Ethnocentric Curricula and the Politics of Minority Incorporation at Tribal and Historically Black Colleges

Abstract

Recent studies have analyzed the diffusion of ethnic studies programs at colleges and universities in the United States. This article explores a different trend: the infusion of “ethnocentric” content—perspectives that explicitly and exclusively focus on one ethnic group—throughout the curriculum at tribal, historically Black, and mainstream colleges and universities. Descriptive and multivariate regression analyses indicate that ethnocentric courses are distributed more widely across fields of study at tribal colleges than at Black or mainstream colleges. To account for this difference, this article examines how tribal and historically Black colleges have been shaped by—and continue to reflect—the socio-political logics that prevailed at the time of their founding is examined. The exceptional quasi-sovereign status of Indian tribes empowers them to charter their own colleges and implement culturally distinctive curricula.