Abstract
This article explores the shifting meanings of diversity discourse from the classical demarcations associated with demographic groups to the individualized applicability the concept has assumed in recent years. The trend toward attenuated understandings of diversity comes at the risk of slighting historic hardship that groups of people have long endured. The analysis weaves student testimonies and teaching experience from the classroom together with existing research and critical theory on diversity. In emphasizing the need to honor legacies of oppression among particular groups, while animating the possibilities that shared experiences across expansive human variation provide, the author includes feedback from classes that bring students inside and outside prison together. The author builds on feminist theory and pedagogy to explore the challenges and affective dimensions of diversity discourse in college classrooms, and concludes by affirming the significance of diverse human experience for learning and living together in an egalitarian democratic society.
Recommended Citation
Utheim, Ragnhild
(2020)
"Diversity and its Discontents: Deepening the Discourse,"
Race and Pedagogy Journal: Teaching and Learning for Justice: Vol. 4:
No.
4, Article 1.
Available at:
https://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/rpj/vol4/iss4/1
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