“Emerging through Critical Race Theory Counter-storytelling in a Rhetoric and Composition Graduate Studies Context”

by Caleb Lee González | Xchanges 15.1, Spring 2020

The Traditions of CRT Counterstory

Solorzano and Yosso (2001) ask a similar question about understanding the state of graduate education as experienced by Chicana and Chicano students. Their answer is developed through CRT and the traditions of counterstory, since the practice of storytelling has “a rich and continuing tradition in African-American (Berkeley Art Center, 1982; Bell, 1987, 1992, 1996; Lawrence, 1992), Chicana/o (Paredes, 1977; Delgado, 1989, 1995a, 1996; Olivas, 1990), and Native American (Deloria, 1969; Williams, 1997b) communities” (p. 475). For oppressed groups, stories have often been linked to survival and resistance (Delgado, 1989).

CRT counterstory, then, is significant as it brings with it a history and practice of documenting the perpetual workings of racism within the institutional spaces of education (Delgado, 1989; Martinez, 2016; 2018; Solorzano & Yosso, 2001; Yosso, 2005; Yosso, Villalpando, Bernal, & Solórzano, 2001). While I argue that marginalized graduate students in the field can be a part of this important practice (even in the context of risk through the documentation of one’s own narrative), I also argue that because of the situatedness of CRT within storytelling traditions, counter-storytelling can function to expose and resist the persistence of racism (Yosso, 2005) as it springs up in a variety of ways within graduate studies in rhetoric and composition.

Yosso (2005) leans on Anzaldúa (1987) and Ikemoto (1997) to emphasize that counter-storytelling is not so much about reacting to the stories of racial privilege, as this can function to keep a clear focus on majoritarian stories. Nor is the key focus to prove that racism exists. We know (or should know) that it does. It is, rather, a way of documenting racism and the ways in which it endures and is significant within spaces of education, and in particular, the space of graduate studies in Rhet-Comp. This is why CRT counterstories are often organized through narrative and critical reflection with specific traditions of testimonios and witnessing. As Yosso (2005) states,

So while counterstories challenge mainstream society’s denial of the ongoing significance of race and racism, they do so by offering a critical reflection on the lived experiences and histories of People of Color. In its multiple forms, counterstorytelling can strengthen traditions of social, political, and cultural survival and resistance. (p. 10)

This matters to graduate studies in that as students in Rhet-Comp engage in this practice, the field might not only consider what majoritarian stories have historically been, but how they are operated and mobilized by institutional entities possessing both power and privilege.