Keywords Now Critical Race Theory

Edited by Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler

In the latest skirmish in a decades-long culture war, the right-wing indignation industry in the United States has identified something it calls “Critical Race Theory” as an existential threat to the nation and its youth. Often abbreviating it as “CRT,” legislatures have passed ordinances against teaching various forms of critical race pedagogy, and teachers in universities, colleges, high schools, and even elementary schools have been pressured to commit to banning them from their classrooms. The impact has been, at best, a heightened nervousness among educators about teaching critical theories and histories of race and racism or, at worst, a turning away from critical pedagogy altogether.