Teaching social justice-why questions must be asked

Over a month ago I spent a Saturday from 8am until 4:30pm at theNorthwest Conference on Teaching for Social JusticeI was excited about it for two reasons: learning tools and strategies to apply to my teaching and learning how teachers in the NW define and practice “social justice”. I was glad to see several workshops highlighting issues and approaches for math and science, instead of just language arts and social studies. It was interesting to be part of a workshop on anthropology with college professors and high school teachers. When given the task of defining “culture” as a group, family and faith were the last elements to be mentioned and though all agreed that we need to teach kids how to see the world around them, they also said no one can ever critique or judge another person and students needed to decide for themselves what was right and wrong. No one pointed out the discrepancy between wanting students to decide their identity while also telling them what it should be.

Overall I was surprised by the fluid definition and unstructured practice of “social justice” around me. No one ever defined “social justice” and no one expressed its impact beyond the classroom. Though I admit that both were assumed implicitly, it is revealing that neither was addressed explicitly. It is hard to find anyone who is against social justice and even fewer who say that education has no social context. Much of our society blames education for its problems, whether academic or moral, and educators are quick to blame others, yet all call out for “social justice.” And even beyond education this cry of “social justice” (much like “local” “free-trade” and “organic”) has become a marketable slogan for everyone from international chain stores to your local stationary shop. Given its popularity and wide application, why is there so little clarity on what social justice is and what it does?

I came in with this question and left with it still unanswered making me rather solemn as I left the conference, while my friends and other fellow educators left the conference much more elated. I wanted space to identify what it was that bothered me yet the responsibilities and commitments of the “now” has enveloped me like a fog since then. And even weeks later my nascent thoughts were still striving for air-until today. I believe we should not throw the word “social justice” around without asking clarifying questions since it can almost mean anything to anyone. Here are some reflections on why those questions must be asked and in another post I’ll share answers I’ve been wrestling with.

Admittedly I walked into the conference with my own baggage around the word “social justice.” In various jobs around the country and world I have met many well intended people who develop a messiah complex trying to establish their own definition of social justice for a community. I have worked alongside people who define social justice as “justice for me.” As a Seattle resident I have seen over and over again advocates of social justice and friends seek to abolish structures around them and once successful become frustrated realizing the necessity of structure to take any action. “Social justice” that was so pure and simple in theory becomes messy and complex in practice.

While studying teaching at UW it has been hard to distinguish social justice from simply good teaching-lending itself to a culture of comparison. Thus, as a citizen and an educator, what I feared going to the conference was a spirit of competition (us vs. them) rather than one of collaboration (us with/for them). The former leads us to mainly focus on identifying shared enemies while the latter leads us to mainly focus on identifying shared problems. I saw the former at the conference with a simplifying of the issues and a tendency to demonize the “other.” The necessity of humility seen in this famous quote by Aleksander Solzhenitsyn was not written to promote inaction but perspective, not to quench passion for healing and restoration but to deepen it:

“If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were only necessary to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”
-One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Human experience led him, has led me, and I believe should lead us to desire a deeper grounding for “social justice” and clearer vision for what it does.

But why are people often content with not having it defined or its purpose or goal stated? I suppose the short answer is that it is easier to mobilize people around an abstract idea than a concrete one. Many activists get frustrated by this reality. Many elements of our modern world let us be associated with something or someone without commitment, and even asking to clarify expectations seems “offensive”. We want to promote things without cost, similar to clicking “like” on Facebook.

The longer answer requires us to admit the gap between our words and actions. Some of my friends started a coalition to address human trafficking in Seattle (SeattleAgainstSlavery) and though people claim to support equality and human rights it is a struggle to get people to carve out 1 hour/month for a meeting or a 5min phone call to their representatives. We hear the words “equality”, “diversity”, and “dignity” and the actions “inform” and “ally” yet there rarely is talk of how to engage the conflict or reveal the cost or sacrifice required.

Again, I admit that most would assume conflict arises with social justice but what I wanted to know, and what would be most beneficial to those at the conference, was how to prepare, address and move past those conflicts. When you see a need to change the curriculum and you have no support at your school to do so, what do you do? When you have colleagues and parents get angry at you for advocating for LGBTQ students how do you react professionally? Personally? Even when you have the letter of the law promote social justice, the hostile culture of your school often still breaks the “spirit” of it- what can you do? Should we distinguish shaping our students’ minds from shaping their character? When I go to the store to buy paper for my students and another teacher distributes laptops to theirs, how do I begin to address the disparity? Information alone does not change people’s minds because change comes at a cost. Simply asking “who will act, who will pay?” makes the attractive call for “social justice” a threat.

In education, like every other area of society, we have conflicting visions for democracy: upholding individual rights and universal equality. Though Foucault would remind us it is all about power Mandela would remind us to not be bitter empowered people but forgiving empowered people. For social justice to be concrete, it must engage these two conflicting values. We must wrestle with asking “Justice for who? According to what? Toward what end? At what cost?” I was frustrated that Saturday because these questions were either ignored or answered with vague platitudes. Addressing something as deeply personal and cultural as “social justice” not only deserves but requires discernment.

Given the gravity and complexity of life, I know it takes courage to ask those deeper questions. It takes even more courage to engage the controversial issues both in and out of the classroom. I am caught balancing hesitant humility and hasty passion in aiming for effective action. Some people know neither the structures they live within nor why they act within them as they do. A crucial part of educating students is making them aware of these power relations, teaching them to identify their role within them, and guide them in taking agency within them as responsible citizens. I want education to give them both the content and context necessary to engage the world-tools to practice that engagement and power to develop them in meaningful ways. That is a high goal, one that I came to the conference hoping to be equipped for. Like Antaeus, the mythical giant in Greek mythology who lost his power when his feet were not on the earth, I can only understand and apply social justice when it has been grounded, when it has something to stand on and stand for. It only has power for me when given this traction and direction in the real world. I think I left frustrated because I was still seeking to give weight, gravity and grounding to those “legs” while others seemed content leaving them in the air.