Understanding racial literacy through acts of (un)masking: Latinx teachers in a new Latinx diaspora community

As Latinx teachers are recruited to work in U.S. schools, a continued agenda to understand their experiences is warranted. This multiple case study considers the storytelling of six Latinx teachers in a new Latinx diaspora community. It documents both their racial literacy (the ability to resolve racially stressful issues) and their experiences with (un)masking (literal and figurative ways to cover or embrace racial markers). This study reveals the tensions that arise when Latinx teachers attempt to define their identity in social spaces where their languages, bodies, and names, among other markers, are racialized when read by others. Implications for teacher education include a call to include storytelling as a pedagogical tool to develop Latinx teachers’ racial literacy skills. By experiencing storytelling in their own schooling, Latinx teachers are more likely to model such racial literacy skills in their schooling communities; thereby, empowering a generation of students to enact more humanizing behaviors.