Purpose: This study aims to explore the perceived barriers that a secondary English teacher faced when attempting to discuss racial injustice through young adult literature in Mississippi. Design/methodology/approach: The authors rely on Critical Whiteness Studies and qualitative methods to explore the following research question: What are the…

Purpose: This study aims to share the development of new conceptual tools, which merge theories of critical whiteness studies (CWS), epistemic injustice and abolitionist teaching, applying them to the discourse of pre- and in-service teachers across the predominantly white institutions (PWIs) as they discuss antiracist teaching through the book…

Purpose: This paper aims to highlight a reconstructive lens on one white teacher's critical approach to teaching literacy. This work equally highlights the importance of anti-racist approach to critical pedagogies centered on a humanizing ethic of cariño. Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on portraiture and qualitative methods, this paper uses…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to better understand the ways in which K-8 teachers from a semirural, predominantly white district perceive their responsibilities to work toward anti-racism, as well as to learn more about how the teachers can be supported as they work to overcome the challenges facing teachers in these fraught times in this…

Purpose: This paper aims to examine two teachers' beliefs and practices on teaching writing at an urban, high-performing middle school to determine: What discourses of writing are being taught in an urban, high-performing US public middle school? What factors prevent or enable particular discourses? Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on case…

Purpose: This qualitative research study examines classroom observations and transcripts, teacher and student interviews and student writing to investigate how white English teachers can cultivate students' critical literacies regarding race and oppression through classroom literature. As research and practice in the field of critical literacy has…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold: to explore how preservice teachers in a young adult literature course critically conceptualize discussions in school spaces about race and police/community relations; and to understand the constraints and affordances of using the young adult (YA) novel, "All American Boys," as a critical…

Purpose: This paper aims to examine the cultivation of anti-racist practices with pre- and in-service teachers in post-secondary contexts, and the tensions of engaging in this work for equity and justice in urban teacher education. Design/methodology/approach: The paper relies on critical race theory (CRT) and critical whiteness studies (CWS), as…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss how the superhero genre, when couched in a space and project that seek to act as a counter-world and is rooted in the life experiences of youth, can allow Latinx elementary school students the opportunity to create counter-stories. Such stories facilitated the process of creating "critical…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to focus on a particular problem that arose in the course of teaching Shakespeare's "Titus Andronicus" to an MA English class in India. The insistence that Aaron could only be "read" in terms of already available stereotypes created a conflict with the nuanced depiction of Aaron within the…