Mexican American Studies and Scholar Activism in a Decolonial Enactment of Citizenship

Valenzuela, Angela; Epstein, Eliza; Unda, María Del Carmen

doi:10.4324/9780429292026-22

Cited by 1 publication

(3 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The tip of the pyramid is a place produced by and host to community, collective work; “If you stand [at the tip of the pyramid], it is because of all the steps leading there” and all the people with whom you walked (Diaz, 2022, p. 20). Ethnic Studies policy struggles rely on the organic voices, constituencies, and, as argued herein, third spaces for collective action (Valenzuela et al, 2021). By merging Chicana feminist ways of knowing with policy advocacy, we highlight how our approach affords researchers critical insights to issues of power, privilege, and the politics of knowledge at the same time that it provides insights on how to be agentic and collaborative in power-laden spaces.…”

Section: Grounding Our Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A recent collaboration between the authors and another scholar, the brilliant doctoral candidate María Del Carmen Unda, demonstrates the work of scholar-activists in doing decolonial policy praxis, as well as the work of scholar-activists in shaping methodological interventions in research (Valenzuela et al, 2021). The decades-long fight to codify Ethnic Studies courses in Texas’s public schools has carried organizers to the tip of the pyramid, and it has brought moments of deep pain and institutional violence.…”

Section: Represent’n’ At the State Board Of Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Our session hosted two of the scholar-activists we featured in our article, though the room was predominantly filled by younger scholars and students who shared stories during the discussion about the ways that they could foster creation resistance on their own campuses. We invite the reader to view the presentation from the day and to listen to the words of the scholar-activists we featured (Valenzuela et al, 2022). You may just need this trip to the top of the pyramid.…”

Section: Represent’n’ At the State Board Of Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Struggles For/With/Through Ethnic Studies in Texas: Third Spaces as Anchors for Collective Action

Valenzuela

Epstein

2023

Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background/Context: Ethnic Studies is an umbrella term for a group of academic disciplines attentive to identifying oppression, restorying history, and creating liberatory futures. These disciplines were born from social movements, with students, educators, and community members demanding educational spaces guided by people who looked like them, curriculum that told their stories, and pedagogies that could transform their communities. Around the country, elementary and secondary schools are expanding Ethnic Studies offerings at the school, district, and state levels. Ethnic Studies work is deeply local, and, as such, different approaches to expanding access to Ethnic Studies have been taken across localities and states. The power and potential of Ethnic Studies to shift social reality beyond the classroom is both a strength in the struggle for just, liberatory futures and a factor that draws the disciplining eyes of the state. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: Like the discipline of Ethnic Studies, Ethnic Studies research is activist, transformative, and community embedded. In this article, we illustrate the ways that our research about the movement for Ethnic Studies in Texas is inextricable from our community-based work to expand access to Ethnic Studies, which is itself woven in and guided by the theories that ground the disciplines of Ethnic Studies. We write with the theories, thinkings, and actions of feminists of color, sharing vignettes that braid together our research and advocacy, highlighting community fostered organic third spaces, in what we call decolonial policy praxis. Research Design: We use digital and auto-ethnography methods to build our vignettes. Conclusions/Recommendations: We note the critical importance of building coalitions and of remaining committed/connected to the liberatory theories of Ethnic Studies in our research and in the collaborative development of culturally sustaining policy. This means building with community, in community, and for community in pursuit of liberatory, Ethnic Studies futures.

show abstract

Section: Grounding Our Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Represent’n’ At the State Board Of Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Represent’n’ At the State Board Of Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation