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When Class Is Colorblind: A Race-Conscious Model For Cultural Capital Research In Education, Bedelia N. Richards

Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications

Sociologists of education frequently draw on the cultural capital framework to explore the ways in which educational institutions perpetuate inequality in schools and the larger society. However, these studies adhere to a white centered “class-based master-narrative,” to legitimize and perpetuate the assumption that racial differences are secondary manifestations of class-based structures. The class-based master-narrative elevates a one-dimensional view of inequality as rooted primarily in class-based stratification and downplays the fact that the economic elites who inhabit these dominant social positions are predominantly white. In this essay, I propose a race-conscious framework to challenge the colorblind assumptions and deficit perspectives inherent …