Public lecture by Ujju Aggarwal – Postdoctoral Fellow, National Academy of Education, Spencer Foundation
May 8, 6pm
Wolff Conference Room, 6 E 16th St Room 1103
Since Brown v. Board of Education, public education has been both the most universally accessible and yet also the most unequal institution in the United States. Public education was also among the first public goods to experiment with the concept of choice. The history of public education in the second half of the twentieth century reveals how freedom, rights, and citizenship were re-imagined, re-structured, and constrained after the Civil Rights movement. Drawing on critical race theory, feminist theory, the concept of racial capitalism, and ethnographic research, this lecture presents a critical genealogy of choice. Organized through race, “choice” is a principle of reform and management and a core component of neoliberal consumer citizenship.