Guiffrida and Wiggan

Upon reading Douglas Guiffrida’s article, I felt very uneasy. What Guiffrida was implying seemed wrong: African American students need a different type of attention than white counterparts. His study and conclusions reminded me of a conversation I had with Spady about the ways in which discourse and affirmation of one’s own “race” and “identity” can actually deepen the ideology of racism itself. Guiffrida does this, arguing that “othermothers”, a legacy and theory from slavery, has been embedded into the educational and social practices that transforms the expectations (all) African American students have for their teachers. Is it the way Guiffrida writes that makes me feel uneasy? Greg Wiggan approaches and intends to explore a similar idea in his study and yet his approach and conclusions don’t seem to be filled with the assumptions that African American students need to be catered to. Guiffrida constantly wanted and drove home the black-white distinction while Wiggan just wanted to explore the experiences of African American students to add a fresh look away from this oppositional, “angry black man”, cultural discourse. In other words, the subtle difference between these two studies are the ways in which Guiffrida emphasizes that blacks and whites are different types of people (the white professor vs. the black professor) and Wiggan’s approach to look at what African American students find are good practices in their education, advocating for approaches to enhance the quality and equity of education practices and accessibility for all people. Thus, Wiggans’ conclusions provides a “viewing of African American students through the lens of resilience” (342), while Guiffrida suggests that white faculty “can support students by striving to adhere to their definitions of student-centeredness” (718). The notion that whites need to adhere deepens racial divisions because it is implying that for white students, the white faculty are doing fine but not for black students.

What both of these studies find from the testimonies of the students are quite similar. Teachers should care about their job and that their students are engaged and learning; they should be culturally inclusive in what and how they teach; and they should support students in and outside of classrooms. Is this really particular to black students? Every Soka student that I know looks for these qualities from a teacher. Why is Guiffrida suggesting that this is a black student-centeredness derived from the concept of the “othermother”? Frustrating….