Oppositional culture

Oppositional culture, also known as the ‘’blocked opportunities framework’’ or the “caste theory of education”, is a term most commonly used in studying the sociology of education to explain racial disparities in educational achievement, particularly between white and black Americans. However, the term refers to any subculture's rejection of conformity to prevailing norms and values, not just nonconformity within the educational system. Thus many criminal gangs and religious cults could also be considered oppositional cultures. Oppositional culture, also known as the ‘’blocked opportunities framework’’ or the “caste theory of education”, is a term most commonly used in studying the sociology of education to explain racial disparities in educational achievement, particularly between white and black Americans. However, the term refers to any subculture's rejection of conformity to prevailing norms and values, not just nonconformity within the educational system. Thus many criminal gangs and religious cults could also be considered oppositional cultures. This theory relates to a larger generalized topic of race and intelligence. According to this theory, minority students underachieve intentionally in school and in standardized testing due to a fear of being stereotyped as acting white. Acting white refers to activities and attitudes associated with white middle-class Americans. Adherence to white norms in African American communities represents a betrayal of black normative culture. Spurred by the pre-existing theories including the culture of poverty and the effects of urban decay, oppositional culture emerged in the late 1970s as a theory to explain the education gap. The principal researcher of this idea, anthropologist John Ogbu, details the principal mechanisms and causes for oppositional culture in his book, “Black Students in an Affluent Suburb, and Minority Status, Oppositional Culture, and Schooling”. Racial disparities in education stem from the historical foundations of America, from the époque of slavery into the 20th and 21st centuries. Slave owners in the American South by and large prevented their slaves from becoming literate, fearing that literacy and education would strengthen slave resistance and empower the slaves to revolt against their masters. While African-Americans in the North fared better, black schools struggled to keep their doors open. The 1896 landmark court case, Plessy v. Ferguson also helped to define education policies in the United States for years to come. The court case ultimately decided that race was an acceptable categorization by which to divide individuals. Additionally the case determined that separation of these individuals was permissible provided that the condition of both facilities was equal. This case helped to promote segregationist practices that prevented African American children from attending white schools. African-American schools had fewer resources leading to greater racial gaps in educational achievement. In 1954, the Supreme Court decided that the concept of separate but equal was unconstitutional in its landmark decision in Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education 347 U.S. 483. The court also ruled that segregation inherently caused harm to the cognitive development of black children, and officially recognized the importance of educational equality as a compelling interest in the United States. Following this ruling, Southern school districts began to publish findings of racial gaps in academics as a justification to oppose desegregation. As a result, the United States adopted compensatory education in order to equalize educational opportunities for all students. Despite these efforts, the education gap continues to persist in SAT scores and college acceptance rates. In the 1980s, a researcher named John Ogbu suggested that equal opportunity was not enough to diminish the racial disparities gap in education and that additional factors needed to be addressed in order to reduce the racial disparities gap. Racial disparities continue to persist in the realm of education even today. A study by George Farkas in 2002 identifies several areas where racial gaps and disparities continue to exist. His research findings show that even in early primary education in pre-school and kindergarten, African American children show lower oral language, pre-reading, and pre-mathematics skills in addition to behavior less suited to school environments. In high schools, measures of academic achievement such as grades and class rank also show an under-representation of African American and Hispanics. Additionally, African American and Latino students consistently perform lower on the SAT than their white counterparts thereby affecting their acceptance rates into universities. Even when accounting for differences in socioeconomic status and single parent households this racial disparity, although reduced, continues to exist. These trends have become the basis for sociological theories, including oppositional culture that explain these continuing racial gaps in education achievement. John Ogbu's primary goal in his research was to explain “academic performance of racial and ethnic minorities with reference to broader societal structures and historical processes ” John Ogbu used case studies, the most famous of which examined the affluent neighborhood of Shaker Heights, Ohio, to research variables that represented oppositional culture. These variables included several explanations of academic disengagement based on African Americans’ self-perception of their work load, their own and white people's academic efforts, and their own explanations for their disengagement. From this case study and other research, Ogbu formulated his theory of oppositional culture. As part of Ogbu's analysis, he defines the position of voluntary minorities versus the position of involuntary minorities. Voluntary minorities in the United States include immigrant minorities such as Chinese and Korean immigrants as well as autonomous minorities such as Mormons and Jews. Involuntary minorities comprise largely of African Americans, Native Americans, Mexicans, and Puerto Ricans who were incorporated into American society against their will through colonization, slavery, and conquest. While voluntary minorities view cultural differences as obstacles to be overcome, involuntary minorities view participation in dominant cultural practices as a betrayal of their group loyalty and a threat to their identity. Ogbu argues that in African American cultures, a collective identity is created from a young age in which cultural frames of reference indicate behaviors that belong culturally and those that do not. According to self-reports of African American students, “talking proper”, playing sports dominated by white students, and having white friends all show that a person is acting white. Ogbu states that these cultural frames of reference create instances of peer pressure and discourage students from schoolwork. While black students did not necessarily see getting good grades as acting white, they did disengage from academic work because they perceived certain attitudes and behaviors that were conducive to making good grades as acting white. These behaviors include the use of Standard English, enrollment in honors and AP classes and acting “smart” in class. Additionally, students in the same sample felt that black individuals gave up some of their cultural background by succeeding in white institutions.