Toward a new narrative on Black males, education, and public policy

This article examines the Black male crisis thesis promulgated by the social science literature, public policy, and mainstream discourse, respectively. The authors contend that the stock‐story that the majority of African American males are ‘at‐risk’ for engaging in self‐destructive behavior or on the verge of extinction perpetuates a discourse of Black male pathology, which leads to over‐emphasis of behavior modification as a strategy for their collective improvement. Subsequently, de‐emphasis on the historical and structural role of race as a life opportunity‐shaping variable occurs, which renders an incomplete understanding of the social and educational status of Black males in the United States. As a result, public policies and social programs guided by this deficit discourse are unlikely to create meaningful change for this population, because society’s existing political economic structures are left unchallenged. The article concludes with the assertion that a ‘new narrative’ is needed in order to rethink the complex and systematic ways the social and educational status of Black males in the United States are constructed.