"Critical race theory (CRT) is an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to analysing how laws, social and political movements, and media shape, and are shaped by, social conceptions of race and ethnicity."
The study of the ways in which race, racism, and power intersect to shape social hierarchies and systems of inequality.
Race and Racism: The concepts of race and racism are central to Critical Race Theory. This includes exploring how race is socially constructed, how power relations influence racial identities, and how racism operates at multiple levels of society.
Intersectionality: Intersectionality refers to the interconnected nature of social categories like race, gender, class, and sexuality. Critical Race Theory acknowledges that individuals hold multiple identities that intersect and influence their experiences of oppression and privilege.
Whiteness: Critical Race Theory examines the concept of whiteness and its role in maintaining systems of oppression. This includes exploring how whiteness is socially constructed and how it privileges individuals who are perceived as white.
Structural Inequality: Structural inequality refers to the ways in which societal systems and institutions create and perpetuate inequities. Critical Race Theory examines how structural inequality operates based on race and other social categories.
Legal Theory: Critical Race Theory emerged from legal scholarship and continues to be heavily influenced by legal theory. This includes exploring the ways in which law and the legal system perpetuate systems of oppression and inequality.
Historical Context: Critical Race Theory recognizes the importance of historical context in understanding the current social climate. This includes exploring the ways in which historical events and structures continue to shape systems of inequality and oppression.
Language and Discourse: Critical Race Theory examines the ways in which language and discourse are used to reinforce systems of oppression. This includes exploring how language is used to marginalize and silence individuals and groups.
Activism and Social Change: Critical Race Theory emphasizes the importance of activism and social change in achieving racial equity. This includes exploring the ways in which individuals and groups can work towards creating a more just society.
Cultural Competency: Cultural competency involves developing knowledge and skills for working across diverse cultures. Critical Race Theory emphasizes the importance of cultural competency in promoting racial equity and reducing prejudice and discrimination.
Counterstorytelling: Counterstorytelling involves sharing personal narratives that challenge dominant cultural narratives. Critical Race Theory emphasizes the importance of counterstorytelling in creating understanding and empathy across diverse groups.
Interest convergence theory: This theory posits that advances in civil rights for marginalized groups only occur when it benefits the dominant group as well.
Structural determinism: This theory argues that inequalities in society are a result of systemic discrimination, and cannot be fixed through individual effort alone.
Whiteness theory: This theory examines how whiteness is constructed as a social and cultural norm, and how this construct perpetuates racial inequalities.
Intersectionality: This theory recognizes that people experience multiple forms of discrimination and oppression based on their intersecting identities, such as race, gender, class, and sexuality.
Critical race feminism: This theory looks at how gender intersects with race, and how Black women experience both racism and sexism in unique ways.
Legal storytelling: This theory uses storytelling and narrative to reveal how law and policy can discriminate against marginalized groups.
Latino/a critical theory: This theory examines the experiences of Latinos/as in the United States and how race intersects with their experiences of immigration, language, and culture.
Tribal critical race theory: This theory explores the experiences of Native Americans in the United States, including land rights, sovereignty, and cultural genocide.
Asian American critical theory: This theory examines the experiences of Asian Americans in the United States and how race intersects with their experiences of immigration, discrimination, and assimilation.
Black feminism: This theory analyzes how the intersection of race, gender, class, and sexuality shapes the experiences of Black women in the United States.
Intersectionality: This subfield examines the ways in which race, gender, class, and other social identities intersect and interact with each other to shape individuals' experiences of discrimination, disadvantage, and oppression.
Colorblindness: This subfield analyzes the rhetoric and practice of colorblindness, which claims to eliminate race-related social inequalities by ignoring racial differences and treating everyone "equally.".
Legal Studies: This subfield explores the ways in which laws and legal systems contribute to racial injustice and discrimination.
Whiteness Studies: This subfield examines the ways in which white privilege and white supremacy operate in social, cultural, and political contexts, and how they shape relationships between different racial groups.
Education: This subfield analyzes how racial inequality is reproduced and reinforced in educational institutions, policies, and practices, and how anti-racist education can be promoted.
Immigration: This subfield addresses the impact of immigration policies and practices on immigrants' access to social, economic, and political rights, as well as their experiences of racialization and discrimination.
Cultural Studies: This subfield focuses on representations of race, racism, and racial identity in popular culture, media, and arts, and how they reflect, challenge, or reinforce dominant ideological and social norms.
Health Disparities: This subfield assesses the impact of race and racism on health outcomes and access to health care, and identifies ways to address health disparities and promote health equity.
Environmental Justice: This subfield examines the ways in which race and class influence exposure to environmental hazards, access to natural resources, and the distribution of environmental benefits and harms, and how to promote environmental justice.
Critical Race Feminism: This subfield synthesizes Critical Race Theory with feminist theory to analyze the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality in shaping power relations and social inequality.
"CRT also considers racism to be systemic in various laws and rules, and not only based on individuals' prejudices."
"The word critical in the name is an academic reference to critical thinking, critical theory, and scholarly criticism, rather than criticizing or blaming individuals."
"CRT is also used in sociology to explain social, political, and legal structures and power distribution as through a 'lens' focusing on the concept of race, and experiences of racism."
"A key CRT concept is intersectionality—the way in which different forms of inequality and identity are affected by interconnections of race, class, gender, and disability."
"For example, the CRT conceptual framework examines racial bias in laws and legal institutions, such as highly disparate rates of incarceration among racial groups in the United States."
"Scholars of CRT view race as a social construct with no biological basis."
"One tenet of CRT is that racism and disparate racial outcomes are the result of complex, changing, and often subtle social and institutional dynamics, rather than explicit and intentional prejudices of individuals."
"CRT scholars argue that the social and legal construction of race advances the interests of white people at the expense of people of color, and that the liberal notion of U.S. law as 'neutral' plays a significant role in maintaining a racially unjust social order."
"CRT began in the United States in the post–civil rights era, as 1960s landmark civil rights laws were being eroded and schools were being re-segregated."
"CRT, a framework of analysis grounded in critical theory, originated in the mid-1970s in the writings of several American legal scholars, including Derrick Bell, Alan Freeman, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Richard Delgado, Cheryl Harris, Charles R. Lawrence III, Mari Matsuda, and Patricia J. Williams."
"CRT draws from the work of thinkers such as Antonio Gramsci, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, and W. E. B. Du Bois, as well as the Black Power, Chicano, and radical feminist movements from the 1960s and 1970s."
"Academic critics of CRT argue it is based on storytelling instead of evidence and reason, rejects truth and merit, and undervalues liberalism."
"Since 2020, conservative U.S. lawmakers have sought to ban or restrict the instruction of CRT education in primary and secondary schools, as well as relevant training inside federal agencies."
"Advocates of such bans argue that CRT is false, anti-American, villainizes white people, promotes radical leftism, and indoctrinates children."
"Advocates of bans on CRT have been accused of misrepresenting its tenets."
"Advocates of bans on CRT have been accused of... having the goal to broadly silence discussions of racism, equality, social justice, and the history of race." Note: Due to the length and complexity of the passage, not every question may have an explicit quote matching it exactly. However, the selected quotes provide relevant information related to the study questions.