Classroom counternarratives as transformative multicultural citizenship education

This paper examines pedagogical responses to James Banks’s concept of failed citizenship, namely the structural factors that inhibit migrants and minorities from accessing fully functioning citizenship and their human rights. Banks commissioned and published 16 case studies of social studies teachers in different national contexts to illustrate and exemplify transformative civic education. These illustrate his theories of failed citizenship and transformative citizenship education. Analysing this dataset through the lenses of failed citizenship, human rights and counternarratives, the paper provides empirical evidence to support and illustrate the theories. These minority teachers working in hostile cultural environments are very aware of the dangers of failed citizenship for their students. They use pedagogical strategies that have been theorized in critical race theory and human rights education including countering homogenizing national official narratives and promoting students’ counternarratives asserting the value of their heritage languages and cultures and asserting their rights to freedom of expression.