A Crack in the Door: Critical Race Theory in Practice at a Predominantly White Institution

Abstract

Midwest Central University1 has a population of 3,500 students, predominantly working class and 95 percent White. The racial composition of the university suggests, and rightly so, that the students have minimal contact with Asians, Blacks, Hispanics/Latinos, Indians, Middle-Easterners, and people of mixed race, even though there is a predominantly black community about two miles from the campus. Given the lack of opportunities for cross-racial interaction among the student body, unless there is some intervention built into the curricula, students can complete their studies at the college with their limited ideological views on race and members of the aforementioned racial groups intact. If we have any hope of attaining a fair and just society, this cycle must be interrupted in the classroom. In this paper, I describe methods that I have used in my teaching and discuss my classroom experiences in an effort to provide some ideas for catalyzing white students to critically examine their own stance on race as well as their particular position of privilege in the racial hierarchy.