The following is my response to a comment section on YouTube on the subject of Critical Race Theory (CRT).
I lived in Brazil my whole life, and lived in Cleveland, OH for 1 year in 2012. The two countries have vastly different histories and demographics (obviously). I remember through primary and secondary education that matters of race were considered essential through the study of geography and history. There's a lack of nationalism here (first difference), which also collaborates for teachers and students to be very auto-critical of Brazil. Slavery was more impactful and "numerically intense" here than in the rest of America due to the sheer magnitude of human trafficking (second difference), so it stands to reason that it's harder to avoid the subject since it's so essential to the country's development. In addition, blacks compose a much bigger demographic slice (third difference), with estimates ranging from 14% (self-declared) to as much as 51% (ethno-genetic estimate). So African descendants continue to play an enormous role in Brazilian demographics (perhaps the biggest). But this is where the difference between US and Brazil strike me the most: around 40% of Brazilians declared themselves to be "miscigenated" (fourth difference). That's mostly the reason why estimates for the proportion of blacks in the population vary so wildly. Many people that would be considered phenotypically black in the US put themselves in the "miscigenated" category here (and there's no "Latino" category in Brazil, obviously lol). For example, I'm miscigenated. Mostly people tell me I look more like Native American or Asian, but my father is phenotypically black and my mother is white. And that is rather the norm here. So already the racial roles in Brazil are already blurred somewhat compared to the US. This, I think, facilitates conversations about race since most people don't feel singled out. And it feels to me like in Brazil there are way fewer taboos about race, since everyone's family is so racially mixed.
How surprised was I when I arrived at an US university. There seemed to me to be a clear segregation between blacks and whites (and Asians, no Latinos in Ohio). And I saw many blacks in lower job positions and few blacks in high job positions. It was striking to me. I don't mean to say that we have many blacks in high job positions in Brazil, we don't, and we are a poor country. But when it comes to being poor, although it's no taboo that proportionally black people are economically disadvantaged (really, it's open, undisputed knowledge here), mostly our perception is that every race and ethnicity are together in poverty. Slums, which we taught in school are leftovers from black occupation of marginalized areas, are filled to the brim with white people. No such thing in the US, though. What put the segregation most starkly for me was that (in OH) I was able to understand white people's English perfectly, but I could barely understand anything black people said. Another racially charged phenomenon I witness in the US was the pronounced awkwardness and taboo around subjects of race. People really felt and spoke differently in racially mixed environments, not because of racism, it was just awkward. (All of this translated to movies and TV, but it's really hard to pick up on those nuances when they're not the focus of the show you're watching, so I had to go there to notice it). Coupled all of the above with the figure of 13% of US population being black (I don't know about its accuracy), and I have strong personal reasons to believe that primary and secondary education in the US might be really, really lacking in terms of racial context. Perhaps in Brazil CRT is not really needed because we have our own body of theories on social, geographical and economical development within racial contexts. It's no coincidence that CRT (which is US oriented) was born in the US. It's probably fair to say it was out of necessity and long overdue compared to the rest of the world.
So, I said all that because, as a teacher, I thought you'd be appreciative of this perspective. But after this entire thesis, I still feel critical about CRT, because there are elements of it which I don't endorse. For example, when I read things like "experiences of my students" and "come to class seeking out someone to listen to what they are witnessing", I refer myself to the Wikipedia article on CRT (as of May 2021), where they list storytelling as a common theme, explaining "use of narrative to illuminate and explore experiences of racial oppression." I don't value this so much. I see the logic and potential, but I'm not convinced this is inherently a good process. They immediately follow it up with this: "Bryan Brayboy has emphasized the epistemic importance of storytelling in Indigenous-American communities as superseding that of theory." Yeah, this is exactly what I was afraid of, stuff superseding theory in importance, even if they prefix that importance with "epistemic". Another common theme they cite is what they call here "Standpoint epistemology", which they describe as "The view that a member of a minority has an authority and ability to speak about racism that members of other racial groups do not have." I completely condemn this view and, as a science student, find it to be detrimental to critical and scientific thinking. Another thing I'm not a fan of at all is intersectionality, I do not agree with the use of this analytical framework. And I know you'd probably have a lot to say about intersectionality and all of the above, but that's a discussion that can only happen over beer bottles and between vaxxed people. I really am no expert, which was made evident after I admitted to have learned the subject from Wikipedia. But I also can't take any expert fully on their word on this, mostly because I know social sciences are not like hard sciences where "truth" is much easier to establish, so I lean on my hard science background to wade through these subjects with caution.
These themes that I cited, storytelling, "standpoint epistemology", and intersectionality, when I was a kid in school they weren't standalone themes in the teaching of history and geography. But even I think they have good elements within them, that can be used right (with the right emphasis, which I believe is lower than what CRT seems to purport), and these elements were somewhat mixed within the scholar curriculum I had in Brazil. But of course, the last 10 years, as these themes rose to prominence in public, media and specially in internet discourse, they were promptly imported into Brazilian culture and they have been well applied throughout social debate here, to an extent which I find excessive and detrimental. When it comes to my country specifically, I feel secure in saying that I wish these themes don't penetrate primary and secondary education textbooks the way they have been proposed by CRT and which dominates "mature" public discourse nowadays. But when it comes to the US, having thought about all of this together for the first time, maybe it's better than not having anything. Because unfortunately I haven't heard about any alternative to CRT from the English speaking world.
Giving some context about myself, I'm a (thoroughly) mixed race straight male in what is considered a "leftist" state. All my life until very recently I considered myself a progressive, before the world was this polarized. Now I feel compelled to label myself anti-conservative so as not to be pushed to one of the two sides of the conversation. Also, I appreciate your sharing your perspective as a teacher and elucidating a little of what CRT is about.
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