Culturally Responsive Teaching Across PK-20: Honoring the Historical Naming Practices of Students of Color

By the time children enter school, they know how to spell their names and are accustomed to their family’s and community’s pronunciation of their names; those names are generally the first aspect of their identity we educators recognize when they enter our classrooms. As the nation’s classrooms become more diverse, there is an urgent need for educators at all levels to enact multicultural and culturally responsive teaching to bridge theory and praxis as central in developing critical race theory’s commitment to social justice. My work builds on Pérez Huber and Solórzano’s (2015) racial microaggressions model by analyzing historical and current naming artifacts that challenge the mispronouncing, Anglicizing, and (re)naming of students of color. I describe pedagogical tools that educators can employ to foster the development of critical consciousness about the importance of students’ names and their connection to their identities. Finally, the ‘hidden transcripts’ of names and naming practices within communities of color reveal their intergenerational resistance to white supremacy.