Justice for All or Justice for Just Us? Toward a Critical Race Pedagogy of Hope Through Brown in Urban Education

Abstract

This article uses critical theoretical methods to reconsider the potential of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka in urban education. It finds Brown as a potentially useful tool for coconstructing critical race pedagogy of hope that involves (a) Socratic questioning of the endemic nature of racism and power dynamics of public education and the political discursive innovations of Brown; (b) a commitment to justice in urban education for all stakeholders, including stakeholders representing injustices linking race to class and gender; and (c) tragicomic hope—locating, critiquing, and ultimately engaging the action of hope to sustain participation in the struggle for distributive justice in public education.