DarkStar Spouts Off

Another "Acting White" Data Point

This is more for me than for you. But if you want to read it, enjoy.

A Problem We Can Agree Upon

There is a problem. On that, nearly everyone agrees. But to what forces should one attribute the black-white achievement gap? Sometimes it seems everyone has a confident opinion. Explanations for the persistent gap in education achievement between African-American and white students range from a decline in personal responsibility among black Americans, to unenlightened education policy, to lazy teachers, to entrenched poverty.

This brief from the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice at Harvard Law School concerns itself with one of the most sensitive and most ubiquitous explanations for the black-white gap in school achievement: the so-termed “burden of acting white.” For more than two decades, a range of people— pundits, educators on the ground in urban schools, and academics in the ivory tower— have contended that for the black student, the punishment for educational success is social ostracism among one’s black peers. Thus, the theory goes, high performing black students, fearing the charge of “acting white,” will refrain from excelling. It is a powerful idea. However, after more than twenty years since its scholarly introduction, there is still no broad consensus as to whether or not such a phenomenon accounts for any portion of the black-white achievement gap.

Acting White: A Media Invention, Dangerous Mindset or Something In-Between?

Simply put, some people argue that an “acting white” mindset is rampant among black youth, especially among young men, and that such attitudes are a major cause of differences in school achievement between black and white students. Others disagree, pointing to data that seem to dispel such ideas. This research brief attempts to summarize the literature and objectively discern whether or not the fear of “acting white” is a phenomenon hampering the eradication of the black-white achievement gap. What we find, not surprisingly, is that the

Research examines coping strategies of African-American students in predominantly white schools

Research examines coping strategies of African-American students in predominantly white schools

A new study examining the interactions of black and white high-achieving students in elite, private high schools reveals how today's millennial generation is negotiating race, identity and academic success. In a paper presented Aug. 8 at the 104th annual meeting of the American Sociological Association (ASA) in San Francisco, Michelle Burstion-Young, a University of Cincinnati doctoral student in sociology, says she is breaking new ground in sociological research – exploring culture and race in the leadership class of the millennial generation – in academically competitive environments where an achievement gap does not exist.

Burstion-Young's study focused on a survey and follow-up interviews with approximately 20 students representing three private prep high schools in the Midwest, including an all-male, all-female and co-ed school.

"Schools are one of the most important sites to study if we are to gain an understanding of how racial interaction is shaped," Burstion-Young writes in the study. "Schools are important not only because they perform the function of education, but also because they are key to how children and young adults become socialized."

"Little is known about how students negotiate the social world of school or how being labeled black (by others and/or self) may influence their social decisions, either by removing options (such as being purposefully excluded or not being included) or creating other options (such as a black social world)," she writes.

Burstion-Young's study examined what she called four coping strategies used by minority students in predominantly white schools

Assimilation – "Acting white" or "acting black" in this environment was not a question of academics, but identity. According to Burstion-Young, both black and white students were dedicated to academic excellence and there were no differences in academic standards. Contrary to previous studies which state that high achieving blacks are viewed as "acting white," Burstion-Young says the black students identified with black culture through association with consumer culture, such as fashion and music, as well as slang and social circles. The students who did not connect to black culture on these levels were viewed as "acting white" – academic achievement (or lack thereof) had little to do with it. In at least one case in this study, an African-American student became so integrated into the white community that she lost her connectedness to her own family and culture, greatly upsetting the family and, Burstion-Young says, eliminating the spirit of integration in creating a generation of bridge-builders across cultures, identifying with each other but accepting and respecting cultural differences.

Integration – Burstion-Young says she found that most of the students actually strived to be bi-cultural or integrated in their dealings with people. Almost all of them placed a great deal of value on being connected with their own black culture and also with the majority (white) culture. She states that they felt that the former was necessary in order for them to have a support system, and that the latter was necessary in order to learn how to be successful in "the real world." Because the students valued being bicultural, associating with white students was not enough to be considered "acting white." Exclusive association with whites was the determining factor.

Separation – During school visits, separation between the races was particularly noted during time spent in the school cafeteria. "Separation is an important strategy for cultivating and maintaining a sense of black culture and while many school officials and white students discourage it on principle," writes Burstion-Young, "most of the black students realize that by not engaging with the black group, they risk being completely ostracized in the long run."

Marginalization – An example would be a shy student representing the only African-American in an AP class. Yet, the same student could be included in extracurricular activities or join African-American friends for lunch in the school cafeteria.

In conclusion, Burstion-Young states that separation seems to be the most popular coping strategy for the social space of students outside of their prep school environments. "The black students in this study were very interested in spending their 'free time' with family, friends and neighbors outside of school," states Bastion-Young. "Because our most intimate connections with people tend to happen intra-racially, the family, friends and neighbors they sought during their free time were overwhelmingly of the same race as themselves."

During school hours, the study revealed that social separation was more likely to occur due to lack of access to the majority/minority, such as not being invited to parties; a lack of interest in the social majority/minority, such as displaying no interest in attending a party or event that crossed racial lines; or preoccupation with one's own culture so that students were not purposefully excluding the other race, but not actively including them.

"For all of these reasons, the terms of most of the school life of blacks seem to be dictated by the dominant culture," writes Burstion-Young. "Therefore many of the students feel they must be instrumental in seeking a black cultural space. When they do, the black students themselves are often accused of being the sole cause of racial separation which I refer to as the 'self segregation paradox,' because it obscures the role the dominant group has in maintaining social separation."

"One of the most important findings of this study," writes Burstion-Young, "is that most students simultaneously use a variety of different coping strategies, but they do so in somewhat different combinations for somewhat different reasons. At the center of their negotiations, however, is an overall concern with identity; more specifically, their coping strategies are geared towards reconciling different, and sometimes contradictory, expectations on identity."

H/T: P6

Acting White, Yet One More Agin

OK, here's another piece that misstates the so-called "acting white" issue.

First, lets tackle a big lie:

Just like her husband, the first lady avoided the 50-percent black high-school dropout rate,

The drop out rate isn't 50% for Blacks, country-wide. It's 50% for some urban areas.

Now, to this:

Obama’s daily presence in the White House finally may repel this foul tide. He also may unravel the “Acting White Syndrome,” wherein young black students who do homework and speak proper English are mocked for “acting white.” Light years more than white racism, this is the biggest cancer facing black Americans.

Obama himself told the 2004 Democratic National Convention that America must “eradicate the slander that says a black youth with a book is acting white.”

The "acting white" charge, according to a Cook and Ludwig, is overblown. According to Roland Fryer, the "acting white" charge doesn't exist in private schools and --- NOW GET THIS --- in majority Black schools. Check out the "Acting White" category for the details about both of the things I mentioned.

I often state that people don't go deeper into the reasons why an "acting white" charge is thrown. For example, is it universal or only from certain students and how are the students who are saying it performing in school? My thought on this is when it is used, chances are it's thrown by students who aren't doing well in school and they are mocking the students performing well out of jealousy.

Or, it's being thrown because of mannerisms and/or likes of the person being called?

“Why you actin’ white?” I heard more times than I care to recall, usually uttered by pint-sized hoodlums who spoke exquisite jive and seemed destined for middle-management in the Crips or Bloods.

I think the above quote hints at mannerisms more so than academic efforts.

Black "Anti-Intellectualism"? Remember This

The next time someone mentions "Black Anti-Intellectualism," remember this article:

First and foremost among the vectors of the new anti-intellectualism is video. The decline of book, newspaper and magazine reading is by now an old story. The drop-off is most pronounced among the young, but it continues to accelerate and afflict Americans of all ages and education levels.

Reading has declined not only among the poorly educated, according to a report last year by the National Endowment for the Arts. In 1982, 82 percent of college graduates read novels or poems for pleasure; two decades later, only 67 percent did. And more than 40 percent of Americans under 44 did not read a single book -- fiction or nonfiction -- over the course of a year. The proportion of 17-year-olds who read nothing (unless required to do so for school) more than doubled between 1984 and 2004. This time period, of course, encompasses the rise of personal computers, Web surfing and video games.

...

This is a portrait not only of a different presidency and president but also of a different country and citizenry, one that lacked access to satellite-enhanced Google maps but was far more receptive to learning and complexity than today's public. According to a 2006 survey by National Geographic-Roper, nearly half of Americans between ages 18 and 24 do not think it necessary to know the location of other countries in which important news is being made. More than a third consider it "not at all important" to know a foreign language, and only 14 percent consider it "very important."

That leads us to the third and final factor behind the new American dumbness: not lack of knowledge per se but arrogance about that lack of knowledge. The problem is not just the things we do not know (consider the one in five American adults who, according to the National Science Foundation, thinks the sun revolves around the Earth); it's the alarming number of Americans who have smugly concluded that they do not need to know such things in the first place. Call this anti-rationalism -- a syndrome that is particularly dangerous to our public institutions and discourse. Not knowing a foreign language or the location of an important country is a manifestation of ignorance; denying that such knowledge matters is pure anti-rationalism. The toxic brew of anti-rationalism and ignorance hurts discussions of U.S. public policy on topics from health care to taxation.

 

If you want more of my thoughts on the so-called "Black Anti-Intellectualism", read this link.

Acting White, Yet Again

Algernon Austin takes a look at the Fryer "Acting White" study.

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If one accepts the findings of the Roland G. Fryer “acting white” study then the group with the most intense fear of being perceived as “white” for having high academic achievement is Hispanics. Whites in private schools have the second strongest fear of “acting white.” Blacks would come in third with the mildest fear of “acting white.” I raise these points because I doubt that white private school students are afraid of “acting white.” The closer one examines the study, the more problems appear.

In 2005, Roland G. Fryer, Jr. and Paul Torelli circulated a paper titled “An Empircal Analysis of ‘Acting White’” through the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and Fryer published a version of the paper for more general audiences titled “Acting White” in Education Next. The research received a great deal of media attention and it was treated as conclusive proof that the “acting white” phenomenon is a serious problem among black students. But if one reads the study carefully and especially the more academic version circulated by NBER one comes to very different conclusions.

The “acting white” phenomenon was defined in Fryer and Torelli’s study as when there are racial differences in the relationship between grades and “spectral popularity index scores.” It is important to note that the analysis is based on spectral popularity scores not actual accusations of “acting white.”

If we accept Fryer and Torelli’s assumptions and evidence then it appears that in majority black schools, black students cease to be as popular as white students after a B+ GPA. We can only dream of the day that most black students have B+ GPAs. This has to be seen as a very, very mild case of “acting white.”

The problem for black students appears to be more severe in integrated schools because in integrated schools after a C GPA, black students are not as popular as white students. This still makes the problem fairly modest because the vast majority of black students attend segregated schools. Additionally, although black students in integrated schools have lower popularity index scores than whites, their popularity index scores still increase slightly up to a B+ GPA. (See image below. Click on image for a better view.) So, if popularity affects black student achievement, even in integrated schools they still have an incentive up to a B+.

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Every time I get involved in the "acting white" "debates," I always state that there are different studies that show different things and when you break them all down, the so-called "acting white" charge is not as simple as people make it appear.

Black "Anti-Intellectualism"

It is claimed that the Black community has a "strong" problem with so-called "anti-intellectualism". I'm going to provide links to two articles and then ask you to answer a question.

Future of D.C. School Vouchers Worries Parents

Tesha Legore, a single mother whose daughter, Jadaica Godfrey, 8, attends St. Gabriel School in Northwest with a voucher, said she wanted to see D.C. public schools improved.

"But I'm not going to wait on them to get [the school system] together," said Ms. Legore, 30. "I want the best for my daughter. From when Jadaica was born, I knew I wanted her education to be solid, but from an income basis, I knew I wouldn't be able to afford it."

Jadaica is vivacious. On a recent afternoon, she bounced around the cheerful house, decorated mostly in pink, that she shares with her mother and grandmother in Northeast. She's bright, her mother says, and in public school, she breezed through without any problems.

Only after Jadaica switched to private school did her mother realize she had problems in reading and math. Jadaica's teacher called Ms. Legore to tell her what her daughter needed to work on at home, she said. Now she works with Jadaica to make sure she has a solid foundation in the essentials.

"I think this school has been very beneficial," she said.

Gregory M. Cork, president and chief executive officer of the Washington Scholarship Fund, said vouchers are part of a larger effort to reform D.C. education.

"We support better D.C. public schools and better charter schools," said Mr. Cork, whose children attend public schools in Northwest. "What parents need are options. The fact that whether kids deserve an option has become a political football is just regrettable."

And then this one (Hat tip P6):

Parents Still Seek The Elusive 'Right' School

No one knows exactly how many students are still without a school, but indicators show that the annual last-ditch scramble for a seat at a school of choice is in high gear:

•  Some 28,217 students remain on waiting lists to get into Los Angeles Unified School District's prized magnet schools, which are special programs established to promote integration.

•  Popular charter schools — free, public schools run independently of the school district — are mostly oversubscribed: The Inner City Education Foundation, which operates the View Park charter schools, pegs its waiting list at more than 5,000.

•  The season for admission into popular private schools is long past, but parents are hoping to find an opening, perhaps at a school looking for a particular demographic to round out its student body.

So how does a parent get into this predicament? Some simply waited too long. Others have diligently researched and visited schools, applied on time but lost admission lotteries or discovered they lack sufficient "priority points" to gain admittance into magnet schools. Some have refused to give up on a private school slot.

By law, every child is ensured a spot in a public school. But for this mass of families, the neighborhood school typically is not the preferred choice.

The Los Angeles school district's magnet office tries to help. So does its open enrollment office. A call to a school — public or private — can uncover unexpected openings; informal parent networks also accumulate information. Parents often find that the local public school is better than first presumed, or has a special and worthy program within the larger campus that they can settle on.

Then there are parents who lie to get into a school, which can backfire if a school investigates.

"It was really difficult when my daughter didn't get a sibling permit" for an in-demand Westside school, said Kerry Allen. "Because I know families who used false addresses."

Other parents have worn out shoe leather, spent evenings poring over test scores and attended lotteries.

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But the summer search transcends Anglo angst. Minority parents also are looking for options.

There is a waiting list of more than 300 minority students who have signed up to be bused to the Westside or west San Fernando Valley. And, charter schools that have opened in working-class, black or Latino neighborhoods have been flooded with applications.

"We have a whole lot of issues in the African American community: What we face with young males — the gang issues," said Joanne Driver-Jordan, a respiratory therapist who lives in the Hyde Park area. "But education is a high priority in the list of priorities — not wanting your child to go to a school that is racially divided, where one race hates the other. And your child is trying to do academics in that setting?"

If "anti-intellectualism" is strong in the Black community, how do you resolve the actions of the parents in these articles and the fact that both articles indicate a "back log" for the options available?

There is more to it than "acting white."

The Truth About Acting White

Surfing around I found the following link.

The Truth About "Acting White"

For twenty years, black students have been chastised based on flawed research. Black leaders and black public intellectuals routinely claim that black students see academic achievement as “acting white.” The actual evidence for the “acting white” hypothesis, however, is meager and not at all convincing when examined carefully.

A study by the Girl Scout Research Institute shows that black and white girls experience equivalent levels of academically-oriented teasing. Forty-one percent of white girls reported that they worried about being teased for speaking or participating in class. Thirty-five percent of black girls felt the same. These results are statistically equal because the margin of error is plus or minus 7 percentage points.

The proponents of the “acting white” hypothesis claim that black students experience much more academic teasing than white students, but they have never presented any direct evidence to support this assertion.

I need to find out more about this. Something seems "weak" about this.

Clarification Of Views

[ Update 9/16/06]

Added "clarification" concerning focusing on bad news vs. good news.

[ Update 9/3/06]

Added Republican Democrat "clarification"

[ Update 8/30/06 ]

Added affirmative action and "acting white" "clarifications" and I'm feeling real silly for doing this.

If you want to read these views in one setting, select the "POV" category to the left.

[ Update ]

I'll bring this to the top each time I post something that is a part of this "series."

It's become clear to me that clarification of some of my views are needed. I do this because it has become increasingly obvious that dealing with partisans means if I argue against concept A, it doesn't mean I embrace concept B which is the polar opposite of concept A.

Unfortunately, this is VERY clear when dealing with partisan Blacks on the Internet. People who I expect to know better. It seems my expectations are TOO HIGH.

[ Update ]

I'll touch on:

• "Black leaders"
• Education
• Republicans, Democrats, and the Black Voters
• Affirmative Action
• "Don't Nobody Bring Me No Bad News"
• "Victimology"
• The Role of Government
• "Acting White"

Clarification Of Views: "Acting White"

This will cover my view on the popular belief that Black kids believe being studious is "acting white."

I don't think that is the case at all. The media and certain pundits are too lazy to do the real intellectual hard work to track down what is really happening. Now, I'm not saying that some Black students have not accused other Black students of "acting white." But this so-called "anti-intellectualism" is not anti-intellectualism but may be a strong case of jealousy. Aren't the few kids who use this term, not performing well in school? I think an investigation would show this to be the case.

It may not be about "anti-intellectualism" vs. a student standing out as different.

But, at this point, this is just conjecture on my part. Here is where I present research to show that the "acting white" charge may be overblown.

First, a relevant post on "Acting White".

Second, an earlier study on "Acting White" titled, The Burden of "Acting White": Do Black Adolescents Disparage Academic Achievement? This study comes to the conclusion that the "Acting White" charge does not discourage academic achievement.

Third, a recent study titled An Empirical Analysis of "Acting White" comes to the conclusion that the "Acting White" charge doesn't affect Black students in segregated [ Black ] schools or private schools. There is some evidence that it does affect Black students in integrated schools.

An honest reading of these should cause the reader to start to question the "common knowledge" of the "Acting White" mentality.

It's Time to Question Statistics About Blacks

It is way past the time that people question the statistics put forth about Blacks in America.

• There are more Black men in jail than in college -- Most of the Black men in college are between the ages of 18-23. So is the comparison of Black men in jail, only for that age range or ALL Black men in jail?
• The Black church is important to Black politics -- How many Black churches are in the "big city" near your area? How many politicians visit how many Black churches in the "big city" near your area? Do the simple math. Are Blacks affected by the preacher saying vote for candidate X?
• The "Acting White" charge is prevalent with Black students -- My first question is, if this is the case, why are there more Black students in college? Next, I would ask you to do the following Google searches:
• "Acting white" fryer torelli
• "Acting white" phillip cook jens ludwig
• "acting white"
• Most Blacks are poor -- The statistics don't back that up at all.
• Most Blacks are middle class -- Let's define what is "middle class" and then account for the standard of living for Blacks in a region. That's probably a better gage.
• Blacks blame "the man" for Blacks' problems -- That's not a statistic, it's a "trueism" that I think isn't true. I remember seeing the results of a poll that asked what are the most pressing things for Blacks today. The results had education, jobs, family structure, and crime at the top of the list. If I recall correctly, racism was not among the problems that needed to be addressed. The "Contract with Black America" that Tavis Smiley et al pulled off, seems to back up my assertion. But, again, question it.

There are more. I forgot what I wanted to mention because real life called for 6 hours or so.

The general idea is, "question" don't accept.

Acting White

This is an article about a study concerning "Acting White" by Roland G. Fryer.

I'm going to hunt down another one that is referenced in this article.

http://www.educationnext.org/200...g/20061/ 52.html

My analysis confirms that acting white is a vexing reality within a subset of American schools. It does not allow me to say whose fault this is, the studious youngster or others in his peer group. But I do find that the way schools are structured affects the incidence of the acting-white phenomenon. The evidence indicates that the social disease, whatever its cause, is most prevalent in racially integrated public schools. It’s less of a problem in the private sector and in predominantly black public schools.

With findings as potentially controversial as these, one wants to be sure that they rest on a solid base. In this regard, I am fortunate that the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Adhealth) provides information on the friendship patterns of a nationally representative sample of more than 90,000 students, from 175 schools in 80 communities, who entered grades 7 through 12 in the 1994 school year. With this database, it is possible to move beyond both the more narrowly focused ethnographic studies and the potentially misleading national studies based on self-reported indicators of popularity that have so far guided the discussion of acting white.

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The patterns described thus far essentially characterize social dynamics of public-school students, who constitute 94 percent of the students in the Adhealth sample. For the small percentage of black and Hispanic students who attend private school, however, I find no evidence of a trade-off between popularity and achievement (see Figure 2). Surprisingly, white private-school students with the highest grades are not as popular as their lower-achieving peers. The most-popular white students in private schools have a GPA of roughly 2.0, a C average.

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I also find that acting white is unique to those schools where black students comprise less than 80 percent of the student population. In predominantly black schools, I find no evidence at all that getting good grades adversely affects students’ popularity.

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However plausible it sounds, the oppositional culture theory cannot explain why the acting-white problem is greatest in integrated settings. If Fordham and Ogbu were correct, the social sanctions for acting white should be most severe in places like the segregated school, where opportunities are most limited. The results of my studies, of course, point in precisely the opposite direction.

The notion that acting white is simply attributable to self-sabotage is even less persuasive. According to its proponents, black and Hispanic cultures are dysfunctional, punishing successful members of their group rather than rewarding their success. That theory is more a judgment than an explanation. A universal, it cannot explain the kinds of variations from one school setting to another that are so apparent in the data I have explored.

This is a link to the PDF of the study.

Here is a link to an earlier study by Ludwig and Cook that is referenced by Fryer.