critical race theory in education pdf

• LOGIN & Help

Handbook of Critical Race Theory in Education

• Education Policy, Organization and Leadership
• Gender and Women's Studies

Research output : Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Book

This handbook illustrates how education scholars employ Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a framework to bring attention to issues of race and racism in education. It is the first authoritative reference work to provide a truly comprehensive description and analysis of the topic, from the defining conceptual principles of CRT in Law that gave shape to its radical underpinnings to the political and social implications of the field today. It is divided into six sections, covering innovations in educational research, policy and practice in both schools and in higher education, and the increasing interdisciplinary nature of critical race research. New chapters broaden the scope of theoretical lenses to include LatCrit, AsianCrit and Critical Race Feminism, as well as coverage of Discrit Studies, Research Methods, and other recent updates to the field. This handbook remains the definitive statement on the state of critical race theory in education and on its possibilities for the future.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

• General Social Sciences

Online availability

• 10.4324/9781351032223

Library availability

Related links.

• Link to publication in Scopus
• Link to the citations in Scopus

Fingerprint

• Critical Race Theory Keyphrases 100%
• Guides Social Sciences 100%
• Education Research Psychology 100%
• Scientific Methods Social Sciences 33%
• Science Policy Social Sciences 33%
• Research Practice Social Sciences 33%
• Reference Materials Social Sciences 33%
• Higher Education Keyphrases 25%

Research output

Research output per year

Critical race theory offshoots: Building on the foundations of crt and emphasizing the nuances they offer

Research output : Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• Critical Race Theory 100%
• Education Research 100%
• Asian Americans 100%
• AsianCrit 75%
• United States 50%

Introduction

• Public Education 100%
• Charter Schools 100%
• History Education 100%

SquadGoals: Intersectionality, Mentorship, and Women of Color in the Academy

• Mentorship 100%
• Academy 100%
• Women of Color 100%
• Women of color 100%
• Intersectionality 100%

T1 - Handbook of Critical Race Theory in Education

A2 - Lynn, Marvin

A2 - Dixson, Adrienne D.

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2022 Taylor & Francis. All rights reserved.

PY - 2021/10/26

Y1 - 2021/10/26

N2 - This handbook illustrates how education scholars employ Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a framework to bring attention to issues of race and racism in education. It is the first authoritative reference work to provide a truly comprehensive description and analysis of the topic, from the defining conceptual principles of CRT in Law that gave shape to its radical underpinnings to the political and social implications of the field today. It is divided into six sections, covering innovations in educational research, policy and practice in both schools and in higher education, and the increasing interdisciplinary nature of critical race research. New chapters broaden the scope of theoretical lenses to include LatCrit, AsianCrit and Critical Race Feminism, as well as coverage of Discrit Studies, Research Methods, and other recent updates to the field. This handbook remains the definitive statement on the state of critical race theory in education and on its possibilities for the future.

AB - This handbook illustrates how education scholars employ Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a framework to bring attention to issues of race and racism in education. It is the first authoritative reference work to provide a truly comprehensive description and analysis of the topic, from the defining conceptual principles of CRT in Law that gave shape to its radical underpinnings to the political and social implications of the field today. It is divided into six sections, covering innovations in educational research, policy and practice in both schools and in higher education, and the increasing interdisciplinary nature of critical race research. New chapters broaden the scope of theoretical lenses to include LatCrit, AsianCrit and Critical Race Feminism, as well as coverage of Discrit Studies, Research Methods, and other recent updates to the field. This handbook remains the definitive statement on the state of critical race theory in education and on its possibilities for the future.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85122773817&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85122773817&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.4324/9781351032223

DO - 10.4324/9781351032223

AN - SCOPUS:85122773817

SN - 9781138491724

SN - 9781138491717

BT - Handbook of Critical Race Theory in Education

PB - Routledge

Advertisement

Critical Race Theory in Education: How Banning its Tenets Undermines our Best Hope for Equity in Education

• Original Paper
• Published: 24 May 2023
• Volume 32 , pages 300–313, ( 2023 )

Cite this article

• Karin Kaerwer   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0299-9017 1 , 2 &
• Malika Pritchett 3  

807 Accesses

4 Citations

Explore all metrics

Critical Race Theory (CRT) and its potential contributions to K–12 public education is under scrutiny by lawmakers and parent groups across the United States. Banning the tenets of CRT will produce even less equitable outcomes for our most vulnerable student populations. Interdisciplinary collaboration is critical for behavior analysts working alongside educators in public schools. This paper will unite educators and behavior analysts in a scholarly discussion of the origins, definition, and opposition to CRT; highlight current inequities and disparities in educational systems; outline the effectiveness of culturally relevant pedagogical practices; and propose a call to action for behavior analysts to collaborate with educators to improve equitable student outcomes.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price includes VAT (Russian Federation)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Framing Critical Race Theory and Methodologies

Putting critical race theory to work in Australian education research: ‘we are with the garden hose here’

Breaking the Silence: Critical Race Theory in Pedagogy and Practice

Data availability.

Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analyzed in this study.

Baer, D. M., Wolf, M. M., & Risley, T. R. (1968). Some current dimensions of applied behavior analysis. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1 (1), 91–97. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1968.1-91

Article   PubMed Central   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Baer, D. M., Wolf, M. M., & Risley, T. R. (1987). Some still-current dimensions of applied behavior analysis. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 20 (4), 313–327. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1987.20-313

Barrett, B., Beck, R., Binder, C., Cook, D. A., Engelmann, S., Greer, R. D., Kryklund, S. J., Johnson, K. R., Maloney, M., McCorkle, N., Vargas, J. S., & Watkins, C. L. (1991). The right to effective education. The Behavior Analyst, 14 (1), 79–82. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03392556

Biglan, A. (2015). The nurture effect: How the science of human behavior can improve our lives and our world. New Harbinger Publications.

Behavior Analyst Certification Board. (2020). Ethics code for behavior analysts https://www.bacb.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Ethics-Code-for-Behavior-Analysts2102010.pdf

Caldwell, V. F. (1996). Critical race theory: The key writings that formed the movement. Columbia Law Review, 96 (5), 1363–1374. https://doi.org/10.2307/1123408

Article   Google Scholar  

Epstein, T., Mayorga, E., & Nelson, J. (2011). Teaching about race in an urban history class: The effects of culturally responsive teaching. Journal of Social Studies Research ,  35 (1), 2–21.

Fawcett, S. B. (1991). Some values guiding community research and action. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis , 24 (4), 621–636. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1991.24-621

Fawcett, S. B. (2021). A reflection on community research and action as an evolving practice. Behavior and Social Issues, 30 , 535–544. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42822-021-00083-x

Article   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed ((30th anniversary ed.)). Continuum.

Garcia-Navarro, L. & Sprunt, B. (2021). Understanding the republican opposition to Critical Race Theory: Weekend Edition Sunday. [Radio Broadcast]. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2021/06/20/1008449181/understanding-the-republican-opposition-to-critical-race-theory

George, J. (2021). A lesson on critical race theory . American Bar Association. Retrieved November 29, 2021, from  https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/civil-rights-reimagining-policing/a-lesson-on-critical-race-theory/

Glenn, S. S., & Malagodi, E. F. (1991). Process and content in behavioral and cultural phenomena. Behavior and Social Issues, 1 (2), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.5210/bsi.v1i2.163

Goldiamond, I. (1978). The professional as a double-agent. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis , 11 (1), 178–184. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1978.11-178

Goldiamond, I. (1984). Training parent trainers and ethicists in nonlinear analysis of behavior. In R. F. Dangel & R. A. Polster (Eds.), Parent training: Foundations of research and practice (pp. 504–546). The Guilford Press.

Google Scholar  

Gutierrez, K. D., Asato, J., Santos, M., & Gotanda, N. (2002). Backlash Pedagogy: Language and culture and the politics of reform. Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, 24 (4), 335–351. https://doi.org/10.1080/10714410214744

TN (2021). H.B. 580, 2021 Public Chapter No. 493, 2021 Amends TCA Title 4 and Title 49. https://legiscan.com/TN/bill/HB0580/2021

Holland, J. G. (1978). Behaviorism: Part of the problem or part of the solution? Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 11 (1), 163–174. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1978.11-163

Hollins, N. A., Morris, C., & Li, A. (2023). Integrating diversity, equity, and inclusion readings within coursework: Suggestions for instructors teaching behavior analysis. Behavior Analysis in Practice, 1–11 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-023-00781-5

Howard, T. C., & Navarro, O. (2016). Critical race theory 20 years later: Where do we go from here? Urban Education, 51 (3), 253–273. https://doi.org/10.1177/0042085915622541

Howard, T., & Rodriguez-Minkoff. (2017). Culturally relevant pedagogy 20 years later: Progress or pontificating? What have we learned, and where do we go? Teachers College Record, 119 (1), 1–32. https://doi.org/10.1177/016146811711900104

Jordan, W. J. (2010). Defining equity: Multiple perspectives to analyzing the performance of diverse learners. Review of Research in Education, 34 (1), 142–178. https://doi.org/10.3102/0091732X09352898

Ladson-Billings, G. J. (1995). But that's just good teaching! The case for culturally relevant pedagogy. Theory Into Practice, 34 (3), 159–165. https://doi.org/10.1080/00405849509543675

Ladson-Billings, G. J., & Tate, W. F. (1995). Towards a theory of Critical Race Theory of education. Teachers College Record, 97 (1), 47–68.

Ladson-Billings, G. (2013). Critical race theory—What it is not! In Handbook of critical race theory in education (pp. 54–67). Routledge.

Ladson-Billings, G. (2021). I’m here for the hard re-set: Post pandemic pedagogy to preserve our culture. Equity & Excellence in Education, 54 (1), 68–78. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2020.1863883

Leonardo, Z., & Boas, E. (2021). Other kids' teachers: What children of color learn from White women and what this says about race, whiteness, and gender. In Handbook of critical race theory in education (pp. 153–165). Routledge.

Love, B. L. (2019). We want to do more than survive: Abolitionist teaching and the pursuit of educational freedom. Beacon Press.

Mattaini, M. A. (2013). Strategic nonviolent power: The science of satyagraha. Athabasca University Press.

Miller, K. L., Cruz, A. R., & Ala’i-Rosales, S. (2019). Inherent tensions and possibilities: Behavior analysis and cultural responsiveness. Behavior and Social Issues, 28 , 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42822-019-00013-y

National Center for Education Statistics [NCES] (2022). Racial/Ethnic enrollment in public schools. Condition of education. U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences. Retrieved February 28, 2023 from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cge

Pritchett, M., Ala’i-Rosales, S., Cruz, A. R., & Cihon, T. M. (2021). Social justice is the spirit and aim of an applied science of human behavior: Moving from colonial to participatory research practices. Behavior Analysis in Practice, 15 (4), 1–19.  https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-021-00591-7

Risley, T. R. (2001). Do good, take data. In W. T. O’Donohue, D. A. Henderson, S. C. Hayes, J. E. Fisher, & L. J. Hayes (Eds.), A history of the behavioral therapies: Founders’ personal histories (pp. 267– 287). Context Press.

Sidman, M. (2001). Coercion and its fallout ((2nd ed.). ed.). Authors Cooperative.

Sleeter, C. E. (2011). An agenda to strengthen culturally responsive pedagogy. English teaching: Practice and critique, 10 (2), 7–23 http://education.waikato.ac.nz/research/files/etpc/files/2011v10n2art1.pdf

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education. (2018).  Status and trends in the education of racial and ethnic groups. Institute of Education Sciences.  https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2019/2019038.pdf

Wright, P. I. (2019). Cultural humility in the practice of applied behavior analysis. Behavior Analysis in Practice, 12 (4), 805–809. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-019-00343-8

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Education, Roanoke College, Salem, VA, USA

Karin Kaerwer

School of Education, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

Department of Applied Behavioral Science, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS, USA

Malika Pritchett

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Karin Kaerwer .

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest.

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Kaerwer, K., Pritchett, M. Critical Race Theory in Education: How Banning its Tenets Undermines our Best Hope for Equity in Education. Behav. Soc. Iss. 32 , 300–313 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42822-023-00130-9

Download citation

Accepted : 14 April 2023

Published : 24 May 2023

Issue Date : June 2023

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s42822-023-00130-9

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Applied behavior analysis
• Critical race theory
• Culturally relevant pedagogy
• Find a journal
• Publish with us
• Track your research

What Is Critical Race Theory, and Why Is It Under Attack?

• Share article

Education Week is the #1 source of high-quality news and insights on K-12 education. Sign up for our EdWeek Update newsletter to get stories like this delivered to your inbox daily.

Is “critical race theory” a way of understanding how American racism has shaped public policy, or a divisive discourse that pits people of color against white people? Liberals and conservatives are in sharp disagreement.

The topic has exploded in the public arena this spring—especially in K-12, where numerous state legislatures are debating bills seeking to ban its use in the classroom.

In truth, the divides are not nearly as neat as they may seem. The events of the last decade have increased public awareness about things like housing segregation, the impacts of criminal justice policy in the 1990s, and the legacy of enslavement on Black Americans. But there is much less consensus on what the government’s role should be in righting these past wrongs. Add children and schooling into the mix and the debate becomes especially volatile.

School boards, superintendents, even principals and teachers are already facing questions about critical race theory, and there are significant disagreements even among experts about its precise definition as well as how its tenets should inform K-12 policy and practice. This explainer is meant only as a starting point to help educators grasp core aspects of the current debate.

Just what is critical race theory anyway?

Critical race theory is an academic concept that is more than 40 years old. The core idea is that race is a social construct, and that racism is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies.

The basic tenets of critical race theory, or CRT, emerged out of a framework for legal analysis in the late 1970s and early 1980s created by legal scholars Derrick Bell, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Richard Delgado, among others.

A good example is when, in the 1930s, government officials literally drew lines around areas deemed poor financial risks, often explicitly due to the racial composition of inhabitants. Banks subsequently refused to offer mortgages to Black people in those areas.

Today, those same patterns of discrimination live on through facially race-blind policies, like single-family zoning that prevents the building of affordable housing in advantaged, majority-white neighborhoods and, thus, stymies racial desegregation efforts.

CRT also has ties to other intellectual currents, including the work of sociologists and literary theorists who studied links between political power, social organization, and language. And its ideas have since informed other fields, like the humanities, the social sciences, and teacher education.

This academic understanding of critical race theory differs from representation in recent popular books and, especially, from its portrayal by critics—often, though not exclusively, conservative Republicans. Critics charge that the theory leads to negative dynamics, such as a focus on group identity over universal, shared traits; divides people into “oppressed” and “oppressor” groups; and urges intolerance.

Thus, there is a good deal of confusion over what CRT means, as well as its relationship to other terms, like “anti-racism” and “social justice,” with which it is often conflated.

To an extent, the term “critical race theory” is now cited as the basis of all diversity and inclusion efforts regardless of how much it’s actually informed those programs.

One conservative organization, the Heritage Foundation, recently attributed a whole host of issues to CRT , including the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, LGBTQ clubs in schools, diversity training in federal agencies and organizations, California’s recent ethnic studies model curriculum, the free-speech debate on college campuses, and alternatives to exclusionary discipline—such as the Promise program in Broward County, Fla., that some parents blame for the Parkland school shootings. “When followed to its logical conclusion, CRT is destructive and rejects the fundamental ideas on which our constitutional republic is based,” the organization claimed.

(A good parallel here is how popular ideas of the common core learning standards grew to encompass far more than what those standards said on paper.)

Does critical race theory say all white people are racist? Isn’t that racist, too?

The theory says that racism is part of everyday life, so people—white or nonwhite—who don’t intend to be racist can nevertheless make choices that fuel racism.

Some critics claim that the theory advocates discriminating against white people in order to achieve equity. They mainly aim those accusations at theorists who advocate for policies that explicitly take race into account. (The writer Ibram X. Kendi, whose recent popular book How to Be An Antiracist suggests that discrimination that creates equity can be considered anti-racist, is often cited in this context.)

Fundamentally, though, the disagreement springs from different conceptions of racism. CRT puts an emphasis on outcomes, not merely on individuals’ own beliefs, and it calls on these outcomes to be examined and rectified. Among lawyers, teachers, policymakers, and the general public, there are many disagreements about how precisely to do those things, and to what extent race should be explicitly appealed to or referred to in the process.

Here’s a helpful illustration to keep in mind in understanding this complex idea. In a 2007 U.S. Supreme Court school-assignment case on whether race could be a factor in maintaining diversity in K-12 schools, Chief Justice John Roberts’ opinion famously concluded: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” But during oral arguments, then-justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said: “It’s very hard for me to see how you can have a racial objective but a nonracial means to get there.”

All these different ideas grow out of longstanding, tenacious intellectual debates. Critical race theory emerged out of postmodernist thought, which tends to be skeptical of the idea of universal values, objective knowledge, individual merit, Enlightenment rationalism, and liberalism—tenets that conservatives tend to hold dear.

What does any of this have to do with K-12 education?

Scholars who study critical race theory in education look at how policies and practices in K-12 education contribute to persistent racial inequalities in education, and advocate for ways to change them. Among the topics they’ve studied: racially segregated schools, the underfunding of majority-Black and Latino school districts, disproportionate disciplining of Black students, barriers to gifted programs and selective-admission high schools, and curricula that reinforce racist ideas.

Critical race theory is not a synonym for culturally relevant teaching, which emerged in the 1990s. This teaching approach seeks to affirm students’ ethnic and racial backgrounds and is intellectually rigorous. But it’s related in that one of its aims is to help students identify and critique the causes of social inequality in their own lives.

Many educators support, to one degree or another, culturally relevant teaching and other strategies to make schools feel safe and supportive for Black students and other underserved populations. (Students of color make up the majority of school-aged children.) But they don’t necessarily identify these activities as CRT-related.

As one teacher-educator put it: “The way we usually see any of this in a classroom is: ‘Have I thought about how my Black kids feel? And made a space for them, so that they can be successful?’ That is the level I think it stays at, for most teachers.” Like others interviewed for this explainer, the teacher-educator did not want to be named out of fear of online harassment.

An emerging subtext among some critics is that curricular excellence can’t coexist alongside culturally responsive teaching or anti-racist work. Their argument goes that efforts to change grading practice s or make the curriculum less Eurocentric will ultimately harm Black students, or hold them to a less high standard.

As with CRT in general, its popular representation in schools has been far less nuanced. A recent poll by the advocacy group Parents Defending Education claimed some schools were teaching that “white people are inherently privileged, while Black and other people of color are inherently oppressed and victimized”; that “achieving racial justice and equality between racial groups requires discriminating against people based on their whiteness”; and that “the United States was founded on racism.”

Thus much of the current debate appears to spring not from the academic texts, but from fear among critics that students—especially white students—will be exposed to supposedly damaging or self-demoralizing ideas.

While some district officials have issued mission statements, resolutions, or spoken about changes in their policies using some of the discourse of CRT, it’s not clear to what degree educators are explicitly teaching the concepts, or even using curriculum materials or other methods that implicitly draw on them. For one thing, scholars say, much scholarship on CRT is written in academic language or published in journals not easily accessible to K-12 teachers.

What is going on with these proposals to ban critical race theory in schools?

As of mid-May, legislation purporting to outlaw CRT in schools has passed in Idaho, Iowa, Oklahoma, and Tennessee and have been proposed in various other statehouses.

The bills are so vaguely written that it’s unclear what they will affirmatively cover.

Could a teacher who wants to talk about a factual instance of state-sponsored racism—like the establishment of Jim Crow, the series of laws that prevented Black Americans from voting or holding office and separated them from white people in public spaces—be considered in violation of these laws?

It’s also unclear whether these new bills are constitutional, or whether they impermissibly restrict free speech.

It would be extremely difficult, in any case, to police what goes on inside hundreds of thousands of classrooms. But social studies educators fear that such laws could have a chilling effect on teachers who might self-censor their own lessons out of concern for parent or administrator complaints.

As English teacher Mike Stein told Chalkbeat Tennessee about the new law : “History teachers can not adequately teach about the Trail of Tears, the Civil War, and the civil rights movement. English teachers will have to avoid teaching almost any text by an African American author because many of them mention racism to various extents.”

The laws could also become a tool to attack other pieces of the curriculum, including ethnic studies and “action civics”—an approach to civics education that asks students to research local civic problems and propose solutions.

How is this related to other debates over what’s taught in the classroom amid K-12 culture wars?

The charge that schools are indoctrinating students in a harmful theory or political mindset is a longstanding one, historians note. CRT appears to be the latest salvo in this ongoing debate.

In the early and mid-20th century, the concern was about socialism or Marxism . The conservative American Legion, beginning in the 1930s, sought to rid schools of progressive-minded textbooks that encouraged students to consider economic inequality; two decades later the John Birch Society raised similar criticisms about school materials. As with CRT criticisms, the fear was that students would be somehow harmed by exposure to these ideas.

As the school-aged population became more diverse, these debates have been inflected through the lens of race and ethnic representation, including disagreements over multiculturalism and ethnic studies, the ongoing “canon wars” over which texts should make up the English curriculum, and the so-called “ebonics” debates over the status of Black vernacular English in schools.

In history, the debates have focused on the balance among patriotism and American exceptionalism, on one hand, and the country’s history of exclusion and violence towards Indigenous people and the enslavement of African Americans on the other—between its ideals and its practices. Those tensions led to the implosion of a 1994 attempt to set national history standards.

A current example that has fueled much of the recent round of CRT criticism is the New York Times’ 1619 Project, which sought to put the history and effects of enslavement—as well as Black Americans’ contributions to democratic reforms—at the center of American history.

The culture wars are always, at some level, battled out within schools, historians say.

“It’s because they’re nervous about broad social things, but they’re talking in the language of school and school curriculum,” said one historian of education. “That’s the vocabulary, but the actual grammar is anxiety about shifting social power relations.”

Education Issues, Explained

The literature on critical race theory is vast. Here are some starting points to learn more about it, culturally relevant teaching, and the conservative backlash to CRT.

Brittany Aronson & Judson Laughter. “The Theory and Practice of Culturally Relevant Education: A Synthesis of Research Across Content Areas.” Review of Educational Research March 2016, Vol. 86 No. 1. (2016); Kimberlé Crenshaw, ed. Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement. The New Press. (1996); Gloria Ladson-Billings, “Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy,” American Educational Research Journal Vol. 32 No. 3. (1995); Gloria Ladson-Billings, “Just what is critical race theory and what’s it doing in a nice field like education?” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education Vol 11. No. 1. (1998); Jonathan Butcher and Mike Gonzalez. “Critical Race Theory, the New Intolerance, and Its Grip on America.” Heritage Foundation. (2020); Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic. Critical Race Theory: An Introduction. 3rd ed. New York, NY: New York University Press. (2017); Shelly Brown-Jeffy & Jewell E. Cooper, “Toward a Conceptual Framework of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: An Overview of the Conceptual and Theoretical Literature.” Teacher Education Quarterly, Winter 2011.

A version of this article appeared in the June 02, 2021 edition of Education Week as What Is Critical Race Theory, and Why Is It Under Attack?

Sign Up for The Savvy Principal

Edweek top school jobs.

Sign Up & Sign In

Breadcrumbs Section. Click here to navigate to respective pages.

Handbook of Critical Race Theory in Education

DOI link for Handbook of Critical Race Theory in Education

Get Citation

This handbook illustrates how education scholars employ Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a framework to bring attention to issues of race and racism in education. It is the first authoritative reference work to provide a truly comprehensive description and analysis of the topic, from the defining conceptual principles of CRT in Law that gave shape to its radical underpinnings to the political and social implications of the field today. It is divided into six sections, covering innovations in educational research, policy and practice in both schools and in higher education, and the increasing interdisciplinary nature of critical race research. New chapters broaden the scope of theoretical lenses to include LatCrit, AsianCrit and Critical Race Feminism, as well as coverage of Discrit Studies, Research Methods, and other recent updates to the field. This handbook remains the definitive statement on the state of critical race theory in education and on its possibilities for the future.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter | 5  pages, introduction, section section i | 83  pages, foundations of critical race theory and critical race theory in education, chapter 1 | 13  pages, the history and conceptual elements of critical race theory, chapter 2 | 10  pages, discerning critical moments, chapter 3 | 12  pages, critical race theory—what it is not, chapter 4 | 18  pages, critical race theory's intellectual roots, chapter 5 | 17  pages, w.e.b. du bois's contributions to critical race studies in education, chapter 6 | 11  pages, scholar activism in critical race theory in education, section section ii | 158  pages, intersectional frameworks, chapter 7 | 15  pages, chapter 8 | 17  pages, critical race theory offshoots, chapter 9 | 11  pages, the inclusion and representation of asian americans and pacific islanders in america's equity agenda in higher education, chapter 10 | 17  pages, examining black male identity through a prismed lens, chapter 11 | 13  pages, other kids' teachers, chapter 12 | 13  pages, the last plantation, chapter 13 | 12  pages, doing class in critical race analysis in education, chapter 14 | 12  pages, tribal critical race theory, chapter 15 | 18  pages, “straight, no chaser”, chapter 16 | 15  pages, utilities of counterstorytelling in exposing racism within higher education, chapter 17 | 13  pages, a discrit abolitionist imaginary, section section iii | 94  pages, methods/praxis, chapter 18 | 17  pages, blurring boundaries, chapter 19 | 11  pages, no longer just a qualitative methodology, chapter 20 | 17  pages, critical race quantitative intersectionality, chapter 21 | 12  pages, confronting our own complicity, chapter 22 | 13  pages, still “fightin' the devil 24/7”, chapter 23 | 9  pages, countering they schools, chapter 24 | 13  pages, critical race theory and education history, section section iv | 97  pages, critical race policy analysis, chapter 25 | 10  pages, the policy of inequity, chapter 26 | 9  pages, a call to “do justice”, chapter 27 | 15  pages, critical race theory, teacher education, and the “new” focus on racial justice, chapter 28 | 15  pages, let's be for real, chapter 29 | 10  pages, a critical race policy analysis of the school-to-prison pipeline for chicanos, chapter 30 | 13  pages, badges of inferiority, chapter 31 | 10  pages, racial failure normalized as correlational racism, chapter 32 | 13  pages, a movement in two acts.

• Privacy Policy
• Terms & Conditions
• Cookie Policy
• Taylor & Francis Online
• Taylor & Francis Group
• Students/Researchers
• Librarians/Institutions

Connect with us

Registered in England & Wales No. 3099067 5 Howick Place | London | SW1P 1WG © 2024 Informa UK Limited

University of Denver

University libraries, research guides, critical race and ethnic studies guide.

• Additional Critical Discourses
• CRT in Education
• CRT in Sociology
• CRT in Religious Studies
• Related Titles of Interest

Denisse Solis

Community Outreach & Reference Librarian

• Q&A: Critical Race Theory in America Deb Ortega, professor at the University of Denver Graduate School of Social Work, has studied critical race theory and sat with the DU Newsroom to explain and clarify the ideology.

Relevant Databases

What is a Libguide?

A "libguide" is short for library guide, it is intended to act as a guide to help students conduct research, in this case, to help students in the CRES minor but also students of The Roger Salter's Doctoral Writing Institute (RSI) find resources related to Critical Race Theory in different disciplines. Throughout this guide, you will see links to articles, freely available or open access journals, as well as journals that the University of Denver Libraries pays a subscription for, and of course, books. Links to other content such as videos or podcasts are also spread throughout the guide.

This guide was started in collaboration with current and previous RSI participants, IRISE post-docs, and others. While it is still a work in progress, and revisited often, I want to acknowledge their labor and express my gratitude for their time and energy. Thank you.

If you have any suggestions, recommendations, or feedback, please feel free to e-mail Denisse Solis at [email protected].

If you need more general library help, you can also contact the library via the Ask Us! chatbox on each page, schedule a one-hour research consultation with a librarian to talk in-depth about your topic, specific resources, evaluating sources, and any other questions you have about the research process. Request a consultation by clicking this link . 

Introduction to Critical Race Theory

What is Critical Race Theory?

As I see it, critical race theory recognizes that revolutionizing a culture begins with the radical assessment of it."

-" Who's Afraid of Critical Race Theory? " Derrick A. Bell*

In the essay, given as the  David C. Baum Memorial Lecture on Civil Liberties and Civil Rights, Derrick A. Bell states,

"First, what is critical race theory? And second, what ought critical race theory to be? The distinction is useful even though the dividing line between the descriptive (what is) and the prescriptive (what it ought to be) can be quite fine. The answers to what is critical race theory are fairly uniform and quite extensive. As to what critical race theory ought to be, the answers are far from uniform and, not coincidentally, tend to be leveled in the form of outsider criticism rather than insider inquiry. As to the what is, critical race theory is a body of legal scholarship, now about a decade old, a majority of whose members are both existentially people of color and ideologically committed to the struggle against racism, particularly as institutionalized in and by law. Those critical race theorists who are white are usually cognizant of and committed to the overthrow of their own racial privilege.

He further quotes Harris,

Harris explains: CRT is the heir to both CLS [Critical Legal Studies] and traditional civil rights scholarship. CRT inherits from CLS a commitment to being "critical," which in this sense means also to be "radical" [while] . . . [a]t the same time, CRT inherits from traditional civil rights scholarship a commitment to a vision of liberation from racism through right reason. Despite the difficulty of separating legal reasoning and institutions from their racist roots, CRT's ultimate vision is redemptive, not deconstructive."

In their introduction to Critical Race Theory: The key writings that formed a movement, the authors recognize that "there is no set of canonical set of doctrines or methodologies to which we all subscribe. Although Critical Race scholarship differs in object, argument, accent, and emphasis, it is nevertheless defined by two common interests;

The first is to understand how a regime of white supremacy and its subordination of people of color have been created and maintained in America, and, in particular, to examine the relationship between that social structure and professed ideals such as "the rule of law" and "equal protection." The second is a desire not merely to understand the vexed bond between law and racial power but to change it. 

The essays gathered here thus share an ethical commitment to human liberation- even if we reject the conventional notions of what such a conception means, and though we often disagree, even among ourselves, over its specific direction" ( Crenshaw et al., 1995 ).

Daniel G. Solorzano and Tara J. Yosso (2000) , rooted in the field of education, state,

"at least five elements that form its basic perspectives, research methods, and pedagogy." They are; (1) the centrality and intersectionality of race and racism; (2) challenge to the dominant ideology; (3) the commitment to social justice ; (4) the importance of experiential knowledge; and (5) the use of interdisciplinary perspectives." CRT also developed subgroups such as Latino/a/x-critical (LatCrit) which will be discussed in other pages.

Five Tenets of CRT in Education

• The Centrality and Intersectionality of Race and Racism
• Challenge to Dominant Ideology
• Commitment to Social Justice
• Experiential Knowledge and Counterstorytelling
• Interdisciplinary Perspectives
• Kimberle Crenshaw, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics."
• Kimberle Crenshaw, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color"
• Gillborn, David, and Laurence Parker. "Intersectionality, Critical Race Theory, and the Primacy of Racism: Race, Class, Gender, and Disability in Education." Qualitative Inquiry 21, no. 3 (2015): 277-87.

• Anthony E. Cook, "The Spiritual Movement towards Justice"

• Bernal, Dolores Delgado. "Critical Race Theory, Latino Critical Theory, and Critical Raced-Gendered Epistemologies: Recognizing Students of Color as Holders and Creators of Knowledge." Qualitative Inquiry 8, no. 1 (2002): 105-26. For too long, the histories, experiences, cultures, and languages of students of color have been devalued, misinterpreted, or omitted within formal educational settings. In this article, the author uses critical race theory (CRT) and Latina/Latino critical theory (LatCrit) to demonstrate how critical raced-gendered epistemologies recognize students of color as holders and creators of knowledge. In doing so, she discusses how CRT and LatCrit provide an appropriate lens for qualitative research in the field of education. She then compares and contrasts the experiences of Chicana/Chicano students through a Eurocentric and a critical raced-gendered epistemological perspective and demonstrates that each perspective holds vastly different views of what counts as knowledge, specifically regarding language, culture, and commitment to communities. She then offers implications of critical raced-gendered epistemologies for both research and practice and concludes by discussing some of the critiques of the use of these epistemologies in educational research.
• Solórzano, Daniel G, and Tara J Yosso. "Critical Race Methodology: Counter-Storytelling as an Analytical Framework for Education Research." Qualitative Inquiry 8, no. 1 (2002): 23-44. This article addresses how critical race theory can inform a critical race methodology in education. The authors challenge the intercentricity of racism with other forms of subordination and exposes deficit-informed research that silences and distorts epistemologies of people of color. Although social scientists tell stories under the guise of “objective” research, these stories actually uphold deficit, racialized notions about people of color. For the authors, a critical race methodology provides a tool to “counter” deficit storytelling. Specifically, a critical race methodology offers space to conduct and present research grounded in the experiences and knowledge of people of color. As they describe how they compose counter-stories, the authors discuss how the stories can be used as theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical tools to challenge racism, sexism, and classism and work toward social justice.
• Richard Delgado, "Storytelling for Oppositionists and Others: A Plea for Narrative"

• Richard Delgado, "Imperial Scholar: Reflections On a Review of Civil Rights Literature"

Introductory Texts

• Next: Additional Critical Discourses >>
• Last Updated: Mar 14, 2024 4:22 PM
• URL: https://libguides.du.edu/CRES

What are you looking for?

Suggested search, growing anti-crt and anti-dei legislation reveals the continued institutional racism of higher education.

Every spring, as college acceptances and rejections hit the email inboxes of hopeful students across the country, the same racist narrative is used to salvage the feelings of disappointment among white students who didn’t get into their first-choice schools. This perpetual fallacy — that affirmative action and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) admissions policies allow undeserving Black students to “steal” spots from deserving white students at the top universities in the country — has never been backed up by data. But it is repeated, and believed, because exclusion of Black people is one of the original tenets of higher education. We may be 200 years removed from emancipation, but whiteness still reigns supreme. 

Black students make up less than 7% of the student body at the country‘s most prestigious historically white-serving colleges and universities. It is a number that hasn’t changed much in the last 100 years. In my new book, Black Women, Ivory Tower: Revealing the Lies of White Supremacy in American Education , I examine the history of formalized education in the US and the racism embedded in the creation of this institution. In the process, I had to rethink my own experiences as a Black woman traumatized in educational spaces, and explore the impacts of institutional racism among the Black women in my family. 

A majority of predominantly white schools today are also historically white-serving institutions., This dates back to the 1600s with Harvard and other early colleges admitting exclusively white students and persisted to the early years of the civil rights movement in the 1950s. Black people literally built the walls and the floors of university buildings, and there are slave quarters (now repurposed) still standing on these campuses. Yet we remain unwanted in the classrooms. The insidious fear of Black people “darkening” campus communities is a lasting vestige of white supremacy in education. Our learning is seen as something to fear – something to stifle.

Black Diseducation

The systemic distancing of a demographic group from formalized education is called diseducation . When emancipation eliminated laws preventing enslaved Black people from reading and writing, institutions created racialized admissions policies to keep Black people out of prestigious schools. Those anti-literacy laws were established after the Nat Turner Revolt in 1831 amid growing fears of slave insurrection. Post-Reconstruction, Jim Crow established “whites only“ schools to formalize disadvantages in resources and reputation for Black schools. After integration, tracking systems, excessive discipline, and underfunding maintained the spirit of “whites only” education in modern institutions. Following graduation rates among Black people across time without context implies some cultural disinterest in school — but that disinterest has been manufactured via the institutional structures and cultures depressing our success and retention.

School integration was meant to ensure Black students had access to the same educational resources as white students, but the implementation of Brown v. Board of Education closed well-supported black schools and eliminated more than 40,000 Black teachers across the U.S. The effect was to isolate Black kids in schools without protection from the violence of these racialized institutions – directly impacting their academic success. Black soldiers with GI Bills were turned away at the campus gates. Those Black faculty that remain are subject to isolation, surveillance, and discipline designed to minimize our impacts on campus.

Anti-critical race theory (CRT ) and anti-DEI legislation are meant to maintain white supremacy and privilege in higher education by rolling back the small progress made on college campuses to improve the experiences and outcomes of Black students in particular. Belief in the necessity of such laws is born of the false narratives of the mediocre Black student being privileged over white students. The irony of fearing privilege while actively benefiting from it is a joke the bill riders are not in on.

Faith and Perseverance

The first manuscript of Black Women, Ivory Tower only had seven chapters, not the eight chapters of the published version. Every interested publisher agreed an eighth chapter was needed, but most thought the new chapter should include some instructions for how to change colleges and universities to be more inclusive. My response was always that Black people shouldn’t be tasked with solving white supremacy. The truth is, I don’t see a way through that isn’t led by the ideas, power, and wealth of white people. As a Black woman, I exist in these spaces, but I don’t control them. I return to them because I believe that my presence affects change, not because I feel welcome there.

Instead, I wrote about faith —  my own and that of the Black women across history who face the violence of white supremacy head-on. A combination of spirituality and religiosity, faith in Black communities has been our tool of choice since enslavement began—a necessity for our own survival. I grappled with my own willingness to continue seeking out education and entering educational spaces that I know aren’t meant for me. During the writing process, it read to me like madness. But then again, existing almost entirely on faith can drive one a little mad. 

When people ask why we’re still here, why Black people continue attending historically white-serving schools when they clearly don’t want us there, I always come back to my faith. The short answer is that we can’t afford not to be—educationally and professionally, school has value. So, we need to be here. Instead of being forced out we persevere, not just to protest white supremacy, but to prove it can be overcome, in ways however small. We have always persevered. My new book explores the expense of that perseverance. We’re still here – but there is a cost. 

Dr. Harris has been published in major newspapers across the country, including Newsweek , The Washington Post , the Houston Chronicle , and the Chicago Tribune . In 2021 she was featured in the Vice News documentary College Sports, Inc. Her first book, Black Women, Ivory Tower: Revealing the Lies of White Supremacy in American Education, was published by Broadleaf Books in 2024.

Explore other articles

L.a. times features dr. manuel pastor as an influential “activist scholar bringing the streets to the ivory tower”, how to do research that changes the world, podcast: manuel pastor discusses the failure created by musk, billionaires, and individualism to our economy.

• institutional racism
• higher education
• critical race theory