Article Review: Racially Charged Cookies and White Scholarships
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Article Review: Racially Charged Cookies and White Scholarships
Racism across social contexts has been a debatable issue in the United States. The education sector has not been spared in this since policies that undermine equal representation of races in various education levels have infiltrated it, even though in low tones. According to Dietrich (2015), affirmative action had its touch in the education sector with a single focus on creating a diverse university campus population. However, this allowed the quota system, which later the court disallowed. Since then, there has been a discount among the campus students across the country, despite this coming to the limelight in 1978 following the Bakke Case that challenged the University of California’s affirmative action admission policies. Failure of the affirmative action policies that undermined fairness and individual opportunities demonstrate the unsolved equal representation of leaners in higher education, which has led to social change among campus students as reflected through anti-affirmative-action protests. The rest of the paper will review “Racially Charged Cookies and White Scholarships: Anti-Affirmative Action Protests on American College Campuses” by Dr. David R Dietrich, a current Associate Professor at the Texas State University.
Research Methodology
In her study, Dietrich (2015) utilized a qualitative content analysis research design. The choice of the research method proved ideal in context examination of frames and themes the protests use. The author used newspapers to extract quotations of movement participants and leaders as sources of collecting information due to their wide coverage of protests across the country. The author also used Internet search engines and news media in Lexis-Nexis to place the protests into context by identifying the date and campus where affirmative action protests happened. Official websites of organizations were also searched as well as YouTube. The process resulted in identifying 137 articles in the newspapers, Web pages, and YouTube clips. The last step involved exploiting theoretical underpinnings to select coding categories, which was done in two phases. The first involved data scanning to generate new coding categories inductively using emerging patterns, combining them with the pre-existing ones. Then, the next phase encompassed actual data coding.
A research methodology is the central channel of maintaining a focus on and achieving study objectives. According to Thomas and Hodges (2010), the only way of adding ingredients such as rigor and logic to a study project’s objectives is by using research methods. Through research design, it is possible to integrate elements such as strategies, plans, and structure necessary to keep the investigation of the topic resonating in a researcher’s mind (Kumar, 2019). This should be done from a lens of research questions to ensure isolation of issues or resolutions to problems of interest are addressed using the most appropriate research tools (Kumar, 2019, p.94). This creates a notion that research objectives, questions, and methods must demonstrate a higher level of coherence to enable the research to reach more compelling findings and conclusions. Jonker and Pennink (2010) affirm that research methodology is more about the justification of a pathway pursued to attain the study objectives and must be consistent with conceived requirements (p.22). These premises indicate that research methodology needs to be innovative.
The elements described in the paragraph above regarding what could be regarded as an ideal research methodology are evident in the Dietrich (2015) study. It aimed to explore the frames and themes emerging from the anti-affirmative action protests on the American college campuses. The decision to use a qualitative research design was consistent with the objective. This is because an individual narrative of the movement participants and leaders was required if qualitative research was to work. The sources for information confirm the effectiveness of the survey design exploited. Hence, it could be generally argued that Dietrich’s (2015) study was innovative in deciding on the research tools and participants.
Research Findings
The process of actual coding of data following the generation of a complete list of pre-existing and emerging categories. This resulted in the identification of three main frames used during the anti-affirmative action protests. The first one was abstract liberalism, where the author found that it had its origin to political and economic ideologies, even though it was consistent with Bonilla-Silva’s (2009) “abstract liberalism” model. In the context of protests, the author found multiple statements recorded indicated that the anti-affirmative protesters adopted political and economic liberalism principles in a sense that ignored the impacts of racial discrimination on the lives of the minorities (Dietrich, 2015, p.115). This was mainly due to reverse racism that aimed to place the minority groups at an advantaged position through the bake sales.
Another frame that emerged was the minimization of racism. Dietrich (2015) noted statements that denounced that racism existed in a significant form in multiple bake sales. This was due to the notion that racism did not purportedly affect the ability of minorities to achieve their educational and career dreams. For instance, the 2009 Slippery Rock University bake sale declared that MJ was right when he said it does not matter if one is White or Black. The author also noted that other students showed that they were more circumspect in their assessment of racism. This was noted that in as much as they do not deny that racism exists, they argued that it has a negligible effect. The last frame that came as a result of coding was white racial identity. The author observed that protesters have been in a constant quest to establish a public white racial identity. What is mesmerizing is that this was attempted to make it more equal to other racial identifies to legitimize reverse racism. An example of the statement the organizers of the bake sale that “Republicans are the real minority on campus” (p.118). The author noted that by trying to place whiteness on the same level equal to blackness, the organizers defined white as a minority race. But she worried that if the education scholarships were eliminated, the minority could be in the suffering end. On the contrary, the white could gain the opportunity of restoring their lost glory.
My Social Imaginations
Even after reading through and analyzing Dietrich’s (2015) research report, I realize that some racial issues remain pertinent. One of them is the bake sales organizers attempting to demean the whites in American society. Even though I concede that we all have the right to fight for our position in society, trying to undermine the more privileged could worsen the situation. In my view, trying to invite everybody to a roundtable discussion is critical in addressing issues that affect society members to establish a more solid, larger community. I would also agree that racism is a common theme that has affected minority groups from ancient times. I will only imagine that the only antidote would be institutionalizing best practices that would inculcate equality across the societal platforms. Fightbacks might not be helpful despite the need to constantly reminding those in authority that creating equal opportunities for all is vital to eliminate a divisive mindset among the public.
Reference
Dietrich, D. R. (2015). Racially Charged Cookies and White Scholarships: Anti-Affirmative Action Protests on American College Campuses. Sociological Focus, 48(2), 105-125. https://doi.org/10.1080/00380237.2015.998166
Jonker, J., & Pennink, B. (2010). The essence of research methodology: A concise guide for master and PhD students in management science. Springer Science & Business Media.
Kumar, R. (2019). Research methodology: A step-by-step guide for beginners. SAGE Publications Ltd.
Thomas, D. R., & Hodges, I. (2010). Designing and managing your research project: Core knowledge for social and health research. SAGE Publication Ltd.