159 Hills South
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003
413-545-3610
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003
413-545-3610
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159 Hills South
University of Massachusetts Amherst, MA 01003 413-545-3610 |
SJE Home Page | Faculty | Courses | Ed.D.| M.Ed. | CAGS | Careers | Assistantships | Practica | Application Information
Social Justice Education's central focus is the preparation of educational professionals and change agents who are able to understand and work effectively with social justice issues in a diverse range of settings. It provides graduate degree programs of study for educational professionals who are concerned with issues of equity, social justice, and the development liberated consciousness.
SOCIAL JUSTICE EDUCATION BODIES OF KNOWLEDGE AND PRACTICE
The approaches to theory and practice taken by Social Justice Education are rooted in the civil rights social movements of the past forty years, within which concepts such as social justice, oppression and liberation are central categories for analyzing, evaluating and transforming interlocking systems of discriminatory institutional structures and cultural practices.
Students in social justice education study the inequities that people experience on the basis of their social group memberships, through systems of constraint and advantage reproduced through the social processes of exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism, and violence (Young, 1990). Social justice education pays attention to the resources that individuals, families, and communities bring to personal and social change and to the transformation of educational institutions and practices. Social justice education also pays careful attention to process in educational and structural interventions and practices. This attention to process includes balancing the emotional with the cognitive; acknowledging and supporting the personal while analyzing and intervening in social systems; attending to social relations within and among families, schools and communities; developing competencies in collaboration and interrelationships as well as education and advocacy.
The bodies of knowledge, research and practice that inform social justice education are interdisciplinary, drawn from anthropology; black and ethnic studies; cognitive, developmental and social psychology; education; gay, lesbian bisexual, and transgender studies; history; literature; Judaic and middle eastern studies; women's studies; and sociology. It includes the following areas: a. theories and research on socialization that inform the development of social identity and social group affiliations within families, schools, communities and other social institutions; b. the formation, maintenance, and interaction among in-groups and out-groups, and interventions that foster positive intergroup relations; c. prejudice and discrimination, the dynamics of power and privilege, and interlocking systems of oppression; d. forms of resistance and processes of empowerment and liberation created by individuals, families, and communities, and implemented within educational and other social systems; e. sociocultural and historical contexts for, and dynamics within and among the specific manifestations of oppression (antisemitism, ableism, classism, heterosexism, racism, sexism) in educational and other social systems; f. sociocultural and historical contexts for the Civil Rights Movement and other social liberation movements that found inspiration in it (such as the women's liberation movement, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender rights movements, the disability rights movement, and liberation movements for other communities of color); g. the interaction of students and families within multicultural schools and communities; h. models for designing, delivering and evaluating curriculum- based social justice education; i. models for designing, delivering and evaluating system-based social justice interventions within or among families, schools, school systems, and communities j. social justice intervention strategies such as conflict resolution, collaboration, or advocacy.
These bodies of knowledge provide the basis for the core competencies included in the masters, CAGS and doctoral concentrations. (For further discussion of the approach taken to social justice education in our program, refer to M. Adams, L.A.Bell, P. Griffin (Eds.) (1997), Teaching for Diversity and Social Justice: A Sourcebook (New York, Routledge).