Us and Them: Using Social Identity Theory to Explain and Re-envision Teacher–Student Relationships in Urban Schools

Abstract

Within a framework of social identity theory (SIT), this paper utilizes social cognitive psychological theories to explain how and why White urban teachers often struggle to create loving spaces in urban classrooms, particularly when their students are from social groups different from their own. Social categorization theory is useful for describing how the sociocultural context of urban schools and schooling created and sustains the archetypal teacher savior identity. Social identity theories of intergroup behavior and organizational role theory are employed to explicate how the group norms of teacher saviors describe and prescribe pedagogical practices that create a hierarchy between teachers and students, leaving little room for warmth and caring. Finally, guided by Howard’s (We can’t teach what we don’t know: White teachers, multiracial schools, 2nd edn. Teachers College Press, New York, 2016) concept of a transformationist teacher identity, I offer suggestions for how teacher educators can help preservice teachers cultivate positive teacher–student relationships in their future classrooms by knowing themselves, knowing their students, and knowing their practice. Ultimately, SIT suggests that urban teachers must be metacognitive about the ways in which their identities are constructed and enacted in schools if they are to care about and for their diverse students.