Graduation Year
2020
Date of Submission
5-2020
Document Type
Open Access Senior Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Government
Reader 1
Roderic Camp
Rights Information
© 2020 Nirel M JonesMitchell
Abstract
Top researchers in the field of critical pedagogy signify that humanization--the process of understanding and connecting with the humanity of another individual—literally liberates the brain from fear. This allows for student creativity and higher-order thinking; without cultural awareness and empathy, researchers claim, educational apartheid will persist. American notions of both teacher and student intelligences as well as ideas of ‘proper’ teacher-student relationships are contextualized by the political philosopher John Locke who delineated a capitalistic political framework based on his interpretation of human motivations: reason and the pursuit of happiness. The corresponding narrow conceptions of intellect, educational success, morality, and emotionality have become cultural dogmas--determining human value based on market norms expressed through particular labels. In the case of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), a Congressional act known for its unintentional marginalization of minority demographics, this value-laden diction complicated attempts at equitable educational reform. Despite Western exclusionary notions of what constitutes ‘rational’ and, thus, useful data, contemporary political philosophers and behavioral economists, affirm that educational policy is missing an analytical framework critical to the realm of both leadership and liberation—namely, a philosophical reading of the societal and a moral reading of the political. Herein lies the need for emorational morality: the understanding of how emotions and reason, which are constantly in interaction in the brain, are impacted by market and nonmarket moral assumptions indicated through word choice. The following analysis attempts to articulate how emorational analysis can apply poli-theoretical knowledge to educational policy in the pursuit of mitigating American human rights crises in the domestic public school education system.
Recommended Citation
JonesMitchell, Nirel, "Humanization is Liberation: ‘Emorational Morality’ in the Mitigation of Inequitable, Dehumanizing, Domestic Educational Policies" (2020). CMC Senior Theses. 2465.
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/2465
Included in
Education Policy Commons, Political Theory Commons, Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education Commons
