Dr. Akil Houston
Inside Higher Ed interviewed Dr. Akil Houston for a new story headlined “Curriculum Incentive Plan Prompts Political Backlash.”
Houston is Associate Professor of Cultural and Media Studies in the African American Studies Department in the College of Arts & Sciences.
Akil Houston, an associate professor of African American studies at Ohio University who coauthored a guide to antiracist pedagogy, said he isn’t surprised by the backlash to the incentive program. He pointed to the rash of recent legal attempts across the country to control how educators discuss race with their students, including two bills introduced in Ohio last May that restrict how the role of racism in U.S. history can be taught in public K-12 classrooms.
Pushback on initiatives to incorporate social justice into teaching is “very common and very much expected,” Houston said. “We’re in a space where we are being pushed by some state legislatures not to talk about the past in meaningful ways.”
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