As a sociology professor, I have taught about the exact issues that Kumashiro mentions for the past five years. On the first day of every class, I tell my students that if they learn nothing else from the class, I hope that they will learn how to think critically. For me, this is more than what Kumashiro suggests. He critiques the critical pedagogy if it focuses on having the students react about their own experiences of oppression as "the other" by providing a sort of tokenism that demands that they speak for whatever othered group that they represent. I'm not sure that I agree with this. If teaching critically is done well, it does not single out any group. You should teach all of your students to think critically. It is the first and necessary step to ending oppression.
I also agree that creating specialized units, by themselves, can reinforce the distinction of "the other." Having unique, self-contained units on "The Native Americans" or "African-Americans" or "Famous Women in history" does not challenge the norm, in that it reinforces their "other" status. Integrating the experiences of all Americans into an American History class just makes good sense. Acknowledging the ways in which power is implicated in this story is important, too.
I do agree with Kumashiro's advocation of reflexive thinking and I believe this should be a part of any teaching strategy. Self-reflexiveness is an essential skill for both students and teachers. I believe that self-reflexive writing about one's experiences of learning and teaching are necessary to being the process of "unlearning" and "relearning." I believe that it can be a successful strategy for effecting change and eroding oppression. I also believe that it cannot be the only strategy.
Oppression is a structural problem. As teachers, we can try to fight oppression on a structural level in the schools and to train a new generation to fight oppression in their own lives. Just as Kumashiro suggests that awakening students to the oppression they experience and perpetuate can overwhelm them, upset them, and get them "stuck," I believe Kumashiro, himself, runs the risk of doing the same with this article. I understand that my academic background puts me in a position to agree with Kumashiro and understand his concepts in a way that some of the other students in our class may not. That being said, I found myself overwhelmed reading the article, thinking "it's such a big problem, we can never eliminate oppression." And, honestly, in our lifetimes, we probably can't. It is hard for us, as potential teachers, not to get "stuck" because of this feeling. Getting "stuck" can produce inaction. And doing nothing, in and of itself, is an act. But there are things we can do. I would have liked some more concrete strategies of effecting change provided by Kumashiro in the article. Even if we can't eliminate oppression all at once, we can push for change in the right direction. Teaching is a learning process in the same way that being a student is. We try strategies and see what works, and change to try to make things better. We falter, but we keep fighting.
