"Teaching for Social Justice"

The article I found was called "Teaching for Social Justice: Translating an anti-oppression approach into practice" by Deirdre Kelly. Kelly's reason for writing the article was that she feels that schools have long failed to benefit students from diverse backgrounds equally, and also because the definitions of teaching to social justice have been different among different teacher education programs, and is therefore vague and difficult to implement. Kelly feels that while most teachers are good at recognizing the differences among their students, more needs to be done to recognize the different social groups in their backgrounds that created those differences.

She feels that both students and teachers should learn about times when one group has been oppressed institutionally by another in history, and learn how to be aware when it is happening and how to respond to it. Social justice, according to Kelly, is an ever evolving concept as we become more aware of the suffering of other groups, and adjust our exact pictures of right and wrong. Her writing seems to be based on the ideas expressed in our previous readings. She feels that social injustice can be imparted on students through the institution of school itself, and that in response to this, schools have a responsibility to teach students the skills of inquiry and critical thinking so that will be able to question and improve upon the institutions which deliver social injustice to them, both inside and outside of school.

She advocates a number of approaches for giving students the skills to create social justice, both in the classroom and beyond. One of these is actively opposing cultural imperialism, where minority cultures are forced to accept and adopt the customs of a majority culture. Students and teachers can do this by learning about minority cultures and celebrating them. By learning about minority cultures, Kelly feels schools can also counter marginalization. As students growing in understanding and empathy for those with different cultural backgrounds, Kelly feels this will lead to a reduction in violence between people of different backgrounds. By giving those students from minority cultures a voice, she also feels this will cut down on exploitation of them, as well as feelings of powerlessness among them.