Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Abolitionist teaching

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. No prejudice against merging this to Bettina L. Love. (non-admin closure) feminist (+) 04:09, 9 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Abolitionist teaching[edit]

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This is a 2019 neologism by college professor Bettina L. Love, who wrote a book (We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom) and created an organization (the Abolitionist Teaching Network) that make use of the term. The term doesn't seem to have caught on yet; outside uses of the term are minimal and all seem to relate directly to Love. Korny O'Near (talk) 13:19, 14 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions. Shellwood (talk) 13:35, 14 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Social science-related deletion discussions. Lightburst (talk) 15:36, 14 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Lightburst (talk) 15:36, 14 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete WP:N This article attempts to give credibility to the teaching method in one book by one author. The references that mention the method are the first two and both are primary. The rest are a form of WP:SYNTH to lend credibility to the topic. Even the book describing the teaching method does not have an article. Lightburst (talk) 15:46, 14 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: A possible alternative may be to selectively merge this into a section in Love's article, which does need some cleaning since it's got a bit of a WP:PUFFERY issue. I do see it covered on some university websites, typically in regards to Love herself as the term's creator. ([1], [2], [3], [4]) Other than that, I did see this study in Urban Education, but the references might be helpful. I will say that the book itself could likely warrant an article since I'm finding sourcing for it, but I also think that Love's page may be a better landing page for this at the moment if there isn't more coverage for the term as a whole. There's more wiggle room with covering the concept as a whole on her page as the term creator than there would be on a book page. ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 12:20, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm actually finding quite a bit out there. Of note is that the term "abolitionist pedagogy" is also frequently used. Right now I'm just putting everything in a "further reading" section, but I think that this topic could warrant its own article. It just needs to be cleaned up. ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 12:46, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If you think the article is worth keeping, I think the whole thing could use a rewrite: right now more than half of it is about general concepts like intersectionality, and the rest is nebulous statements like "Abolitionist teaching resides at the intersection between education, race, abolition and Black joy." Nowhere is the term "abolitionist teaching" actually defined, as far as I can tell. Reading between the lines, it seems to be a combination of social justice-based education and getting rid of tests and grades and so on; but if that's true, that would basically make it a synonym for critical pedagogy, which I think includes all of those concepts. Korny O'Near (talk) 13:34, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'd have to look into it a bit more to get the finer details. Admittedly I was more looking for the term and if the paper(s) had some sort of description, as well as went into some depth, but I didn't read the sources for the actual meat (ie, so I could do any substantial re-writes). With this in mind, if it seems like it's more of a loosely defined subset of critical pedagogy that uses the same general overall framework, then it may be best as a subsection there and in the author's page. I don't really get as much time as I used to as far as article editing goes and this is one that would need more attention than say, my usual film or book article. I'll try to set aside some time to look at this. Mostly I'm just setting things out in case anyone else can jump in first. ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 18:06, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Why not simply redirect to Bettina L. Love as a WP:ATD? AleatoryPonderings (???) (!!!) 03:02, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Several valid options, no clear consensus
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 03:11, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Because this a topic largely of interest to university professors, it seems most of the sources are paywalled in scholarly sources, but I am finding a lot of evidence that it is a term in use, especially when considered synonymously with "abolitionist pedagogy". From the first two pages of my library's search results, sources which use "abolitionist pedagogy": [5][6][7] Sources that use "abolitionist teaching" in their titles: [8][9]. Sources which state in their methods that they "draw from abolitionist teaching": [10][11][12] A useful review of Love's book: [13] That review also provides Love's definition of the term, "the practice of working in solidarity with communities of color while drawing on the [strategies] of abolitionists to eradicate injustice in and outside of schools" (2). The fact that most sources cite Love while using the term does not, to my mind, detract from the notability of the term: we still cite Bourdieu when we use the term cultural capital. I think fully contextualizing the idea might end up renaming the article "abolitionist pedagogy" (since that term emerged first) but it would take some research to see if it was appropriate, and "abolitionist teaching" also seems supported. I haven't read deeply on the topic, but I think it is a notable subset of/spinoff from critical pedagogy (as noted above) distinguished by its specifically US and Black focus, and its close links to trauma-informed pedagogy. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:57, 31 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I also want to suggest, as a preferred alternative to deletion, converting this into an articld about Love's book, which passes WP:NBOOK (I saw more than 2 reviews while skimming sources). I still slightly lean keep but think this is the next best option. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 08:54, 31 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 19:05, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Even cursory GScholar searches show that this is a new and expanding and vibrant field of study: [14], [15], [16]. These are significant papers in process or published in reliable scholarly journals and a WP:BEFORE should have found them. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 14:07, 8 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep A brief literature search on JSTOR suggests that Abolitionist Teaching is a fairly new, but widely discussed sub-framework in Critical Pedagogy. It might be worth renaming the article to Abolitionist Pedagogy, which seems to be the more common name in use. CamAnders (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 01:33, 9 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.