Latinx Studies Minor

Latinx Education, Assimilation, and Being

“bien educada/o/”

SPAN 100: Intro to U.S. Latinx Studies

Oct. 20th, 2020

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO RECEIVE A

“GOOD EDUCATION”?

Educational Pipeline • The pipeline represents a system of connecting educational institutions (K-12 and beyond).

• Schooling structures, practices, and discourses facilitate the flow of knowledge, skills, and students along the educational pipeline.

Educational Pipeline

Educational Pipeline

“Education” - Angela Valenzuela • “Because of its generally positive impact on the life chances of

individuals, and because it engenders greater social equality, education in the United States is more frequently characterized by what it accomplishes (outcomes) than by the knowledge that is actually taught in schools (content) or by the way it is delivered (process)” (51).

• Individual merit/effort is perceived as a main factor in academic achievement outcome by mainstream models.

• Latinx education models interpreted within “deficit-based” frameworks. � Latinx students “lack this…or that…”

“Education” - Angela Valenzuela • Historically, education for

Latinx community seen as an instrument of assimilation.

• “Subtractive schooling” – shedding “language, cultures, and community-based identities to adopt new cultural ways of speaking, behaving and interacting that mirror the morals, values, and interaction styles of the dominant, Anglo majority group” (52).

• "The first day of school said a lot about my scholastic life to come. I was taken to a teacher who didn't know what to do with me. She complained about not having any room, about kids who didn't even speak the language. And how was she supposed to teach anything under these conditions! Although I didn't speak English, I understood a large part of what she was saying. I knew I wasn't wanted. She put me in an old creaky chair near the door" (26).

“Assimilation” – Catherine S. Ramirez • Long understood as the “telos in narratives about the American experience”

(14). � Not all reach (or choose to move into the direction of) “Americanization”.

• Tentative stages to the notion of “assimilation” � Acculturation � Incorporation � Integration

• The importance of “assimilation” concept in Latinx Studies. � Not because it serves as an explanation of Latina/o history or experience. � It is a two-way street… “allows us to understand the dynamism of culture and

society and the complex relationship between social structures and social agents” (18).

Tato Laviera (1950-2013) “Asimilao”

“Asimilao” – Tato Laviera

•What does the word “asimilao” tell us about Laviera’s approach to the concept of “assimilation”?

On being “bien educada/o”… • In Valenzuela’s work she explores the multifaceted definition of the Spanish

word educación [education]: � “A conceptually broader term than its English language cognate…Though inclusive

of formal academic training, educación additionally refers to competence in the social world, wherein one respects the dignity and individuality of others” (Subtractive Schooling 23).

• Being “bien educada/o” goes beyond simple internalizing of academic knowledge and skills � Knowledge and skills are futile if “individuals do not know how to live in a world as

caring, responsible, well-mannered, and respectful human beings” (23).

• How do you envision an educational approach that not only stresses the importance of academic knowledge but one that also prioritizes the importance of being “bien educada/o”?

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO RECEIVE A “GOOD EDUCATION”?

• Education is “transformational”

� Disempowering (“banking system” / subtractive schooling)

� Empowering (culturally relevant pedagogy)

� Liberating (problem-posing / critical thinking)

Yosso, Tara. Critical Race Counterstories Along the Chicana/Chicano Educational Pipeline. Routledge, 2006.

The Debate Surrounding Ethnic Studies in AZ and CA.