Teaching the U.S. civil rights movement and its legacy in Taiwan: an exploration of racial awareness in a Taiwanese high school class

ABSTRACT

This article analyzes a Taiwanese learning experience about the U.S. Civil Rights Movement, launching an educational project with 18 Taiwanese high school students to discuss their understanding of race, racism, and social justice. The rationale of analyzing the student participants’ comments rests on critical race theory. After analysis, this study found that Han ethnocentrism functions as a hidden identity and value system to influence the student participants to respond to racial issues. Han ethnocentrism caused the participants focusing on the racial experiences in Han groups and narrowed their understandings to the world. However, the result of this research also indicated that with a proper introduction, participants were willing and capable of developing racial sensitivity and affirmative attitudes about social justice toward minorities in Taiwan, such as Taiwanese Aboriginals and Southeast Asian migrant workers.

KEYWORDS:

• Antiracist education
• color-blind racism
• critical race theory
• taiwanese racial experiences
• the U.S. Civil Rights Movement

Disclosure statement

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest/Competing interests with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Availability of data

The author collected all data in this study by himselve, having no associated data from data repository.

Data deposition

Not applicable.

Geolocation information

Taiwan, Republic of China, East Asia, Pacific Islands

Notes

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24. See above 21.1965.

25. Ibid.1965.

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27. See above 21.1965.

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29. See above 23.

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35. See above 32.

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37. See above 17.

Additional information

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes on contributors

Ming-Kuo Hung

Ming-Kuo Hung received his Ed.D. from the University of San Francisco and is interested in understanding how education working on anti-racist discourse. This article is based on his doctoral study of discussing racial experiences with the Taiwanese high school students through ethnographic methods. He continued researching about Taiwanese racial and ethnic experiences through qualitative approaches.