Don’t Get It Twisted: How Whiteness Rhetoric Obscures Teacher Education

One elusive aspect of Whiteness is how it is inextricably linked to the everyday, seemingly mundane rhetoric of teaching and education. Therefore, the daily, seemingly ordinary speech, behaviors, routines, epistemological framing, and even rhetorical discourse within a White society in and of itself cannot escape the ideologies of Whiteness, so too that it is not absent in teacher education. The question then becomes how does Whiteness rhetoric obscure, distort, and allow Whiteness to elude detection inside teacher education? The seemingly simple quandary often inquired in teacher education points to the need for teacher diversity. We will discuss the continual desire for more teacher candidates of Color to diversify the teaching field and their systematic exit as a form of Whiteness rhetoric. Scholars utilized a critical Whiteness study method and critical race hermeneutics (CRH) to connect how Whiteness rhetoric inside teacher education continually harms pre-service teachers and instructors of Color. This chapter’s goal is to re-interpret the rhetoric inside teacher education. The false premises and disingenuous approaches to diversifying teacher education lurk within the rhetoric of teacher education, even if unintentional. The chapter will begin by helping readers understand how rhetoric is power. It will then overlay how race and Whiteness specifically infiltrate the commonplace rhetoric upon which society frequently draws and teaches education. Finally, recommendations will explore the development of critical rhetoric and how it can lead to racially just teacher education programs.