Critical issues: Examining constructions of race in literacy research: Beyond silence and other oppressions of white liberalism

In this article, we explore our complicity as white liberal literacy researchers in the social and political dynamics that support continued inequities in school-based literacy success. We focus on social constructions of difference, particularly addressing differences related to race and racism. We begin by reviewing what several noted scholars have said about race, racism, and white liberalism. We describe four deleterious patterns within the tradition of white liberalism, showing how these unwittingly undermine the goals for equity that this group espouses. Next, we use our critique of white liberalism as a basis for critiquing our own practice as literacy researchers. We do this by examining two pieces of our own research. In conclusion, we offer suggestions for literacy research that reflect our review and ana sis, and we invite others to contribute to the conversation. When matters of race are located and called attention to in American literature, critical response has tended to be on the order of a humanistic nostrum - or a dismissal mandated by the label "political," (Morrison, 1992, p. 12).