, we examined the power relationships influencing and emerging from the discourse produced in this context.

Findings: the ever-morphing endurance of racism

Four strands of discursive conflict emerged in regards to: (1) the purpose of school; (2) the nature of the problem with the school closure – with community members taking a broad view and school administrators having a narrow focus. Strand 2 was the most complex in that it was comprised of two themes of conflict: the relationship of school and community and the history of the problem; (3) communication between school administrators and the community; and (4) the issue of racism. Within each of the above strands and themes, where it existed, we also present excerpts illustrating areas of agreement between community members and school administrators.

Strand 1: what is the purpose of school?

Although the participants were never directly asked about the purpose of schooling or education, community members spontaneously and explicitly addressed the topic. The school administrators only implicitly addressed the purpose of schools.

Enlighten, uplift the community, and improve society. Black community members described the purpose of education to be emancipatory and uplifting for the communities in which they lived and worked:

You know somebody else needs to be engaged in the work of building up people. I mean I try to do what I can but that’s where we need churches and schools to really you know step up and play a role. (Ms Smith, city council representative)

Community action, community involvement, healthcare, and education.… Everything revolves around education. I’d like to see, I’d like to set a model in the Eastside on improving the community, improving society as a whole, really. (Mr Irons, former student)

Good test scores, large bands, and appropriate student behavior. School administrators discussed the criteria they used to determine whether or not a school was being successful. Mr Garcia, the superintendent focused upon two measures of school success: test scores and enrollment rates as seen in the size of the school band. He provided examples of schools doing well using these measures of success:

We [at Hilldale School] were doing real well. We were picking up the scores at that elementary school…

And

Longfellow Middle School’s a perfect example of benefiting from, ah, receiving kids. Longfellow Middle School, Longfellow Middle School has over 360 kids in their band.

Mr James, the principal narrowly focused on topics such as the type of student behavior that would show that DHS was successful.

You know, a senior, we need to make sure a senior is acting like a senior, getting the things that a senior needs. We need to make sure a freshman is acting like a freshman, not preparing the freshman to be a sophomore.… I want my kids to be able to stand in front of whoever [sic] and go over their thinking that got ‘em to this point to be able to present this project.

Strand 2: the nature of the problem: broad or narrow viewpoints

In keeping with their understanding of the purpose of schools, community members’ and school administrators’ discourse differed in their description of the problem associated with their conflict over closure of the school. Community members’ discourse expressed a broad viewpoint concerning the two themes of this strand: (a) school community relationship--community members describing the problem as being centered on the nexus of DHS and the community; and (b) the historicity of the problem, describing the current closure as one in a historical continuum of neglect of the community. Whereas, school administrators’ discourse focused upon the school, with the community constructed as peripheral at best; their history of the problem focused on the schools’ recent enrollment, test scores, and economics.

School and community are parts of an integrated unit. Eastside community members did not view DHS as separate from the community, but rather as integrated with the community and thus the problem was just not about the school, but the community and school as a unit:

On all three plans, Dubois High School was closed on three, on all three plans. I was just devastated.… There were no other schools on all three, you know. And what would that do to our community? You know if you kill the school you know you’re killing the community, right? (Ms Jackson, parent advocate)

So, if we close the only public high school, that’s like a death sentence to the community. So, I think that’s why people just you know felt like you know look enough is enough. (Ms Smith, city council representative)

The community on the east side knows Dubois High School and their local church. That’s it. I’m mean, what else, what else do they have? (Mr Irons, former student)

Part of an ongoing historical oppression. Community members saw the school closure as part of an ongoing historical system of community oppression. Community members described the proposed closure of DHS as the further erosion of a community already marginalized by the combined result of deprivation of resources:

How dare you rob us again?… Continually you see all the development monies being placed you know Northside.… Just drive over here and drive somewhere else and see what you see. And so we’re tired of you know the continual you know neglect and racism, redlining, you know whatever you want to call over all the years.…You’re going to try to take our school. This is a community thing. (Ms Jackson, parent advocate)

Unlike the other community members, Mr Irons, presented test scores as evidence that DHS was failing:

If you look at the middle schools and elementary schools and you look at their performance as well they’re all at the bottom of the barrel as far as [the state] is concerned.… And it’s just horrible oversight and accountability.… DHS, as you know, they’ve been performing poorly for the past 20 years, 20–30 years. I mean if you go back and look at all the report cards from State Education, you’ll see that in the numbers. I mean SAT scores, ACT scores, [state exam] scores, all standardized testing has just been horribly…. DHS is 50, ranked 57th out of 57 high schools in [the city], according to Children at Risk.

As seen in the above excerpts, for the most part community members agreed upon the nature of the problem. They described the proposed closure of DHS as part of the ongoing oppression and historical neglect of Eastside and its education systems. Ms Jackson and Ms Smith were primarily focused on the closure of the school as the problem for the community. Mr Irons, on the other hand, focused on the overall under-education of the students in Eastside and the systemic neglect of the community’s education.

A narrow focus on DHS and the numbers: economics, enrollment, and test scores. In contrast the administrators focused solely on the DHS’s problems, citing economics and enrollment as well as test scores and graduation rates of the very recent past. Mr Garcia, the superintendent, describes the problem mostly in economic terms, relating enrollment and school performance to the economic efficiency of DHS:

Keeping DHS as a comprehensive high school is very costly, ok? But secondly, uh, uh just from a cost per student stand point from the district, you know that school is costing in the millions more than what it costs to run PVHS or DVHS because you have to have a certain number of counselors, you have to have, but there aren’t enough students to drive the expenditures that you’re having to use on that school.… And, so, as a CEO or superintendent you have to understand that and do what you can…

He also referenced the conflict as a problem, which occurred because the faculty advisory committee failed to adequately perform their role:

Ideally, they [the facilities advisory committee] go back and help cover the decision making process, help provide political coverage, if you will. ‘Hey we were on the committee and you know we tried, we represented the eastside but here are the reasons and the rationale and the decision making matrix that they all used…’

Mr James, the principal, focused on the burden the low academic standing of DHS placed upon him as new principal:

With [DHS] being academically low performing there are documents and people you have to answer to at [the State Education Agency]. And so, I have people that come to our school on a regular basis that I’ve got to sit with and complete huge documents throughout the year to submit on a regular basis to [the State Education Agency]. Well, that to me was enormous because that had me stay here nine, 10, 11 o’clock at night to take care of the stuff that you need to take care of and then also be a principal.

Mr James, was persistently silent about the controversy over the proposed closure. Like the superintendent, he focused on enrollment and what he needed to do to solve that problem:

So, you could had a kid that entered ninth grade, left your school say at semester break and said he was going to go to X school. Never went to X school. No one knows where he is, so that kid’s a dropout. And so that was the biggest issue with Dubois High School You gotta do investigative work to go track down where that kid is.

Thus, both administrators focused upon DHS, rather than discussing how the closure would affect the community – in their discourse the school and community were not integrated. In addition, their discourse describing the problem was peppered with quantitative indices.

The vague and problematic history of DHS or historical amnesia. Mr Garcia, discussed DHS’s ongoing problematic history in vague terms:

First of all, because they’ve been low performing, they’re getting more state and federal money as a way of fixing the school through the SIP grant, school improvement grants, and TIF grants, whatever those, I get them all confused now. But, over time, DHS has received those things.… The other schools are outperforming them over time, they have at a less cost. How long can we keep doing that and we’re cheating all the other kids?

In contrast, Mr James was silent about the economics of the situation and claimed to know little or nothing about the community resistance to the proposed closure. When asked, ‘Oh, so you didn’t know this before you started?’ He replied, ‘Correct, not at all.’ This is somewhat an incredulous claim, given that the proposed closure was a hot-button topic in the city for months:

I didn’t understand, I don’t, I didn’t understand the community district relationship or you know I can’t answer that. I’m still learning that myself. And you know last year you know if you asked me on a Friday what I did on a Tuesday, I couldn’t answer you, you know. That’s just because you just take care of what needs to be taken care of.… Well, the community meetings pretty much were addressing the things that I was doing to answer the state’s call in regards to being an academically low performing school.… And so those community meetings addressed that. We didn’t go back and address (pause), I don’t spend a whole lot of time on what happened in the past. (Mr James, principal of DHS)

Strand 3: im/proper communication?

The third strand of conflict in the discourse of community members and educational administrators was their construction of communication between school administrators and community members. In addition, community members’ discourse indicates an awareness of the administrators’ viewpoints; however, the administrators’ discourse is largely silent in reference to the community members’ viewpoints.

Communication problems – disrespect of community members. Ms Smith, Ms Jackson, and Mr Irons all described school administrators’ disrespectful responses to offers of services and opportunities from community members. Even when apparently given the opportunity to state their concerns, community members felt as though administrators were not truly considering their voices:

[In reference to a former principal] The administration there is one that pushes the people away from the school.… I mean I asked the principal. I’m like, I wanna bring in tutors; I wanna bring in mentors. He told me ‘No. No, we can’t do that. This is my house. You’re not bringing these folks into my house and messing up my stuff. And I’m like you’re stuff’s already messed up quoted unquoted. I mean he thinks it’s like. No, that’s not happening. You’re not bringing in the community.

The board never responded to anyone.… A young man that went up there and asked them, ‘Alright, you’ve had 50 speakers come up here. What do you think?’… The superintendent said, ‘I want to get to the next person.’ They didn’t respond there at all. (Mr Irons, former student)

We tried to build a relationship. I made three appointments with the principal. Not the current principal. I made three appointments with the principal, she stood me up every time. Every time I went down to that school. And one time, I had, I had read in the paper that they were flunking all the math tests, right? And we had an Americore intern who had just finished his degree in math and we didn’t have anything for him to do and I wanted him to run a tutoring program for the kids at the school. I couldn’t even get a meeting with her. (Ms Smith, city council representative)

It’s not healthy communication, cause you don’t have people at the table with the right mindset.… I know he [the superintendent] doesn’t have the right mindset, and this is like an attack on him. And he kept trying to bring up all these different subjects.… He has a lack of respect for women.… He was totally different you know in how he interacted with the, the business leaders and what not and how he talks to them as opposed to when he comes in a room with us. (Ms Jackson, parent advocate)

School administrators either chose not to address the community’s perceptions of the communication problems described by the community members or they were unaware of their perceptions. Their construction of communication was defensive, focusing on their adherence to proper procedures.

Formal bureaucratic procedures for communication. Both administrators referred to their communications with community members in procedural terms rather than the specific content of the communication. Mr Garcia describes his communication with the community. He described the types of communication he has with the community:

First of all, that that [town hall] meeting was a form of communication to the community. We, we, we tried to explain to them at that meeting what our situation was and why it made sense to close Dubois High School.… I meet with Ms Jackson and we talk about issues when we need to. We’ve visited with representative Smith about the issues. And, you know, [the district school board president] has his community meetings. I meet with, I’ve met with over time, the clergy that are leaders in that community on the east side.

He described the procedures he used to involve the community in the proposal to close DHS:

First of all, the facilities advisory committee came up with ah one, one of the three plans, I’m sorry, I believe it was two out of the three plans involved closing Dubois.… The facilities advisory committee, is made up of community members. Each board member chose five members to represent their district and then I believe that gave administration, they gave us about five or six seats to fill. So, you know, the representation, the intention was to have equal representation from all over the district.

When asked to describe what he learned from the community about the controversy, Mr James’ focused on procedural matters and, again, had little reference to community concerns:

And so, after the fact, you kinda, attending community meetings, speaking with leaders in the district, going to board meeting, you, you know, what I understood was, is that it wasn’t the district who was proposing the closure. It was a community committee. It was a committee that was put together to go out and do a study and then, and then introduce this, their results to the school board and to the district.

There was only one instance when the principal relayed the content of a community member’s conversation at the town hall meeting where the community resisted the proposed closure. Even then, the content had nothing to do with the community’s perspective on the proposed closure:

I can remember standing at the community meeting last year of course back just kinda listening to what was going on and a parent came up to me and said, ‘Are you nervous about what’s going on? How does this make you feel?’ I said, ‘It doesn’t make me feel either way right now. I’m just learning the process.’

Referencing the Other’s viewpoint. Community members referenced the administrators’ viewpoints more often, in greater detail, and more accurately than school administrators’ referenced community members’ viewpoints. An example of this referencing by community members was previously seen in Mr Iron’s description of the problem. Ms Jackson describes one of the challenges as understood by the school district:

Well, they [the school district] say that the enrollment is low and that then of course it’s 4th year AYP.… So why not just redraw the boundary where 500 of those students come over here to Dubois. Then you deal with some enrollment things.

Ms Smith also accurately describes the school administrators’ concerns about the numbers:

From the administrations point of view, they closed, they tried to close the school because of low enrollment, because of test scores…

What needs to be done, in my view… In contrast, the school administrators’ discourse rarely addressed the community members’ point of view. Mr Garcia described the overall reaction of the community, but not why the community reacted in that way:

We went out to get a feel from the community and learned right away you just don’t close high schools… And, by the way, you know, we’re not out of the water with this new legislation that’s coming up, they’re proposing some major cuts to local school districts. You know, that issue may be revisited.

Mr James likewise was vague about the content of the community’s viewpoint:

You know there were people who got up there who were very sound and very specific and did their homework. There were people up there just crying away and you could hardly understand just anything other than they didn’t want the school to close because they’re were passionate about the school, what it meant to the community, and then what it’s going to mean to the future kids.

Though the community members showed an awareness and willingness to address the issues as perceived by the school administrators, the discourse of school administrators did not address the content of community’s concerns, save the superintendent over one issue: their community’s perception of the proposed closure as racist. The fourth and final discursive conflict occurred around the issue of race and racism.

Strand 4: what’s race got to do with it?

In the interviews with the participants, we specifically asked about racism and whether or not it had anything to do with the problem. Mr Irons, Ms Jackson, and Ms Smith all described the neglect and underdevelopment of the Eastside community, including DHS. To them, this marginalization was indeed racism. However, they differed somewhat in regards to the part that racism played in the decision to propose the closure of DHS ‘That racism thing.’ Ms Jackson explains why it is racist, but adds that some of those involved in the decision might just be blind, rather than outright racist – implicitly describing institutionalized racism at work:

Racially driven to me is what it appears. You know, if you close down (pause) this is the only predominant, we’re only 7% here in [the city] and we’re dispersed. We’re, I mean, we’re all over the place. But as far as concentrations of African American, this is the highest concentration of African.… It’s not big, but there are still little pockets of people [in the DHS community] that don’t want to believe that racism thing. But, and I don’t know necessarily if they’re being racist or they’re just being blind. You know, some may have racism and some may not.… But they’re also not necessarily looking at the whole big picture, too. So, I think that a lot of that is going on.

Ms Smith also opposed the closure, citing many of same reasons as Ms Jackson, but she never uses the term racism:

My constituency definitely feels marginalized. And it’s definitely true. It’s probably the area of town that has the largest concentration of black people.… Then as far as desegregation this is the school were it happened. And then, I guess you know with white flight, what happens. Then it becomes the more, you know, we, it became a bowl of sweat, segregated again. That’s an exaggeration but you know.

It’s not racism. However, Mr Irons explicitly and repeatedly insisted that the proposed closure of DHS was not racist:

It’s not racism or anything like that. And a lot of people will claim that and that’s what really teed me off at the town hall meeting back in September when they had it was a lot of people are up in arms calling racism. You’re closing it cause we’re on the poor side of town, all this other stuff. I’m like No. It’s because we’ve neglected the performance for so long.… The problem here is not racism. It’s not racism.

The administrators took different discursive tactics when discussing the charge of racism. Mr James, the principal, repeatedly denied knowledge of the community’s perception of racism in the proposed closure. When asked to, ‘describe how parents interpret [what] the committee was proposing and maybe what the district, what was on the table?’ Mr James said:

See, that’s a question I couldn’t answer. That’s a question you would have to answer or ask the people who were there. You know, parents and things like that.

When asked again in another way, I understand that most of the people who showed up in the meeting were African American. After that point or in that point, did you get a sense that they felt that it was based on racism that they were closing Dubois? He replied:

No, see I never got that. And again, I’m in the forest amongst the trees and so when you’re in the forest amongst the trees [pause] my campus is half Hispanic half African American, basically.

Asked again, So somebody comes to you and says you know what this district is being racist, my, and the proof is that they’re closing Dubois, the only high school in the in [the district] with a large number of blacks. How would you respond? He responded:

My response would be, I’m sorry that you feel that way because my school is half Hispanic half African American and at our school we take care of our Hispanic kids and our Hispanic families. We take care of our African American kids and our African American families. And I’d say we are not in the business at DHS with distinguishing between the two. We take care of our kids. That’s how I’ll respond every single time.

In contrast, Mr Garcia’s discussion of racism was the lengthiest and most complex, weaving in and out of his interview at different times. He presented a six-part argument about why the decision was not racist. He first addresses why the appearance of racism was wrong:

I think that if the facility advisory committee would have just pointed to DHS, it may have appeared to have been, or could be, it could be speculated that it was because that’s an African, a predominantly African American community and school. But then again, that idea that PVHS was included sort of shatters that theory.

The rest of his argument centers on why he himself should not be seen as racist for his part in the proposed closure of DHS. The second part of his argument was, as a Hispanic, to reiterate in a number of different contexts that ‘DHS now is about 50% Hispanic.’ The third part of his argument, exonerates him from racism by pointing to his past success as a principal of an African American elementary school:

I was a principal of an elementary, very large elementary school in Hilldale. And for the most part, and for, in Hilldale it had about 50–60% African American in inner city in Hilldale. And, the other half was Hispanic. We were doing real well…and we had some very challenging kids

The fourth part of his argument illustrated his historic and present lack of concern for being politically correct, but that he was, ‘gonna do what’s best for kids’:

The superintendent asked me to go over there and sort of fix that school, get it back on track. The LULAC, Hispanic organization, said, ‘Look as a Hispanic, this white superintendent is being prejudice against this Hispanic principal, and we’re representing her.’… I said, ‘Wait a minute. This school is 99% Hispanic and the scores are dropping, OK. Are you defending a principal or are you representing all these Hispanic kids. Now, I’m gonna go over there and do what’s best for all these Hispanic kids. There’s a difference between doing what’s politically correct, ok, versus reacting to a racial, something that you feel you have to defend as racial.… Now let’s go to DHS. Here’s the question that that needs to be asked. It’s not easy but suppose the superintendent is fighting for the African American kids.… Suppose the superintendent recognizes that these African American students do not have the programs that Hispanic kids do, OK. He could remedy that by shutting that school down and getting them to schools that are offering more for those kids.

The fifth part of Mr Garcia’s argument was that some of the parents in Eastside had already made the decision to send their children to a different school:

I think a better conversation would be to gather the African American parents, OK, who have chosen not to go to that school, OK, and ask them why.… And a lot of Hispanics are bailing out too and going to other schools.

The final part of his defense against the charge of racism was when he brought up reverse discrimination based on the economics of keeping DHS open:

You know, you know, I’m not gonna call it reverse discrimination but, you know, the numbers speak very clearly. We are doing, you should do, what I’m hearing, you should do more for the school because we’re, we are on this side of town and we African Americans, we are.

The discourse of the two school administrators about racism showed both similarities and differences. The principal repeatedly refused to talk about racism or even perceptions of racism. Finally, when pushed he described the racial make up of Dubois itself, insisting that Dubois was not racist because it took care of all their students and that race was not a factor. Whereas Mr Garcia, the superintendent, perhaps because he was Latino, explicitly and extensively claimed that he and the district board, in developing proposal to close DHS, were not racist.

Discussion and implications

The above findings are discussed in terms of the different knowledge paradigms that are enacted in the participants’ discourse: The community members’ discourse supports and is an instantiation of an emancipatory knowledge paradigm; while, the administrators’ discourse supports and is an instantiation an ‘objective’ technical-rational, knowledge paradigm. Next we explore the issue of racism as expressed in the discourses. These discursive conflicts are discussed in regards to participants’ positionings within the relations of power. Finally, we discuss the implication of these results in terms of our understanding of the operation of institutional racism.

Technical-rational versus emancipatory and hermeneutic discourses

An emancipatory knowledge paradigm incorporates instrumental and hermeneutic knowledge within the broad aim of improving society by making it more equitable; thus, emancipatory knowledge focuses upon identifying and alleviating oppression. In keeping with an emancipatory knowledge paradigm, the focus of community members’ discourse was very broad in terms of their description of the problem and the historical scope they considered. Focusing on the end purpose of schooling as societal uplift is one of the two integral aspects of emancipatory knowledge. Without being prompted, the community members’ discourses all addressed the larger purposes of schools as improving society. Their criticisms and cries of racism were premised upon the school administrators’ failure to foster this larger societal purpose of education for their community. The second integral aspect of emancipatory knowledge is identifying and alleviating oppression. All community members’ discourse included numerous instances of oppression experienced by their community.

For example, the discourses of all community members contained descriptions of school administrators’ dismissiveness and disrespect toward DHS community members. Such dismissiveness is a form of oppression. Noting this disrespect is a feature of community members’ discourse that instantiates and supports an emancipatory paradigm of knowledge. In the one discursive conflict between community members, Ms Jackson explicitly and Ms Smith implicitly perceived the proposed closure as racist; in contrast, Mr Irons explicitly denied racism as a factor. The older women saw the proposed closure as part of the larger picture of racist oppression, whereas the younger man saw the proposed closure as a measure of alleviating the ongoing oppression of his community and former school. Even in this conflict, all community members’ discourse was focused on identifying and alleviating oppression. Finally, the discourse of the community members all addressed the perspectives of the school administrators, indicating the use of hermeneutics to understand a perspective different from their own.

On the other hand, administrative discourse rarely if ever addressed community perspectives; moreover, their discourse never once spoke to the purpose of schools as related to the community or society. In contrast and in keeping with a technical-rational knowledge paradigm, both administrators’ discourse was very, even deliberately, narrow in terms of their description of the problem and its history. This finding supports Rollock’s (2012) contention ‘that those excluded from the centre can experience a “perspective advantage” as their experiences and analyses become informed by a panoramic dialectic offering a wider lens than the white majority located in the privileged spaces of the centre are able to deploy’ (65). Although superintendent and principal were people of color, they were positioned closer to the centre than the community members were and likewise had narrower perspectives. Their discourse also incorporated a second integral feature of a technical rational knowledge paradigm in that they referred repeatedly to procedures, calculations made, and numbers using phrases such as, ‘the facts are the facts’ or ‘A good leader looks at the scores.’ The superintendent discourse was more heavily burdened with economic and budgetary issues, while the principal focused upon how graduation rates were calculated. The principal’s discourse, in particular, resonates with Weber¹s prediction of with the iron cage of bureaucracy, in that some of the most common phrases in his discourse were ‘not my job’ or ‘not my responsibility.’ The administrators’ discourse could have incorporated the technical-rational knowledge within an emancipatory knowledge paradigm – or the technical rational aspects of their discourse could have included hermeneutic knowledge aspects by incorporating the perspectives of community members; but their discourse did neither. Rather, through silence, the administrators’ discourse, which issued from a more dominant position, devalued community’s voice.

However, the technical-rational knowledge paradigm did help them to defend themselves against accusations of racism. Their painstaking descriptions of the procedures followed were used as a defense; they were following the mandated procedures in the actions and decisions they made in their positions as principal and superintendent. Unfortunately, the technical-rational knowledge paradigm exclusively used in the administrators’ discourse allowed them to remain blind to, or silent about, the oppression that community members all discussed in length. The silence of the administrators’ discourse in regards to racialized oppression tacitly supports white privilege, just as colorblind discourse does (Holyfield, Moltz and Bradley 2009). Further, without a larger end in mind, their calculations and procedures were not interrogated for their ultimate effect upon the students and community. Thus any linkage between their actions and continuing oppression upon the community remains invisible to them. In fact, the superintendent even wonders if the community’s outrage could be an example of reverse discrimination.

Emancipatory, hermeneutic, and technical-rational knowledge paradigms produce different interpretations of reality. Different interpretations of reality call for different decisions and actions. One of the possible actions is voicing a description of an interpreted reality. Although there were different nuances in the reality voiced in the emancipatory discourse of the community members, they all clearly articulated oppression of their community. Hill Collins (2000), noted that those who experience oppression, are more likely to develop and use knowledge paradigms (i.e., epistemologies) that enable them to see and name their oppression. The discourse produced by the participants’ supports her viewpoint. Without an emancipatory lens, it becomes difficult for the administrators to question whether the policies and procedures that they have been asked to follow will have a racist effect upon the community. Without a hermeneutic lens, it is difficult for them to learn to view events from their community’s perspective. Finally, although no personal racism seems to motivate the proposed closure of Dubois High School, it could be argued that the proposed closure occurred through and because of historical institutional racism enacted through the sole reliance upon a technical rational instrumental discourse and the exclusion of emancipatory and hermeneutic discourse.

A market-place accountability within a neoliberal context

As neoliberalism is currently hegemonic (Apple 1999), the power relations of this ideology influenced the discourse of the participants. Gintis and Bowles (1988), claim that school leaders’ tend to affirm societies’ prevailing ideologies due to their desire for credibility. The marketplace ideology of neoliberalism with its emphasis upon of choice, competition, markets, standardized testing, and blindness to an uneven playing field is being strongly felt by schools. The accountability system used in high stakes testing is based upon a technical-rational knowledge paradigm that understands numbers to produce the truth about the world. Darling-Hammond (2007) has noted that this accountability system has many negative consequences for racialized students – its promotion of a technical-rational discourse and the exclusion of emancipatory discourses could be considered another such negative consequence. Many of the phrases used by the participants reflect a marketplace accounting ideology. For example, the synonymous use of the terms CEOs and Superintendents in, ‘as a CEO or superintendent.’ Aronowitz and Giroux (1993), note that ‘Ideologically, this meant abstracting schools from the language of democracy and equity while simultaneously organizing educational reform around the discourse of choice, re-privatization, and individual competition’ (1). Author 1 et al. (2012) explain that neoliberal ideology acts to further invisibilize institutional racism, while at the same time promoting the blaming of families and communities for any failure that schools encounter. Finally, neoliberalism makes middle level school administrators, i.e., principals vulnerable by positioning them as scapegoats and in such a positioning they are even more likely to affirm prevailing ideologies (Anderson 2001).

Under these conditions the school leaders are increasingly likely to affirm a neoliberal ideology, relying upon and instantiating an exclusively technical-rational knowledge paradigm in their discourse, even more so for a school that is labeled as failing. By doing so, the school leaders are unlikely to become aware of institutional racism, in which they may become complicit through their discourse or actions. And that is what we see in their discourse – the exclusive instantiation of a technical-rational knowledge paradigm. Any discussion of the larger purpose of schooling, or the importance of understanding other perspectives is silenced; hence their discourse was blind to both the reality and the underlying arguments of community members in this study. The principal in this study is even more vulnerable given that this was his first position as a principal and he was overburdened by the ‘accountability’ paperwork demanded by state policies for schools deemed to be failing. Given this context, he retreated and narrowed his discursive focus down to one thing, ‘graduating kids.’ The superintendent repeats the marketplace mantra of neoliberalism in his explanation of why DHS ought to be shut down – it’s economics and enrollment. Furthermore, the superintendent’s extended argument for why he in particular and the district decision to close the school was NOT racist, but rather was a matter of the numbers, reflects a defensive technical-rationality against the vulnerability induced by neoliberal school policies.

Influenced by these power relations, with their narrowed vision, school leaders are induced to pay even less attention to communicating with and understanding their communities than before. Yet, Khalifa (2012) explains that one of the most crucial aspects of successful African American urban schools is their relationship with their communities. School leaders who utilize hermeneutic knowledge paradigms to build strong relationships with their communities are much more likely to have academically successful students than those whose relationships are superficial and formal. Although the discourse of the community members resonated at times with neoliberal metaphors, it also resonated more strongly with earlier ideologies of democracy and of the larger purpose of schooling. Their discourse to a far greater degree instantiated and supported an emancipatory knowledge paradigm. Further it echoed earlier educational scholars such as W.E.B. Du Bois (1903) and Dewey (1916) who both claimed that the purpose of school in a democracy was to uplift and improve society.

Where do we go from here?

Although, this is just one case study, it supports previous critical discourse analyses of schooling (e.g., Augoustinos, Tuffin, and Every 2005; Briscoe and de Oliver 2012). The implications of this study for educational leaders are threefold. First, we need to foster an emancipatory knowledge paradigm in the training of educational leaders so that while they must follow the neoliberal mandates with its technical-rational knowledge paradigm, they can keep the broader purpose of education in mind while doing so. Second, educational leaders need to become aware of the concept of institutional racism so as to sharpen their sensitivity for policies and practices in their schools that collude in institutional racism. Indeed, the administrators in this study – despite being people of color – were not either willing or able to interrogate their own ideologies (neoliberal) and institutional policies, such as the closure of DHS for racist effects; it is most likely they were never trained to interrogate their ideologies or institutional policies for such effects. Finally, it is crucially important that school administrators develop their hermeneutic knowledge learning to truly listen to and respect the voice(s) of their community. Truly listening to community members will help school administrators to retain their broader view of the purpose of education and to maintain and use an emancipatory knowledge paradigm to assess and act within particular contexts. These traits will enable school leaders to truly begin to educate the students from diverse communities for a democratic society.

Notes

1. All proper names used in this article are pseudonyms