Achievement as white settler property: How the discourse of achievement gaps reproduces settler colonial constructions of race

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.31.7131

Keywords:

achievement gap, critical race theory, settler colonialism, critical discourse analysis, Ontario

Abstract

Racialized narratives of academic ability, perpetuated by ahistorical interpretations of student performance data, have led to educational policies focusing on short-term solutions, instead of the ongoing legacies of racism and settler colonialism. The aim of this paper is to show how the racially defined achievement gap operates within the structure of settler colonialism. Informed by theories of settler colonialism (Tuck & Yang, 2012, Veracini, 2010) and critical race theory (Harris, 1993; Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995), I closely examine some Toronto District School Board documents that address the so-called achievement and opportunity gaps. Using critical discourse analysis, this paper shows how the notion of achievement is racialized to protect white settler property rights, and how the discourse of achievement gaps functions as a settler technology to concurrently include and exclude individuals from the settler project. Understanding the settler colonial constructions of race brings to the foreground the relations between Indigenous erasure, anti-Blackness, and othering of racialized communities within the contemporary multicultural nation (Haque, 2012; Tuck & Gorlewski, 2016).

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Author Biography

Diana M. Barrero Jaramillo, University of Toronto

Diana Barrero Jaramillo (she/her) is a PhD candidate at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) at the University of Toronto specializing in Women and Gender Studies. Her research focuses on antiracism, human rights education, and social movements. Her current research examines how Colombian women use textile-based narratives to visibilize their individual and collective demands for truth and justice. Diana is also part of the editorial team at Curriculum Inquiry and a teaching assistant for the Centre for Critical Development Studies at University of Toronto Scarborough.

Published

2023-02-14

How to Cite

Barrero Jaramillo, D. M. (2023). Achievement as white settler property: How the discourse of achievement gaps reproduces settler colonial constructions of race. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 31. https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.31.7131

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Articles