ABSTRACT
This chapter traces the development of theorizing race beginning with/in community curricula that showed how race was lived and experienced. It then follows the displacement of this knowledge to a predominantly white space where race was learned in “contrast”, and, ultimately, how living and learning in a red state amidst the rise of white nationalist politics necessitated new approaches. The author discusses settler colonialism as an overarching frame serving as a progenitor and incubator of racialization schemes and structuring politics. These theorizations and engagements with Critical Race Theories and Settler Colonial Studies—namely, that whiteness functions as property and that property/ownership shapes citizenship and sovereignty—necessitate a focus on communities that most benefit from white supremacy and settler colonialism. The author then discusses a “tracking” approach to research as a way of uncovering settler tracks. By “tracking” settler/racial (re)production via schools, the author engages in research and theorizing of race/politics where damage is focused away from Black, Indigenous, and other communities of color and onto settlerness and its resultant political investments. In doing so, we can better work towards unsettling civic education and education writ large.
