Grounding at the Crossroads

A Collective Reflection on Walter Rodney’s Critical Pedagogy

Abstract

Drawing on our collective experiences as community-grounded ethnic studies scholars, we reflect on our engagement with the work of Walter Rodney. In particular, we discuss a reading group we created during the COVID-19 pandemic to discuss Rodney’s 1969 text The Groundings with My Brothers. Building on a body of scholarship that uplifts Rodney’s approach to critical pedagogy, known as “grounding,” we each reflect on our experiences applying Rodney’s “grounding pedagogy” to our respective regional and institutional contexts.