Full Description
The word "dignity" isn't typically used in education, yet it's at the core of strong pedagogy. This book names the concept and shows readers what education looks like when it is centered on students' dignity. By bringing together a collection of chapters written by authors with wide-ranging expertise, this volume presents a powerful approach to education that reminds people of their somebodiness—the premise that each person inherently possesses the intellectual acumen and creative resources to pursue development on their own terms. This timely book brings dignity into sharper focus, moving the field toward a language that captures what is required for oppressed communities to recognize their potential. It synthesizes research for educators, school leaders, and educational activists to help them make sense of what they are working for and against: dignity and the numerous affronts to it. Dignity-Affirming Education is important reading for anyone who works with students of any age, including nontraditional or adult learners, in formal and informal educational contexts.Book Features:
Provides a clear picture of how educators can affirm students' dignity in their everyday practice.
Outlines an approach to social-emotional learning (SEL) that takes social processes such as stigma, exclusion, and marginalization into account.
Offers vivid portraits of what dignity-affirming education can be for a variety of settings.
Contributes to a new vocabulary for seeing educational processes as students experience them.
Presents rigorous research in a way that is digestible for policymakers, practitioners, and scholars alike.
Provides a base for emerging study and sets the stage for additional inquiry and research.
Contents
Contents
Preface: Dignity at the Forefront vii
Acknowledgments xi
1. I Am, We Are Somebodies: An Introduction to the Idea of Dignity 1
Decoteau J. Irby
Part I: IMAGINING AND ORGANIZING DIGNITY-AFFIRMING SCHOOLS AND EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS
2. The Radical Affirmation of Dignity: Septima Clark, Ella Baker, and Educating the Disenfranchised 23
Charity Anderson and Charles M. Payne
3. Contradictions and the Dignity of Resistance: Truth and Reckoning at a Social Justice School 42
Daniel Morales-Doyle and David Stovall
4. Breathing Dignity Into a Community College Success Course 59
Jacqueline Robinson
Part II: DIGNITY-AFFIRMING EXPERIENCES
5. ÒYou're Gonna Get Respected, Listened to, and Your Opinion Will Be RespectedÓ: Dignity Affirmation in the Clemente Course in the Humanities 81
Charity Anderson
6. Power Lifting: Being Somebody, Becoming Significant 96
Eric K. Grimes/Brother Shomari
7. "Teachers Don't Like Me Because You Have to Earn My Respect": Deference and Dignity in the Classroom 111
Crystal V. Breedlove
8. "The Protests Made Me Feel So Proud of Us": Racial Literacies and Bearing Witness to the Movement for Black Lives 128
Samuel Finesurrey, Arnaldo Rodriguez, Alondra Contreras, Aidan Lam, and Michelle Fine, with the S2 Alumni Research Collective: Joel Almonte, Nathan Boissier, Samantha Bruno, Noah Campbell, Noel Columna, Ashley Cruz, Jesslin Hiraldo, Mya Laporte, Brandon Mendoza, Naomi Pabon, Sheylany Paulino, Ariana Pe-a Ram'rez, Lauren Santos, Siarra Savinon, and Alyssa Victoria
9. Subverting Invisibility: Connectivity as Dignity-Affirming Pedagogy 143
Manali J. Sheth and Ayako Takamori
Part III: DIGNITY-AFFIRMING SOCIAL AND EDUCATION POLICY
10. Threaten to Close?: Alternative Schools of Dignity, Recognition, and Transformation Under Constant Neoliberal Assault 163
Mica Baum-Tuccillo, Varnica Arora, Evin Orfila, Christyl Rodriguez, and Michelle Fine
11. "It's Powerful. There's Nothing Punitive About It; You're Just Listening": Restorative Justice as a Dignity-Affirming Practice 182
Elisabeth H. Kim and Priscilla Wohlstetter
12. Taking Pride in Our Languages, Taking Pride in Ourselves: Dual Language Education as Dignity-Affirming Spaces for Latinx Communities 200
Ramona Alcal‡ and P. Zitlali Morales
Conclusion: Centering Dignity 219
Charity Anderson, Charles M. Payne, and Decoteau J. Irby
Notes 227
Index 229
About the Editors and the Contributors 239
