Culturally Responsive Teaching: Link between Social Justice and Pedagogy

Rajbir Saha

(He can be reached at rajbirsaha1995@gmail.com)

Since schools are charged with the overwhelming responsibility of preparing the next generation of students with increased diverse populations, teacher education programmes must arm teachers with transformative pedagogy of culturally responsive teaching that incorporates the social justice component in order to enhance critical thinking and knowledge of diverse students. Therefore, culturally responsive pedagogy must advance beyond a patchwork of cultural additives and sensitivity where students simply consume knowledge without the ability to critically examine inequalities.

Culturally responsive teaching must empower students to see contradictions and inequalities in society so that they can "develop intellectually and socially in order to build skills to make meaningful and transformative contributions to society. Culturally responsive teaching epitomizes the connection between social justice and pedagogy by creating the space needed for instigating social change because culturally responsive teaching equates education with liberation and freedom. Culturally responsive teaching pays attention to a synchronous power dynamics and imbalance in the distribution of power in society and seeks to make public and explicit the inequitable distribution of institutional and systematic power along racial lines. Unlike traditional teaching which promotes top-down approach driven by standardized outcomes, culturally responsive teaching interrogates the distribution of power and focuses on the development of authentic relationship between educational institutions and the community it serves.

Geneva Gay defines culturally responsive teaching as "using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, frames of reference, and performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make learning encounters more relevant to and effective for [students]". Culturally responsive teachers motivate, activate and teach students how to carry out struggle for equality because as one of the most renowned culturally responsive teaching theorists posits, culturally relevant teachers are "teachers who focus on student learning, cultural competence, and socio-political consciousness in their work. Socio-political consciousness enhances students' capacity for democratic participation because it makes students to become active and engaged citizens. And through activism, organization and mobilization that translates into student protests, students are able to transform their communities. The goal of the curriculum was to empower students to critically examine their existing conditions so as to, "gain the knowledge and confidence to activate change, and to prepare themselves to contribute creatively and positively in their communities".

Culturally responsive teaching conceptualizes the connection between education and knowledge on the one hand, and education and social justice on the other because as a scholar once stated, "the goal of greater justice is a fundamental part of the work of education in democratic societies". Indeed, culturally responsive teaching takes upon itself the responsibility of restoring, Indeed, as one of the leading scholars in this field has noted, students must attain beyond academic achievement and cultural competence, they have to also develop socio-political consciousness that would allow them to critique the cultural norms, values, mores, and institutions that produce and maintain inequalities. It is critically important to note that culturally responsive teaching cements the connection between social justice and pedagogy and creates the space needed for instigating social change. For example, instead of blaming for lack of resources for the poor condition of the school, teachers should encourage his/her students to do something to remedy the situation. First, the students should identify the poor condition of their school building as the major problem confronting the demand their school. To replace their dilapidated school building, the students should work with their teacher to find a solution. Having clearly identified the problem, they should set out to do something about it. As the students brainstorm solutions to their problem, they decide on the following line of actions: Talk to certain people in the community to make their plight known, publicize their problem through publications in newspapers and magazines, and put pressure on lawmakers, political leaders, members of the school board, school administrators and staff, and heads of major corporations to come to their assistance. The students could use two daily leading newspapers for publicity and use newspaper publications as leverage to achieve their goal. They should be able to interview and petition people with power in the community, write letters to legislators and invite politicians to the campus and produce a documentary video. In order to get the much-needed publicity, they should write letters to the media, to the powerful and to the political elites in the community.

Culturally responsive teaching activates civic citizenship of all students, keeps students awake, and makes them active participants in the fight for social change. In culturally responsive classrooms, civic citizenship and social justice can be achieved because culturally responsive teaching encourages students to be active participants in the fight for change and social justice through social activism such as volunteering, doing charity work, civic missions and civic values. Culturally responsive teaching teaches students how to channel their frustrations appropriately in order to initiate change. It also encourages students' involvement in social development projects through collective action in order to effect change in their own communities. Indeed, by enhancing students' capacity for democratic participation, students become active and engaged citizens. And through activism, organization and mobilization, students are able to transform their communities.

Culturally responsive teaching makes students aware of both institutional and structural barriers to democratic practice and explores the means through which students can negotiate, challenge, and resist dominant control by teaching students how to use school walkouts, marches, and other forms of civil disobedience to make their voices heard in society.