CRITICAL THEORY AND POPULAR CULTURE: PREPARING SCHOOL LEADERS FOR THE EMERGING BIRACIAL MAJORITY

ABSTRACT Critical Theory and Popular Culture: Preparing School Leaders for the Emerging Biracial Majority Since the implementation of the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) decision, school leaders have been tasked with the challenge of mitigating the historical and societal tensions that have existed between blacks and whites that developed during slavery. Despite the integration of blacks and white students within the same school building, American public schools continue to struggle with inclusiveness of all groups of students, as evidenced by the lack of success of certain minority groups (English, 2002; Shields, 2004). As a result, several diversity initiatives and reform efforts have been implemented (Sleeter, 2012; Wardle, 2000). Moreover, many educational leadership programs have begun adopting social justice frameworks in an effort to develop transformative leaders. Even with these attempts to recognize and include all groups of students, black-white biracial students are rarely included in educational research and literature (Root, 1996, 2001; Wardle, 2007; Williams, 2009, 2011). This dissertation was an inquiry into the pedagogical use of popular culture, in the form of film—specifically films with biracial characters and in some instances other video texts—for the purpose of engaging school leaders (principals and assistant principals) in critically reflective activities that merge theory and popular culture. The theories that the researcher employed are Stuart Hall’s Encoding/Decoding and Critical Race Theory (CRT). Transformative leadership strategies are embedded throughout the pedagogical project, which serve as the primary justification for the dissertation format that results in an authentic product that consists of a 3-day professional learning experience