The Culture Trap: Ethnic Expectations and Unequal Schooling for Black Youth

In The Culture Trap, Derron Wallace argues that the overreliance on culture to explain Black students' achievement and behavior in schools is a trap that undermines the historical factors and institutional processes that shape how Black students experience schooling. This trap is consequential for a host of racial and ethnic minority youth in schools, including Black Caribbean young people in London and New York City. Since the 1920s, Black Caribbeans in New York have been considered a high-achieving Black model minority. Conversely, since the 1950s, Black Caribbeans in London have been regarded as a chronically underachieving minority. In both contexts, however, it is often suggested that Caribbean culture informs their status, whether as a celebrated minority in the US or as a demoted minority in Britain. Drawing on rich observations, interviews and archives in London and New York City schools, Wallace suggests that the use of culture to justify Black Caribbean students' achievement obscures the very real ways that school structures, institutional processes, and colonial conditions influence the racial, gender, and class inequalities minority youth experience in schools. Wallace reveals how culture is at times used as an alibi for racism in schools, and points out what educators, parents, and students can do to change the beliefs and practices that reinforce racism.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Preface Introduction: The Power of the Culture Trap Part I: Constructing the Culture Trap 1. Model and Failing Minorities? Divergent Representations of Black Caribbean Achievement 2. Black Caribbean Immigrants and the Legacies of Empire 3. Tracking Structures and Cultures: The Role of Academic 'Ability' Grouping Part II: Negotiating the Culture Trap 4. Distinctiveness and the Secret Life of Social Class in Representations of Culture 5. Deference and the Gendered Rewards of 'Good' Behavior 6. Defiance and Black Students' Resistance to Cultural Racism Conclusion: Dismantling the Culture Trap in Schools Appendix: Organizing Methods for Ethnographic Fieldwork Notes About the Author References Index

About the Author :
Derron Wallace is Assistant Professor of Sociology and Education at Brandeis University, and Research Associate at the Centre on the Dynamics of Ethnicity at the University of Manchester. He is a cultural sociologist of race, ethnicity, and education. His research and teaching interests are concerned with the analysis and amelioration of structural and cultural inequalities that shape schooling in the United States, Britain, the Caribbean, and around the world.

Review :
This is an important contribution to our understanding of how discourses and practices of racial representation work to shape and perpetuate ethnic inequalities in our schools. Wallace's comparative ethnography of schools in London and New York offers a unique insight into how ideas of culture and identity are formed historically and politically, and how these are lived by those caught in the trap of ethnic expectations. With a sharp eye for detail and an ear for the voices of young people, teachers, and parents, Wallace breathes new life into an old, and seemingly intractable, problem. Cultural explanations of the achievement gap, such as culturally responsive and culturally relevant pedagogy, are popular within schools, colleges, and universities. This visionary, timely, engaging, and informative book describes the limits of cultural explanations and how culture, class, and context interact to influence academic achievement. It is a compelling and essential read. The Culture Trap exemplifies the beauty of cross-national research by deftly illuminating both the general and the particular of social forces across contexts. Wallace sharpens our understanding of the ways that different racial formations in the U.S. and Britain intersect with ethnic and class identity of Black Caribbean youth and permeate the walls of schools and classrooms. It's a compelling ethnography of the everyday lived experiences of second-generation immigrant students, which illuminates how 'ethnic expectations' influence their educational well-being. Many scholars and teachers of culture, race, ethnicity, and education will appreciate the informative, useful nature of Wallace's work. Derron Wallace has written a field-defining book. Comparing Black Caribbeans in London and New York, he shows how ethnic expectations, rooted in history, colonialism, and the proliferation of U.S. media culture, influence the incorporation and academic outcomes of second-generation Black Caribbean youth. Bursting with rich narrative accounts, powerful theoretical insights, and exceptional writing, this book will shape the sociology and education discourse on Black Caribbean students for years to come. Everyone who cares about race, ethnicity, education, and immigration should read this book. How to explain the markedly different educational experiences and levels of achievement of African-Caribbean youth in London and New York? Conceptual clarity alongside careful listening to the voices of Black youth, parents, and teachers is at the heart of Derron Wallace's timely and thoughtful analysis of the 'ethnic expectations' which serve as an alibi for racisms and reinforce inequalities. This fascinating book takes us into two schools—one in New York City and one in London—where teachers use cultural narratives on the essential elements of Caribbean heritage towards very different goals—to highlight Black students' endless talents and possibilities in one setting and to stress the limited potential of Black adolescents in another. Beautifully written, gripping, and deeply interesting, The Culture Trap sheds new light on the mechanisms through which inequality is sustained. Highly recommended! This brave, brilliant book takes no hostages. Beautifully evocative and richly theorized, The Culture Trap sets out a compelling argument for why culture should not be prioritized over structure in understandings of educational achievement. Weaving wonderful ethnographic narratives with stunning insights, the book brings a welcome clarity to the messy and highly contested morass that culture has become. For much needed illumination, this is the book to read—it is both an enormous pleasure and a revelation. The Culture Trap is a wonderful contribution to the comparative analysis of the ways in which black youth have been the subject of unequal schooling. Through a nuanced and detailed analysis, Wallace illustrates how black Caribbean youth have been subjected to persistent and deeply embedded unequal treatment in the school systems of the UK and US. The Culture Trap is an insightful study of the experiences of Afro-Caribbean youth in New York City and London schools. Wallace's careful look at how schools create 'culture traps' through essentializing ethnic expectations of their Afro-Caribbean students is sure to become an instant classic. The book demonstrates how positive expectations go hand in hand with negative expectations, and how the history of colonialism shapes ethnic stereotypes in the US and Britain. Beyond the school, Wallace also shows how students themselves respond to the ethnic expectations they experience. Never reductive, Wallace uses 'storytelling sociology,' providing a vivid and convincing account of the lived experiences of the communities he observed, with deep respect, care, and curiosity. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in immigration, education, and the African diaspora. Findings from this study are important...I highly recommend this book to all but especially to educators in teacher preparation programs, preservice teachers, educators in the field, and educational policymakers and leaders in both the United States and Britain. This book demonstrates a high calibre of authorship and scholarship, which audiences within the field of education, teaching, and learning will find informative for their practice, as I myself have. Wallace does a good job of demonstrating that expectations regarding culture can affect outcomes...Recommended. Undergraduates through faculty; professionals. In his provocative new book The Culture Trap: Ethnic Expectations and Unequal Schooling for Black Youth, sociologist of education Derron Wallace provides an incisive examination of how cultural explanations are often used to obscure systemic inequalities in the education of Black students...Wallace's penetrating study will push vital conversations on educational equity towards grappling with racial and ethnic biases that cultural platitudes leave unexamined. This makes The Culture Trap a valuable tool for helping undergraduate and postgraduate students alike complicate their understanding, in comparative relief, of how everyday actions and utterances within education systems perpetuate enduring discourses of inequity and difference. This book is a valuable resource for anthropologists, sociologists, educators, school leaders and students from marginalised communities.