Order-obsession and fear of losing face silence dissent in classrooms

Evidence

Bourgeois values in the classroom create a barrier, blocking the possibility of confrontation and conflict, warding off dissent. Students are often silenced by means of their acceptance of class values that teach them to maintain order at all costs. When the obsession with maintaining order is coupled with the fear of “losing face,” of not being thought well of by one’s professor and peers, all possibility of constructive dialogue is undermined. — bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress, 354

Categorization

• XREF: Builds on ch5 claims that apparent classroom neutrality/order can be unsafe for marginalized students; here the mechanism is class-coded shame rather than race alone. — connects to: Classroom decorum rules covertly enforce bourgeois values on working-class students — bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as…, 353; Professors’ fear of losing control blocks any class critique in the classroom — bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as…, 377; Stress, threat, and lack of information increase conformity to group norms — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice: How to Communicate…, 186 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• Stress, threat, and lack of information increase conformity to group norms #expands (0.85) — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 186
• Tenure-track conformity to power precedes and explains academic quietism #expands (0.80) — Hamid Dabashi, Brown Skin, White Masks, 325
• Solidarity degenerates into fear-driven obedience when followers forfeit independent judgment #expands (0.80)