“This book does much more than engage the intellectual, emotional, and ethical—it inspires the very soul of readers. As we research, more deeply understand, and navigate these stubbornly orchestrated times, policies, and practices designed to dismantle progress toward a democracy, this is just the book we need to reawaken our commitments to fight for a world we need and our children deserve. Although coordinated, bold, selfish, and dangerous moves and movements attempt to wear us down, this is the book we need to persevere—reembrace and defend We the People. Grounded in research, history, experience, facts, and ultimately truth, Banks and colleagues have produced an essential new text.”
—H. Richard Milner IV, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Education, Vanderbilt University
“Once again, James Banks has published a timely and profoundly important volume on issues of critical importance. By bringing together many of the nation's most talented scholars on diversity, equity, and inclusion, Standing Strong provides the justification we need to continue to defend the effort to make America a more just and equitable society.”
—Pedro A. Noguera, Distinguished Professor of Education and dean, Rossier School of Education, University of Southern California
“As the father of multicultural education, James Banks has long been at the forefront of illuminating how education can cultivate inclusive and just societies. This timely volume, edited by Professor Banks, brings together distinguished scholars to examine both the role and immense possibilities of multicultural education in a context marked by surging authoritarianism and mounting challenges to democracy.
This book is much more than an essential resource; it is an invitation to engage rigorously and critically with our collective responsibilities as educators and citizens. Its chapters situate the current threats to diversity, equity, and democratic norms within a broader historical and global perspective, offering concrete pathways for educators committed to safeguarding democracy through their daily practice. I strongly recommend this book to all educators, scholars, and policymakers concerned with the future of education and democracy.”
—Fernando M. Reimers, Ford Foundation Professor of Practice in International Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education
"Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times is the book that we desperately need at this moment. It is a vibrant celebration of 30 years of groundbreaking work in multicultural education, honoring the legacy James A Banks, and the Teachers College Press Multicultural Education Series. This work, comprised of some of the most transformative scholars over the past 5 decades, invites educators, scholars, and policymakers to engage with powerful research and practice that unapologetically centers equity, diversity, and inclusion in classrooms and communities. By highlighting the experiences of racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic groups, this volume inspires a renewed commitment to justice and belonging in education. It is both a tribute to past achievements and an invitation to shape a more inclusive and hopeful future together."
—Tyrone C. Howard, Pritzker Family Endowed Chair in Education to Strengthen Children & Families, UCLA, and author of Why Race and Culture Matter in Schools, Second Edition.
This book, which commemorates the 30th anniversary of the Multicultural Education Series, exposes the multidimensional nature of today’s attacks on education and the democratic ideals that sustain it. Yet it offers hope, illuminating pathways for all who remain committed to nurturing and educating children of every background in these challenging times.”
—Guadalupe Valdés, professor emerita, Stanford University
“This is a needed book in these challenging and toxic times. With strategic clarity and moral urgency, the authors powerfully demonstrate what educators concerned about democratic learning can and should do to stand strong, to protect justice-oriented knowledge production, and to resist the fascism and autocracy endangering not only democracy but our humanity as well.”
—Joyce E. King, Benjamin E. Mays Endowed Chair for Urban Teaching, Learning, and Leadership, and professor of educational policy studies, Georgia State University
“In this exemplary edited volume, James Banks’ decades-long leadership in multicultural education bears fruit to encourage educators and our allies to ‘stand strong’ in perilous times. An intergenerational assembly of voices address the question: What can we do to resist divisive, punitive, often untruthful attacks on education and democracy? Through keen analysis, this book offers an inclusive and visionary pedagogy of hope.”
—K. Tsianina Lomawaima, Indigenous studies scholar and coauthor of "To Remain an Indian"
Lessons in Democracy from a Century of Native American Education, Second Edition
“For over half a century, Professor James A. Banks has guided our nation’s schools and educators to not merely tolerate difference, but to truly study, learn from, and appreciate plurality for the strengths it brings to our shared world. In Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times, Banks brings together a wide array of intellectual warriors—an intergenerational chorus of scholars that offer research-informed analyses and outline practical steps for extending the fight for more justice and fairness in the future. This book boldly addresses today’s threats to democratic education with sharp insights about historical and current events, and it does so without relinquishing hope for the road ahead.”
—Jarvis R. Givens, professor of education and of African and African American studies at Harvard University, and author of American Grammar: Race, Education, and the Building of a Nation
