Joannie Halas

Claiming Space: Aboriginal Students within School Landscapes

Abstract There is an emerging body of theoretical, historical and design research that examines the ways in which race and cultural identity are understood to be produced and represented in the landscape. Yet, there remains a dearth of research examining both the historic and contemporary effects of race upon the development of school geographies. This paper has two broad purposes. It highlights the experiential aspects of racialized geographies within schools and, at the same time, it grapples with the processes that maintain or challenge the spatial conditions for the construction of whiteness. Drawing upon in-depth case study research this paper highlights the experiences of Aboriginal students and staff at four different schools, with a particular focus on cross-cultural schools, in Manitoba, Canada. What is needed is a concept of landscape that helps point the way to those interventions that can bring about much greater social justice. And what landscape study needs even more is a concept of landscape that will assist the development of the very idea of social justice. (Henderson, 2003, p. 196)

The wages of whiteness: confronting the nature of ivory tower racism and the implications for physical education

In this paper, we draw attention to the profound lack of racial diversity as well as the prevalence of whiteness within Canadian faculties of Kinesiology and Physical Education. In support of our argument that there exists an immediate need for equity programming within physical education in higher education, we present the results from two interconnected studies designed to make transparent: (1) the demographic character of faculties of Kinesiology and Physical Education across Canada; as well as (2) the delivery of content related to race, diversity and whiteness within the curriculum. In the first study, we collected website representations of faculty and staff (i.e. photos) as well as lists of curricular offerings for each of the member institutions of the Canadian Council of University Physical Education and Kinesiology Administrators. Website documents were downloaded, analyzed and organized according to criteria related to race and diversity. The follow-up study consisted of interviews with 40 faculty members across Canada where we asked questions pertaining to their perceptions of the faculty setting (i.e. the demographic make-up of their faculty including faculty, staff and students as well as the culture within the faculty) and the curriculum. As a method of triangulation, interview data was used to confirm and inform our analysis of the initial website data; when combined, the analyses provide a comprehensive picture of the cultures of whiteness that exist within physical education in higher education. In order for physical education to be truly inclusive, we call for the development of greater alliances across disciplines and geographic borders such that the hegemony of whiteness within the (physical education) academy can be disrupted.

Questioning Our Assumptions: Unconventional Lessons from the Swamp of Practice

(2004). Questioning Our Assumptions: Unconventional Lessons from the “Swamp of Practice”. Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance: Vol. 75, No. 4, pp. 14-18.

Shooting Hoops at the Treatment Center: Sport Stories

The following series of shon stories has been reconstructed, in part, from the data collected during an interpretive case study of an active living program at an adolescent treatment center/school (Halas, 1999). Using excerpts from interview transscripts, fi eldwork observations, reflective journal writing, and personal memories (from the authors past experiences as a teacher at the school). this fictional narrative describes how a day at a treatment center/school unfolds. not just on the basketball court, but also in terms of interconnected life issues. The configuration of stories to follow attempts to demonstrate how physical education can provide a space during the school day for change to occur, thus providing an alternative perspective from which to view the value of the physical activity experience, particularly for troubled youth.