Hahn Tapper, A. (2013) A Pedagogy of Social Justice Education: Social Identity, Theory, Intersectionality and Empowerment. Conflict Resolution Quaterly. 30(4), pp.411-417.

But what is social justice education? One common, but certainly not ubiquitous, idea is that it explicitly recognizes the disparities in societal opportunities, resources, and long-term outcomes among marginalized groups (Shakman et al. 2007, 7). Others use different terms in its place, such as anti-oppression education, diversity education, and multicultural education (Cochran-Smith 2004; Sleeter and Grant 2007). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.412)

Theory: Paulo Freire, Education, and Social Justice

For renowned Brazilian pedagogue Paul Freire, education is the key to enacting social justice (Freire 2006). Freire contends that education provides venues for students to achieve freedom, both intellectual and physical—the “indispensable condition for the quest for human completion” (Freire 2006, 47). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.413)

In his own words, “It is impossible to think of education without thinking of power . . . the question . . . is not to get power, but to reinvent power” (cited in Evans, Evans, and Kennedy 1987, 226).  (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

in his monumental treatise Pedagogy of the Oppressed (2006), Freire explains the role that identity plays in the shaping and implementation of education. One of his most important arguments is that students’ identities need to be taken into account in all educational settings. Th ey should not be approached as if everyone in the classroom, including the teacher, is starting from the same place in terms of social status and identity. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

Freire extends this point, expounding on how a teacher’s social identities play as much of a role in a classroom environment as anything else. He says that an ideal educational experience exists between a teacher and students rather than emanating from a teacher to students. A teacher needs to create experiences with, and not for, students, integrating their experiences and voices into the educational experience itself (Freire 2006). Teachers’ and students’ identities are thus tied to one another in an interlocked relationship (Rozas 2007). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

the banking system of teaching, where educators try to “deposit” a set amount of information into students’ minds (Freire 2006, 109). Such a form of education fails its students because, among other reasons, it does not take into account their realities, their “situation in the world,” especially in terms of social status (Freire 2006, 96). Instead, it ignores this critical element of teaching in an eff ort to impart or impose “knowledge” on them (Freire 2006, 94). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

He asserts that one way to move students toward freedom is to create an educational structure whereby both teachers and students engage in habitual, critical reflection, a model that takes into account their identities. In his own words, “Authentic thinking, thinking that is concerned about reality, does not take place in ivory tower isolation, but only in communication. If it is true that thought has meaning only when generated by action upon the world, the subordination of students to teachers becomes impossible” (Freire 2006, 77). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

Rather, their primary goal is to have students teach one another about social identities and intergroup dynamics using critical thought. Teachers and facilitators are understood to be guiding, rather than leading, students through this process, assisting in steering the experience while not actually piloting it in a top-down, dictatorial manner, always using and reinforcing academic methods of critical thinking along the way. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.414)

Next academic year, in the first lecture of Fashion History and Theory Year One (introduction to the study of Fashion Histories), I will introduce the idea of critical pedagogy and the issues with the banking system. Then I will ask each one (including myself) to introduce themselves via a personal item of fashion. I will stress the point that my aim is to build learning experiences together and we need to start with ourselves in our studies (positionality).

Theory: Social Identity Theory and Intergroup Encounters

contact hypothesis (Allport 1954). According to this supposition, if individuals identifying with particular groups in conflict interact with one another in a positively structured environment, they have an opportunity to reevaluate their relations with one another such that one-time enemies can become acquaintances or even allies. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.415)

this theory assumes that the primary reason groups have discord with one another is the negative perceptions each has of the other, something that can potentially be overcome through affirmative contact. If people are able to deconstruct and even eliminate these negative stereotypes, the conflict between them can be resolved. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.415)

Basis of my Multaka project? By engaging on personal levels (embodied experience) to other cultures and building meaningful relationships first, the students are better able to study transnational fashions and museum objects without conforming to the current biases of the canon and perpetuating one-dimensional stereotypes (single stories).

One basic criticism is that if the conditions of an intergroup encounter are not ideal—whether they are “unfavorable” (Amir 1969) or simply not as constructive as they can be—relations between groups can actually worsen as a result of contact. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.416)

Many claim that one way to avoid such pitfalls is to structure intergroup encounters so that they reflect, if not altogether exemplify, equality (Allport and Kramer 1946; Allport 1954; Maoz 2000b). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.416)

Still others assert that even if an experiment based on this hypothesis can theoretically be based on the ethos of equality (i.e., equal numbers of students from the two groups, equal opportunities to off er ideas if the two groups are given an intergroup task), the reality outside the room cannot be controlled, which will inevitably shape power dynamics within any given experiment for the worse. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.416)

Those arguing that encounters between two groups based on the con-tact hypothesis are not only ineffective but potentially harmful commonly say that the following core elements are missing from these interactions: an exploration of social identities (in contrast to individual identities), power relations, and the relationship between the two (Sonnenschein, Halabi, and Friedman 1998; Abu-Nimer 1999; Maoz 2000a, 2000b; Halabi 2004b). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.417)

SIT [social identity theory] posits that intergroup encounters must be approached in and through students’ larger social identities. Th is theory assumes that structured intergroup encounters reflect or are influenced by the dynamics that exist between the communities “outside the room,” that is, in the larger societies in which the encounter is embedded.

Its core premise is that in many social situations people think of themselves and others as group members, rather than as unique individuals. The theory argues that social identity underpins intergroup behavior and sees this as qualitatively distinct from interpersonal behavior. (Ellemers and Haslam in Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.417)

SIT maintains that human beings are social by virtue of their relationships with one another, an existence embedded within a vast web of networks that are constructed based on identity-based associations. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.417)

Perhaps most important, SIT contends that when individuals relate to one another, actions are usually perceived, first and foremost, as being representative of the assorted social groups to which they belong rather than as individual examples of behavior. Consequently, individuals have group identities that they choose, as well as group identities that are imposed on them. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.418)

Because social identities are one of the primary criteria through which power is enacted, SIT-based models focus on intergroup (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.418)

SIT presupposes that in intergroup encounters, the social relations (including power relations) that exist outside the working group will appear within the group and emanate from it as well, often manifesting in terms of asymmetrical power (Pettigrew 1998; Halabi 2004b). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.418)

This model also presumes that the way to transform a given encounter is to focus on the local-cultural characteristics of the groups involved, as opposed to using a Western or third-party methodology that manifests in a top-down approach while claiming to be neutral or objective. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.418)

Multaka: local-cultural characteristics of Middle Eastern volunteers (all refugees, all interested in fashion) and Fashion History and Theory students from the Global North (mostly White British).

practitioners in the fi eld of intergroup work sometimes take this idea to a logical, yet extreme, place, running encounter programs through the lens of group identities (and their own interpretation of the relationship between the involved communities) alone. This prohibits individual perspectives from surfacing and locks students into the very group identities the encounter program is ostensibly working to transform. Such programs do not allow for individual interactions because students are seen only through their larger social identities. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.419)

Exactly! The personal should never be completely dismissed. Within our social groups, we each have our unique identities based on a myriad of factors (intersectionality), which will also influence – perhaps in lesser degree (I’m new to this theory!) – our views of the world.

those using a more moderate SIT-based approach … counter by saying that people have numerous social identities. Reducing members of group A and group B to groups A and B only is simplistic and at times harmful (Northrup 1989; Steele, Spencer, and Aronson 2002; Cuhadar and Dayton 2011). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.419)

if in a given intergroup encounter, one community clearly has more power than another, facilitators will probably intuit that these power imbalances will be reflected in the encounter itself. But if they are interpreting power only through overt signals—seeing such dynamics only through the identities of group A and group B, for example—they would no doubt misread the way certain subordinate groups enact power, such as in much more subtle ways. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.419)

Perhaps Aisha’s response to Multaka was through a ‘myopic, orthodox SIT-based’ perspective?

In sum, whereas maximalist versions of SIT reduce individuals to larger collectives, maximalist versions of the contact hypothesis reduce individuals to being isolated human beings, prohibiting an exploration of social identities. When used in a rigid way, neither approach creates sustainable social change beyond, at best, an infinitesimal number of participants. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.420)

merely telling someone that she is part of a group, even if she never had a prior relationship to or exhibited dominant characteristics of the group, can often be enough to trigger her bias toward that group and against other groups, something referred to as minimal group paradigm (Tajfel et al. 1971). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.420)

participant interactions within intergroup settings are often a reflection of interpersonal dynamics or social group interactions or a combination of the two. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.421)

Intersectionality and Intergroup Encounters

Intersectionality posits that oppression in one place is intricately linked to oppression everywhere else. Because oppression primarily exists in terms of structures, and because these structures are linked to social identities (e.g., white, black, gay, straight, and so on) and their relation to power, oppression is the by-product of unequal structures built around power and identity. Such dynamics privilege particular social identities over others, permitting people from one group to have more power than another based simply on their group identities (Adams et al. 2007, 2010; Hahn Tapper 2011). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.421)

every person and every conflict is in some respects like all others, like some others, and like no others (Kluckhohn and Murray 1948). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.421)

in the words of Audre Lorde, that “there is no hierarchy of oppressions” (Tatum 2010, 8). … all groups, to various degrees, are victims and perpetrators, innocent and guilty. All of us play active and passive roles in the structures of oppression in which we live (Scheff and Retzinger 1991; Sonnenschein et al. 1998; Tryfonas 2000; Berlak 2004; Zembylas 2008). (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.422)

students learn to embrace the notion that each of us has several social identities—identities based in relation to ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic class, and so on. In addition, each of us has an individual identity—a unique personality shaped in relation to our manifold social identities. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.422)

This is key!

it develops students’ sensitivities to societal structures and the way they are linked to power and social identity. It also raises students’ awareness of the various components of society that exist within them. Th is awareness entails a realization that each of us plays a role, active or not, in how power and social identity manifest and are enacted in society. We are not separated from the societies in which we live even if we are physically taken out of them. Even if students are unable to grasp how this occurs in the macroworld, they are able to learn how these larger intergroup dynamics exist in the program encounter itself. Ideally students come to understand that each one of us has a responsibility to the people around us, both to the other participants and other members of society. (Hahn Tapper, 2013, p.434)