Notes from the Ethnic Studies home front: student protests, texting, and subtexts of oppression

Abstract

The protest against Arizona House Bill 2281 designed to ban Ethnic Studies from K-12 public schools on 12 May 2010 in Tucson resulted in 15 arrests. Students walked out of their classrooms in large numbers to defend their Mexican American Studies curriculum and program. Based primarily on participant observation of the protest, the authors examine the pedagogies of transformational resistance, interrogate HB 2281’s repressive aspects, and illuminate the role of social networking media as expressions of cultural citizenship in the twenty-first century.