Representations of African American male athletes: Media as discourse, education as counter-discourse

This study grew from two primary interdisciplinary questions, one historical and the other sociological: What measures did black Americans take to educate themselves during the Civil Rights Era and post-desegregation? How do black boys create meaning from media representations of African American male athletes? The journey to address these inquiries was exploratory, reflexive, transformative, and liberating. While this research project considered the history of black education in the United States over a span of four centuries, its primary focus encompassed the past four decades. Black education has run the gamut from a life altering endeavor to a vehicle for social mobility albeit, due to overlapping more often than not, the distance between the two boundaries was, and is, quite short. Black Americans have demonstrated their commitment to educating themselves through fervent pursuits of freedom and an unyielding quest for survival. They have struggled with adversity to fortify their dedication to uphold consciousness-raising activity as a bona fide civil right. This extensive history of the black American quest for liberation through formal pedagogy represents education as a practice of, and vehicle to, freedom. For this investigation, I have delved into Black/Africana Studies to capture a portrait of pedagogical and curricular approaches to black education.