scholarly journals The Tower of Babel: Bridging the Divide between Critical Race Theory and "Mainstream" Civil Rights Scholarship

1995 ◽  
Vol 105 (2) ◽  
pp. 513 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleanor Marie Brown
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Tower Of Babel

Frameworks of Critical Race Theory

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee E. Ross
Keyword(s):  
Native Americans ◽  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Education History ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Legal Studies ◽  
American Society

Critical race theory (CRT) concerns the study and transformation of relationships among race, (ethnicity), racism, and power. For many scholars, CRT is a theoretical and interpretative lens that analyzes the appearance of race and racism within institutions and across literature, film, art, and other forms of social media. Unlike traditional civil rights approaches that embraced incrementalism and systematic progress, CRT questioned the very foundations of the legal order. Since the 1980s, various disciplines have relied on this theory—most notably the fields of education, history, legal studies, feminist studies, political science, psychology, sociology, and criminal justice—to address the dynamics and challenges of racism in American society. While earlier narratives may have exclusively characterized the plight of African Americans against institutional power structures, later research has advocated the importance of understanding and highlighting the narratives of all people of color. Moreover, the theoretical lenses of CRT have broadened its spectrum to include frameworks that capture the struggles and experiences of Latinx, Asian, and Native Americans as well. Taken collectively, these can be regarded as critical race studies. Each framework relies heavily on certain principles of CRT, exposing the easily obscured and often racialized power structures of American society. Included among these principles (and related tenets) is white supremacy, white privilege, interest convergence, legal indeterminacy, intersectionality, and storytelling, among others. An examination of each framework reveals its remarkable potential to inform and facilitate an understanding of racialized practices within and across American power structures and institutions, including education, employment, the legal system, housing, and health care.

scholarly journals Authentic Compliance with a Symbolic Legal Standard? How Critical Race Theory Can Change Institutionalist Studies on Diversity in the Workplace

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Yael Plitmann
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Organizational Analysis ◽  
Racial Justice ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Legal Concept ◽  
A Value ◽  
Legal Standard ◽  
Diversity In The Workplace

This review essay introduces critical race theory to the organizational analysis of diversity in the workplace. One central finding of the empirical institutionalist literature examining diversity in organizations is the apparent failure of diversity, as a value adopted by the organization, to transform practices of discrimination and exclusion in the workplace. Scholars in this field implicitly accept the narrative about diversity as a substantive civil rights value, associating its presence with racial justice ideals. A critical analysis of this legal concept inspired by the lessons of critical race theory highlights the problematic legal construction of diversity and its role in justifying and reinforcing racial hierarchies. Adding to existing neo-institutionalist literature, I suggest that, alongside an investigation into employers’ compliance practices with diversity precepts, attention should be paid to the limitations inherent in the legal standard of diversity itself.

scholarly journals W.E.B. DuBois's “The Comet” and Contributions to Critical Race Theory: An Essay on Black Radical Politics and Anti-Racist Social Ethics

2006 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reiland Rabaka
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Social Ethics ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Legal Studies ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Law Professors

No longer considered the exclusive domain of legal studies scholars and radical civil rights lawyers and law professors, critical race theory has blossomed and currently encompasses and includes a wide range of theory and theorists from diverse academic disciplines. Its most prominent practitioners, initially law professors and “left scholars, most of them scholars of color” employing the work of the breathtakingly brilliant African American lawyer, scholar, and activist Derrick Bell (2005) as their primary point of departure, borrowed from many of the political and theoretical breakthroughs of black nationalism, anti-racist feminism, poststructuralism, and postmodernism. They also employed and experimented with new cutting-edge literary techniques and social science methodologies that shaped and shaded their work and burgeoning socio-legal discourse, ultimately giving it a fierceness and flair unheard of in the history of legal studies. Early critical race theorists' work acutely accented “the vexed bond between law and racial power” (Crenshaw, Gotanda, Peller & Thomas, 1995, p. xiii). The emphasis on race and power quickly led them to the critique of “white supremacy and the subordination of people of color,” not simply in the legal system, but in society as a whole (p. xiii).

Critical race theory will fuel US political divisions

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
High School ◽  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Professional Athletes ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Liberal Tradition ◽  
High School Classrooms ◽  
Colour Blindness

Significance CRT has become a new line of division between Democrats and civil rights reformers, for whom it accurately describes embedded racism, and some Republicans who regard it as an outdated set of beliefs about race that violate a liberal tradition of colour blindness. Impacts Despite the current political salience of CRT, the term is rarely used in elementary and high school classrooms. Critics of CRT see its influence ranging from university tenure battles to professional athletes taking the knee before games. For many companies, a desire to increase diversity and affirm commitments to equality will outweigh calls to criticise CRT.

Critical Race Theory and The Political Uses of Legal History

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Timothy Lovelace
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Legal History ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Racial Justice ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Legal Defense

In 1976, Derrick Bell, a former lawyer for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, wrote about the inability of modern civil rights litigation to advance real racial justice. His willingness to dissent from civil rights orthodoxy would radically reshape the study of race, law, and history. The result would lead to the creation of critical race theory. This chapter begins by examining the role of historical analysis in the development of critical race theory. It then explores how legal historians of the civil rights movement imported insights from critical race theory to develop three decades of movement scholarship. Next, it charts new scholarly directions for both critical race theorists and legal historians. The chapter concludes with reflections on how legal history and critical race theory have influenced contemporary struggles for racial justice.

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