BREEDING ANIMOSITY: THE "BURDEN OF ACTING WHITE" AND OTHER PROBLEMS OF STATUS GROUP HIERARCHIES IN SCHOOLS

Karolyn Tyson

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

and

William Darity, Jr.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Duke University

and

Domini Castellino

Duke University

RUNNING HEAD: Status Group Hierarchies and a Burden of Acting White Word Count 21,355 (not including tables and footnotes)

* Direct all correspondence to Karolyn Tyson at UNC-Chapel Hill, Department of Sociology, 155 Hamilton Hall, CB# 3210, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3210. Support for this research was provided by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.

BREEDING ANIMOSITY: THE "BURDEN OF ACTING WHITE" AND OTHER PROBLEMS OF STATUS GROUP HIERARCHIES IN SCHOOLS

Almost 20 years have passed since anthropologists Signithia Fordham and John Ogbu (1986) published the article "Black Students’ School Success: Coping with the ‘Burden of Acting White’." Yet it remains among the most popular and influential publications addressing the academic underachievement of black students and the black-white achievement gap. Indeed, there is strong public belief that an "oppositional peer culture" is pervasive in the black community and that it explains the underachievement of African American students and some part of the black-white achievement gap. Scholars interested in black achievement outcomes have had to contend with the claims of Ogbu’s "oppositional peer culture" theory (Ogbu 1986; 1987), including the "burden of acting white" (Blau 2003; DeVos and Suarez-Orozco 1990; Jencks and Phillips 1998; Lawson 1997; Lovaglia, Lucas, Houser, Thye, and Markovsky 1998; Mahiri 1989; Patillo-McCoy 1999; Suarez-Orozco and Suarez-Orozco 1995; Sanders 1997; Steinberg, Dornbush, and Brown 1992).

Recently, social scientists have engaged in lively debate addressing the claims of the theory (see Farkas, Lleras, and Maczuga 2002; and Downey and Ainsworth-Darnell 2002). The debate centers on whether and to what degree an "oppositional peer culture" exists among black students and the extent to which it affects the group’s academic achievement. Overall, the research findings related to these questions have been mixed (see for example, Ainsworth-Darnell and Downey 1988; Cook and Ludwig 1988; Ferguson 2001; Kao, Tienda, and Schneider 1996; Neal-Barnett 2001; Steinberg, Dornbusch, and Brown 1992) and this has lead to confusion about the phenomena involved and ongoing debate. In this article we review the "burden of acting white" hypothesis, describe the current debate, and use interview and extant data from North Carolina to join the debate assessing the hypothesis.

THE "BURDEN OF ACTING WHITE" HYPOTHESIS

Among African Americans, the term "acting white" is used to refer to blacks who use language or ways of speaking, display attitudes, behaviors, or preferences, or engage in activities that are considered to be white cultural norms (McArdle and Young 1970; Neal-Barnett 2001; Perry 2002). Understandings of what is "acting white" may vary by region, social class, or age, but also may be idiosyncratic. Nonetheless, some understandings remain remarkably constant over time and place (e.g., listening to heavy metal music is almost always considered a "white" preference).

The term also has come to be used with respect to indicators of academic performance and success (Bergin and Cooks 2002; Neal-Barnett 2001). Using focus groups to understand how black teenagers define "acting white," Neal-Barnett (2001:82) reported that the list of items the students identified included "being in honors or advance placement classes." Incidentally, the list also included "Speaking Standard English, dressing in clothes from the Gap or Abercrombie and Fitch rather than Tommy Hilfiger and FUBU, [and] wearing shorts in the winter" (Neal-Barnett 2001:82).

Fifteen years earlier, Fordham and Ogbu (1986) had posited that this notion of "acting white" was part of a larger oppositional peer culture constructed by blacks as a result of the history of enslavement and discrimination faced in America. In response to persistent racial inequality—including discriminatory treatment in the labor market—black youths constructed a culture in opposition to "white" culture. In essence, according to Fordham and Ogbu the oppositional identity is "part of a cultural orientation toward schooling which exists within the minority community" (1986:183). Consequently, black students who are striving for academic success have their cultural authenticity as a black person called into question; that is, they are accused of "acting white." According to the theory, academic achievement is not valued among African Americans because it is perceived as conforming to standard norms of success among white Americans. Moreover, it does not pay off for blacks like it does for others.

Therefore, black students are confronted with a choice between representing an authentic "black" self or striving for academic success. Fordham and Ogbu claimed that it is this dilemma, this "burden of acting white," that contributes to the relatively low academic performance of black students. They are not alone in their assertion (see for example, Herbert 2003; McWhorter 2000; Weissert 1999). Faced with this dilemma, these authors believe, many black students choose to stifle their academic ability and achievement in order to stay true to the race and avoid charges of "acting white" and other ridicule and ostracism from their black peers. However, in the original published study (Fordham and Ogbu 1986), which addressed black academic underachievement, no respondent was shown to have directly referenced being accused of acting white with respect to achievement.

Only within the last ten years have the main propositions of the oppositional culture thesis, including the "burden of acting white," been examined empirically. Two high-profile studies (Ainsworth-Darnell and Downey 1998; Cook and Ludwig 1998), both examining data from the National Educational Longitudinal Study (NELS), found little evidence of either an oppositional culture or a "burden of acting white" among black adolescents. For example, Ainsworth-Darnell and Downey’s (1998) analysis showed that blacks actually had more pro-school attitudes than whites, and Cook and Ludwig (1998) reported finding little difference between black and white adolescents in the degree to which they valued academic achievement. The results of the latter study also suggested that there were more social benefits than costs to high academic achievement for black students.

Another more recent analysis of survey data from schools in Shaker Heights, Ohio, also found little evidence of a peer culture that is oppositional to achievement among black adolescents (Ferguson 2001). Ferguson found that black and white students with similar family background characteristics were not very different with respect to their satisfaction with school, interest in their studies, or opposition to achievement (2001:387). Findings from qualitative studies (Akom 2003; Carter n.d.; Tyson 2002) also fail to substantiate the acting white and oppositional culture hypotheses. Although focusing on younger students, Tyson (2002), for example, did not find opposition toward achievement or any mention of "acting white" among students in an ethnographic study of all-black elementary schools. In fact, she reported that the students were "very much achievement oriented and engaged with the process of schooling" (2002:1157).

Akom (2003) studied a group of adolescent females in the Nation of Islam attending a predominantly black urban school and specifically raised the issue of acting white with participants. Interestingly, none of the descriptions the participants offered included reference to academic achievement. The findings of these studies challenge many of the claims Fordham and Ogbu (1986) made, which were based on a qualitative study of one predominantly black high school in Washington, D.C.

However, there is also empirical evidence that substantiates some of Fordham and Ogbu’s (1986) claims (Bergin and Cooks 2002; Ford and Harris 19996; Horvat and Lewis 2003; Steinberg, Dornbusch, and Brown 1992). For example, Neal-Barnett’s (2001) focus groups with black adolescents revealed that high achieving black students often encounter charges of "acting white," and some respond in ways that undermine their academic performance.

In another survey of 148 low-SES black students in fifth and sixth grades, Ford and Harris (1996) found that half of the sample knew students who were teased for academic achievement, 26 percent reported being rejected when they made good grades, and 16 percent reported not having as many friends when they achieved. Note, however, that reference to "acting white" was not included in the Ford and Harris survey and no statistical comparisons to teens of other race or class groups are provided; thus it is not clear whether the peer-related achievement problems were in fact related to a "burden of acting white" specifically, or to the general culture of mediocrity which "shuns academic excellence" that a number of researchers have observed (Coleman 1966; Cookson and Persell 1985; Steinberg 1996). The results of the Cook and Ludwig (1998), Ainsworth-Darnell and Downey (1998), and Ferguson (2001) studies showing that the attitudes of black and white students toward school were not very different, lend some credibility to this position.

In their work, Fordham and Ogbu (1986) used quotes from eight students at the predominately black Capital High to describe how a "burden of acting white" undermines the academic performance of black students. According to the students, they attempted to downplay or camouflage their ability by using strategies such as humor, being the class clown, involvement in athletics, and/or doing just enough to get by.

But students in virtually all racial and ethnic groups confront similar dilemmas with respect to high academic achievement, and they also tend to employ similar strategies. For example, we find strikingly similar narratives in Kinney’s (1993) work on the transition from middle to high school of students formerly labeled "nerds." As Kinney reported, some of the students "were singled out for their superior academic performance" (1993:27). In another study, focusing on student engagement and including 20,000 students in nine high schools, Laurence Steinberg, concluded that: "…the prevailing norm in most adolescent peer groups is one of ‘getting by without showing off’– doing what it takes to avoid getting into trouble in school, but at the same time shunning academic excellence" (Steinberg 1996:161). Cookson and Persell (1985) reported similar findings in their study of elite boarding schools; even among the most privileged adolescents they found students expressing a particular disdain for their peers who study too hard. According to the authors, "Many students are placed in a difficult bind where they must succeed without appearing to try…" (1985:105).

We do not mean to suggest that the nature of this experience is identical for all groups; for as described earlier, some issues are peculiar to black students. However, in order to claim that a distinctive "burden of acting white" with respect to achievement exists for black students, we must be able to distinguish between the typical culture of mediocrity found among students from other racial and ethnic groupsfound in many American high schools and a peer culture among blacks that specifically racializes and devalues achievement and achievement-related behaviors. This was not the case in Ford and Harris’s (1996) study for example, nor, it appears, in many others (e.g., Forhdam and Ogbu 1986; Horvat and Lewis 2003).

However, in a more recent analysis of NELS and NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) data, Farkas et al. (2002), specifically challenging Ainsworth-Darnell and Downey’s (1998) earlier results, reported finding evidence to support the existence of an oppositional peer culture among black students. In particular, they found that "very good" black females in high minority schools were more likely to be "put down by peers" than other students (2002:149). This does seem to imply a situation peculiar to blacks, but it is unclear why the same is not true for black males. Downey and Ainsworth-Darnell (2002) respond to the Farkas et al. claims with a reanalysis of their own and identify methodological flaws in the Farkas et al. study. They contend that the use of white females as the omitted category in certain analyses skewed the Farkas et al. findings. They charge that Farkas et al. can only claim to have found an oppositional peer culture among high-achieving black females in high-minority, low-achieving, nonurban schools, which turns out to represent a very small number (4%) of blacks in the sample (Downey and Ainsworth-Darnell 2002). In light of this charge and the results of their own reanalysis, which again failed to find support for the existence of an oppositional peer culture among blacks, Downey and Ainsworth-Darnell (2002) conclude that the theory cannot therefore explain the achievement gap between black and white students.

The studies reviewed here, though certainly just a small sample of those that examine aspects of the theory of an oppositional peer culture or a "burden of acting white," include both qualitative and quantitative analyses, yet with conflicting results. Apparently, differences in methodological approach do not fully explain these inconsistencies. So how do we account for the contradictory findings regarding these phenomena? Do high achieving black students experience a "burden of acting white"? That is, are black students concerned about excelling academically because of a belief that academic striving and high achievement is antithetical to black cultural authenticity or that it may be perceived as such by others and therefore sanctioned? Are black students making educational choices that reflect a concern with being challenged on their "blackness" or commitment to the race by other blacks?

We address these questions in the current article with an analysis of interview and extant data collected in a study examining the underrepresentation of minority and low-income students in rigorous courses and programs in eleven North Carolina public schools. In proposing that a peer culture that racializes and demeans academic achievement results from the values of the black culture, in the way that Fordham and Ogbu and others have, we would expect to find evidence of a "burden of acting white" wherever we find black students, whether high or low achieving, for we assume that people carry their culture with them wherever they go. Thus, for example, where we find low and average -achieving black students we would assume that their performance is due in part to the a result of intentional withholding of effort, and where we find high achieving black students we would assume that their achievement incurs a social cost.

Analysis of student interviews at the eleven schools revealed that few of the 53 black respondents had encountered charges of acting white specifically because of high academic achievement. While we do find other references to acting white, they are not specific to achievement. We also find a pattern of animosity among white students at many of the schools that is connected to a perception that high-status groups occupy high academic position in the schools. We note similarities in this pattern to the development of a burden of acting white that have not been appreciated by researchers.

In the following sections we describe the study and the participants before presenting the findings and offering an alternative explanation for the process by which a burden of acting white with respect to achievement develops, which may help to shed light on the contradictory research findings. In this study, we define the structural conditions under which a burden of high achievement becomes manifest specifically for black students. In light of the contradictory research findings such an examination seems especially pertinent.

DATA AND METHODS

In 2000-2001, we undertook a study for the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (NCDPI) examining the underrepresentation of minority students in rigorous courses and programs (Advanced Placement [AP] and honors courses, and programs for students identified as academically and intellectually gifted [AIG/AG]) in public schools throughout the state of North Carolina. The diverse group of schools included in the NCDPI study provided an opportunity to address the claims of a burden of acting white hypothesis; however, these data were not collected exclusively or specifically for that purpose. Thus there are several limitations, which we address below.

Using extant data collected annually by the state’s Department of Public Instruction from all public schools in North Carolina, we first established the extent of minority underrepresentation in rigorous courses and programs statewide using a measure we call a Disparity Index (DI). The disparity index calculates the ratio of the percentage of minority students in advanced courses and programs relative to the percentage of minority students enrolled in the school. The lowest possible value of the DI is zero, a case where there is no minority participation in the advanced course or program in question. A DI score of one (1) represents parity and scores higher than one indicate overrepresentation of minorities. We have not previously seen any study that included systematic attention to a comparison of the presence of minority students in a school’s rigorous courses and programs in relation to their presence in the general student body of the school.

Using data from NCDPI databases, we determined that Biology, Calculus, English, and History were the AP courses most high schools offered (each course was offered by between 45 and 66 percent of the high schools in the state) (see Table 1). Honors Biology, History and English were offered by the greatest number of high schools (see Table 2). We used these courses for our analyses of disparity in the high schools. The schools in Tables 1 and 2 are organized from lowest to highest disparity across the variety of courses offered.

SecondNext, in cooperation with NCDPI staff, we designed a survey to assess the programs and courses available at each public school in the state, criteria for enrollment, and processes for identification, data which is not available in the NCDPI database. The surveys gathered data on gifted programs from elementary and middle schools across the state and on advanced curricular offerings from the state’s high schools. The elementary/middle school survey also collected information on enrollment by race and gender in the gifted program. We mailed surveys to principals at all of the state’s public schools along with self-addressed stamped envelopes and a letter from the NCDPI describing the study and its purpose. We received 866 (47%) completed elementary and middle school surveys and 231 (52%) completed high school surveys.

We included in our analysis a variable we called a disparity index (DI) to measure the extent of underrespresentation of minority students in a given school’s advanced courses (AP and Honors) and high ability programs (AIG/AG).Using data from NCDPI databases, we determined that Biology, Calculus, English, and History were the AP courses high schools were most likely to offer (each course was offered by between 45 and 66 percent of the high schools in the state) (see Table 1). Honors Biology, History and English were offered by the greatest number of high schools (see Table 2).The disparity index calculates the ratio of the percentage of minority students in advanced courses and programs to the percentage of minority students enrolled in the school. The lowest possible value of the DI is zero, a case where there is no minority participation in the advanced course or program in question. A DI score of one (1) represents parity and scores higher than one indicate overrepresentation of minorities. We have not previously seen any study that included systematic attention to a comparison of the presence of minority students in a school’s rigorous courses and programs in relation to their presence in the general student body of the school.INSERT TABLE 1 HERE

INSERT TABLE 2 HERE

We selected a sample of schools from a universe of schools on which we had done a quantitative study. We selected eleven schools (6 high schools, 2 middle schools, and 3 elementary schools) with high and low DI scores to explore in greater detail the issues involved in student placement decisions (see Table 1). We selected schools that would also give us a mix of high and low minority populations; SES and urbanicity were secondary considerations (Table 3). We followed similar procedures to select the two middle and three elementary schools. We selected one school with a high minority population (≥ 60%) and high minority gifted enrollment (≥ 75%); one with a high minority population (≥ 60%) and low minority gifted enrollment (≤ 25%); and a third with a low minority population (≤ 20%) and high minority gifted enrollment (≥ 75%) (Table 1). We were most interested in schools with the high/high and high/low configurations. We excluded schools with a low minority population and low minority gifted enrollment from the study. We followed a similar procedure for the two middle schools selected (Table 2). A team of three or four black female interviewers spent one day at each school conducting interviews with principals, counselors, teachers, and students to learn more about the course selection and placement process at the various schools.

INSERT TABLE 3 HERE

Banaker, East, Avery and Franklin hHigh Schools schools had high DI scores, ranging from .73 to 1.90 for at least two of the four AP courses (Table 1) in 1999-2000 (the year before we conducted the interviews), with scores reaching parity or above in just two cases, in AP Biology at Avery and AP Calculus at Franklin. Avery is the only school in this group showing a reverse trend for honors courses; Banaker, East and Franklin showed high DI scores for honors courses as well.

The other two high schools, Clearview and Dalton, have low DI scores for all AP courses offered. No black students were enrolled in either AP biology or AP Calculus at Dalton in 1999-2000, and none were enrolled in AP Calculus at Clearview during that time. Neither school showed representation of black students in the other AP courses at a rate above 30 percent of black students’ presence in the school population. At Clearview, however, black students were somewhat better represented in honors courses, with DI scores of .45 and .50 in the English and History courses, respectively. Dalton had low DI scores for honors courses as well, with black students represented in those courses at less than one-third of their presence in the school population.

Among the five elementary and middle schools, Bblack students were underrepresented in gifted programs at a rate less than half of their presence in the general student body at four schools (see Table 1) in the sample. Only at Kilborn Middle School did the DI score reach parity for black representation in the gifted program during 2000-2001. Kilborn is a fairly rural school with a majority white student body; African Americans make up ten percent of the student body and eleven percent of the gifted program. According to school personnel, anyone scoring at the 98^th or 99^th percentile on the state’s end of grade (EOG) test is "auto-in" to the gifted program. Kilborn also offers accelerated courses in math and language arts at each grade (6, 7 and 8). The classes, which include the pre-Algebra and Algebra sequence and "AP" classes, are open to any student scoring at or above the 90^th percentile on the EOG test. Both gifted and non gifted students may enroll in the accelerated classes.

Georgetown is a magnet elementary school serving a majority black population from the surrounding low-income neighborhood and a small population of white students from other neighborhoods who are attracted by the school’s arts program. White students, just eleven percent of Georgetown’s population, comprised 56 percent of the gifted program. Information from a number of sources indicated that Georgetown did not routinely provide parents with written information on the gifted program. For example, the 2000-2001 school handbook included no mention of the program, although the website did offer a description of the program. Since the majority of the black students at the school came from low-income backgrounds, they may have had less access to the information than the better off white students.

At Inkwell Elementary, although blacks were underrepresented in the gifted program, Hispanics were not. Therefore, in the original analysis which included blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans, the DI score for Inkwell Elementary was .72. The presence of minorities other than blacks did not make a significant difference in DI scores at any of the other schools.

The student body at Jackson Middle School was 50 percent black in 2000-2001 but blacks comprised just 9 percent of the gifted program.

Finally, school administrators at Holt Elementary, which was 72 percent black in 2000-2001, reported on the survey that there were no black students in the gifted program. However, three months later, by the time of the interviews, one black student was participating in the program. One of our adult respondents, a black female counselor, informed us that the student was placed in the program after the school learned it had been selected to participate in the study. The counselor also reported that although the school had a brochure on the gifted program, it was not distributed to everyone. For example, she noticed it was not distributed at the school’s open house. This may explain why the black students we interviewed reported that their parents did not know about the gifted program until they told them about it.

INSERT TABLE 2 HERESampling Informants

We relied on the schools to identify students. In a letter to the school, we requested that consent forms be distributed to a mix of high- and low-achieving, white and minority students. Generally, the group of students interviewed at each school did represent a racial mix (see Table 4). However, the achievement, and in two cases, the grade level, mix at the schools was more limited. For example, all student participants at Kilborn Middle were eighth graders, and twelve of the fourteen participants at Franklin High were eleventh graders.

INSERT TABLE 4 HERE

Additionally, tOur respondents also tended to be higher achieving students, particularly the white students. Among the 56 white students, only six reported earning grades less than C and only one earned grades below D, and 73 percent were reported that they were academically gifted (see Table 4). The group of black respondents was more diverse, with a mix of high-achieving and average students. a larger Less than half of this group (43%) reported gifted identificationproportion of non gifted students (see Table 4). Overall, there were few low-achieving students among the group; thus we miss the opportunity to learn much about the experience of this group. However, because we are interested in whether high achievement incurs a social cost for black students and whether average and high-achieving black students are intentionally withholding effort, the sample presents an excellent opportunity to address these issues. The schools may have distributed consent forms to the higher achieving students (possibly to have only their "good" students participate), or higher achieving students may have been more likely than others to agree to participate in the study.

However, the higher achieving sample, while not ideal, does offer some advantages, because the issue is whether high achieving black students are feeling social pressure to underachieve. What we invariably miss, though, is the opportunity to talk to the real low achievers, who supposedly are engaging in the peer sanctioning.

INSERT TABLE 4 HERE

We interviewed only those students with signed consent forms on the day of our visit, a total of between three and sixteen at each school. School staff self-selected into the study based on their availability on the day of our visit. At each school, we interviewed at least one principal or assistant principal, one or two counselors, and at least three teachers. With participant consent, interviews were audiotape recorded. We spoke with school personnel about the selection of courses and programs offered by the school, student placement and course selection processes, student attitudes toward particular courses and achievement, perceptions of and expectations for students, and efforts to increase the participation of minority and low-income students in rigorous courses and programs.

Students were asked a standard set of questions addressing issues about their grades, academic placement, which courses they take, how they make those choices, attitudes toward school, learning, achievement, their peers and teachers, and other related aspects of the school experience. The interviews were semi-structured, leaving room for the exploration of other issues and for the order and exact content of questions to vary across interviews. There were no standard questions asked about "acting white" specifically because this was not the focus of the original investigation. However, we did ask a standard set of questions about the respondents’, their friends’, and other students’ reactions to high- and low-achieving students and placement in rigorous courses and programs. We also collected information from students on parent education and occupation; however, some of it seems unreliable (see Table 5). Many respondents, especially the younger students, were not sure what type of work their parents did (e.g., "She works at the mill.") or how far they went in school. The NCDPI study did not contain individual-level SES data.

INSERT TABLE 5 HERE

This article is based on analysis of the interview data, primarily student interviews. We conducted interviews with 125 students in grades one through twelve, 57 teachers, 15 administrators, and 18 counselors. At the elementary level, we interviewed 40 students, of which 13 were black and 3 biracial (see Table 4). We interviewed 24 middle school students and 61 high school students, of which 9 and 31, respectively, were black. Animosity grows and over time and develops from a general concern about arrogance among elementary age students to a more focused concern about academic inequities between status groups among adolescents.

In the analysis of the interviews for the report to the NCDPI, we noted patterns in the interviews of black respondents’ that had implications for the "burden of acting white" hypothesis. Given the popularity and strength of that theory and our own interest and previous work on the topic, we felt compelled to undertake a more focused analysis of the data. We used two methods of textual analysis, manual and computer-based. Based on the themes we identified in the analysis for the NCDPI report, we began by rereading (with two new research assistants) hard copies of the student interview transcripts guided by the following questions such as: How do students talk about being smart or high achieving, being seen as such, and being in gifted or other high ability courses? Are there differences or similarities among students across the three school levels? Is there a difference between the ways in which black and white students talk about being smart, being seen as smart, and being in gifted and other high ability courses? Again, the "burden of acting white" asserts that black students perceive high achievement to be at odds with authentic blackness and that this tension creates a dilemma for the group that contributes to academic underachievement. Thus, we were interested in learning more about the achievement orientation and social experiences of black students across these eleven schools.Is there a gender difference? Is a racial or gender difference present among the youngest students?

Each research assistant and one of the authors read the transcripts and coded interviews on factors such as perceptions of students in particular courses and programs, self-perceptions, friends’ encouragement and support for academic endeavors, friend and peer response to achievement, and reasons students give for taking particular classes. Coders individually summarized each interview on these factors and highlighted the corresponding dialogue. Next, coders summarized the set of interviews by race and school level and included quotes that best illustrated each interpretative point. The three coders were in agreement in almost all interpretations and generally chose the same quotes to illustrate particular points. We then identified the dominant patterns across the interviews. What types of comments were repeated across interviews? Which respondents made which comments? What do the respondents have in common?

Another level of analysis was done using the qualitative software program ATLAS.ti, which allows for easier organization and use of textual data files. It was particularly useful for the comparative analyses that we undertook. For example, once coded we could simultaneously search all 125 transcripts for the term "acting white" or "smart," identify which respondent at which school used the term and how, and include counts of the usage in one or more interviews if we chose to do so. This program also allowed us easy access to quotes linked to particular codes and to identify exceptions to the patterns we identified. In short, we could easily identify the interviews which did not contain a particular theme and then try to understand why. The goal of this analysis, though, is to capture the achievement and related social experiences of students, their understanding of those experiences, and the context in which they occured in an effort to illustrate the process by which a "burden of acting white" may develop.

Analysis of student interviews at the eleven schools revealed that few of the 53 black respondents had encountered charges of acting white specifically because of high academic achievement. While we do find other references to acting white, they are not specific to achievement. We also find a pattern of animosity among white students at many of the schools that is connected to a perception that high-status groups occupy high academic position in the schools. We note similarities in this pattern to the development of a burden of acting white that have not been appreciated by researchers. First, wWe first present our results regarding the achievement orientation of black students to address the question of the existence of a "burden of acting white" among black students. We present the results by school level because this affords a meaningful distinction for understanding the development of a "burden of acting white" as students go through school. We include white students in the analysis to address the question of black-white differences in achievement orientation. We then describe a problem of animosity that exists for both blacks and whites in specific schooling contexts, which helps us to better understand how a "burden of acting white" appears to develop for students. present the findings related to the theme of animosity to show how such a burden might originate and argue that differences in values related to group culture do not explain the burden of acting white. We propose an alternative understanding of this phenomenon to shed light on the contradictory research findings on the topic, and the development, more generally, of an oppositional peer culture among blacks.

ACHIEVEMENT ORIENTATION AMONG BLACK STUDENTS

Both black and white students at the elementary level desired high achievement and to be perceived as "smart" by others. As we learned from these respondents, participating in the gifted program was one of the best ways to achieve that goal. Of the thirteen black elementary school respondents, only four were in the gifted program, two at Holt and one at each of the other schools. With the exception of one black first grade student, every respondent, gifted or not, was aware of the gifted program and had a sense of its significance. Furthermore, contrary to the notion that doing well in school causes psychic distress for black students (Fordham and Ogbu 1986; Horvat and Lewis 2003; McWhorter 2003), none of the thirteen black elementary school students interviewed reported peer problems related to high achievement. Instead they reported they received only support for their achievements from friends and peers, as long as they did not brag, a point to which we return later.

Participation in the gifted program was highly valued among the young students. Just one black student, a fifth grader at Inkwell, was not particularly interested in participating in the gifted program. When we asked Mikalya whether she wanted to participate in the program, she answered: "Yes, but it doesn’t really matter." The only explanation she gave for this was that she did not want to leave her class to go to another teacher for the special program. That two of the friends Mikalya mentioned hanging out with at school were in the gifted program, though, suggests that she did not view achievement negatively. Moreover, as Mikalya proudly informed us, she, and two of her other friends, were on the school’s honor roll.

All of the other black respondents who did not participate in gifted programs expressed a desire to do so, and those who perceived themselves as smart thought they belonged in the program. Most thought that the program would be fun, but more importantly, they saw participation in the gifted program as confirmation of one’s intelligence. Ria, a black sixth grader at Holt (DI=0.00), told us she wanted to participate in the program because "they [are], uhm, like, advanced math students who are, like, smart and I feel that I should be in it because I think I’m smart." Mae, another black student at Holt, made similar comments and seemed perplexed by her exclusion from the gifted program. She imagined her teacher would describe her as an "intelligent, smart student that works very hard [and] that tries to do her best." Mae explained why she wanted to be in the gifted program:

I feel like I’m smart enough to be in that class…Because I feel like I been working really hard, practicing, basically everything. I read a lot, I do math a lot, I do science a lot, I do all topics a lot and I feel like that I been studying really hard, practicing really hard, and I’m smart enough to be in the AG class.

Mae told us that she made 3’s and 4’s on the end of grade (EOG) test, which is one of the instruments schools use to screen for possible giftedness. Kyra, a black third grade student at Inkwell, expressed a similar desire to participate in her school’s gifted program.

Kyra: Uh-uh (no) but my friend, uhm Lisa, she's going to try to get to me in there, she said.

Interviewer: …Have you ever been tested for AG? Do you know?

Kyra: No I haven’t. But I need to be, I want to be tested. Because I really

wanna be in AG. It sounds pretty cool.

The comments of these students undermine theany argument that the underrepresentation of black students in gifted programs at the elementary level in North Carolina is explained by negative attitudes toward school or achievement or fear of being perceived as acting white by other black students. The black students in this sample study were no less achievement oriented than the white students we interviewed who were mostly gifted students. These data support previous studies showing that elementary age black students desire achievement and perceive themselves as intelligent (Entwisle and Alexander 1989; Tyson 2002). The students did not appear to experience much self-consciousness about being seen as smart at this early stage, and they generally reported receiving support from their friends for their achievements.

Among those few black students we interviewed who were participating in their school’s gifted program we heard only excitement and pride. Robert, a fifth grader at Georgetown, thought he "hit the big time."

Not only was Robert excited by his achievement, so, too, he told us, were his parents. None of the black students we interviewed suggested that academic achievement might cause problems for them among their peers, families, or in their neighborhoods. When we asked respondents how their family and people at church reacted to the news of their being in a gifted program, two of the students reported that people were proud or happy for them; the other student reported that no one asked him about it.

Kris, the only black student participating in the gifted program at Holt, and his parents, were as excited as Robert and his parents about participating in the program. Kris told us that his parents were happy for him because they "knew he wanted to be in AG for a long time and they took it like [he] just one a million dollars or something."

The comments of these students are not consistent with theories that posit that black students learn ambivalence toward academic achievement in their communities (Fordham and Ogbu 1986). There is no hint of ambivalence in the gifted students’ words and no indications that any family, friends or peers were displeased about the student’s accomplishment. None of the thirteen black or three biracial (with one black parent) elementary school students interviewed ever mentioned the term "acting white" in any context (although one white student at Georgetown did mention that black students accused her of "trying to act black" when she used slang) or gave indications of attitudes oppositional to school achievement. Rather than opposition to achievement, we found that the younger black students in this study held positive attitudes toward school and achievement. We did not find a relationship between Tthe level of racial disparity in achievement and academic placement in a school and did not appear to affect the young black children’s understandings of smartness or privilege. as it seemed to do among older students.

We believe, as others have suggested, that race may not yet be as salient a category for grade school children (Spencer 1984; Tyson 2002). For example, the elementary school students rarely identified people or patterns by race, even when probed for descriptions.

them to me. Describe what they look like.

Henry: Well, there’s Teddy. He’s a little bit taller than I am. Basically he has the same build as I do. But, and then there’s Shia. She’s pretty big for her age. And then there’s Jaylyn. She skipped a grade and so she’s smaller than most other people in there. And there’s Monica who, she has long hair and she’s like just, a girl.

Henry, a white student at Georgetown (DI=.51), describes students by various characteristics, but does not mention race. It may be that all of the students named are also white, therefore, as scholars of race have noted, race is invisible in this context, whiteness is the norm, a taken for granted characteristic, not seen or named (Dyer 1997). Yet because the black elementary school students described students in similar ways, without referencing race, we believe that the invisibility of race among the younger students also has to do with maturity.

This is not to say that the young students did not "see" race, for we know from their teachers that they did. For instance, a few teachers interviewed at Georgetown mentioned that students, even as early as kindergarten, recognized that many of the "smart" children were white, and the teachers expressed concerns about the impact this pattern had on the self-esteem of minority children. Young students may have recognized the patterns of achievement by race, but they were less likely than their older counterparts to acknowledge or articulate concerns or beliefs about the patterns to strangers. Perhaps the young students were old enough to know that racialized speech could get them into trouble, yet not sophisticated enough to know how to "do" race appropriately (Van Ausdale and Feagin 2001).

Among the 24 middle school respondents at Kilborn and Jackson, there is a pattern similar to that among the younger students. Both black (n=9) and white students (n=12) continued to express a desire to participate in the gifted program, but that desire now was tempered by concern about taking on too much work. Four of the black middle school students interviewed participated in gifted programs (three at Jackson), and among those who did not, some were enrolled in advanced courses such as pre-Algebra (7^th grade) and Algebra (8^th grade).

While the gifted program in elementary school was perceived as "fun" and "challenging," in middle school, students were more likely to perceive the program as involving extra and more difficult work. With classes now getting more difficult and schedules including more extracurricular activities, students were slightly less interested in taking on the additional work. Shandra, a black seventh grade student at Jackson (DI=.18), gave the following response when asked if she ever wanted to be in the gifted class: "Well, not really because I’m lazy and you have to do more projects and stuff, but besides the projects, yes." Shandra expressed no objection to participating in the gifted program on grounds other than the expectation of additional work. Reporting grades of A’s and B’s and enrolled in the seventh grade pre-algebra class, Shandra did not appear to reject to academic achievement.

When asked if she knew what it would take to be in the gifted program, another non gifted black student at Jackson, Evelyn, responded:

I know I took a test in third grade, I think it was, and I think I missed it by a little bit and so far I haven't been asked to do it again. If they ask me I think I would do it, but I'm not really excited about being in it. But if they asked me, I would be in it.

Evelyn explained that the gifted identification process "kind of confuses" her:

’cause I'm in stuff like pre-Algebra and stuff like that, but I'm not in AG; sometimes it confuses me, so I think I probably could belong. I know lots [of students] that could belong in them and I make the same grade that all of them make, so—.

Evelyn also mentioned that she knew some students who had not passed the test but were asked by the gifted teacher if they wanted to be in program "and they said yes, so now they’re in it."

Both Shandra and Evelyn expressed some ambivalence about participating in the gifted program at their middle school, but not for reasons related to fear of the social consequences of excelling academically. As Evelyn pointed out, she had (as had Shandra) done well enough to be placed in the pre-Algebra class, and her grades were just as good as her peers. Two other black girls at Jackson who were not identified as gifted were unequivocal in their desire to participate in the gifted program in middle school.

There were two gifted female respondents at Jackson identified as gifted, one seventh and one eighth grader. For one student, isolation from peers of similar background in the accelerated classes was a concern. We asked Crystal, the only minority student in her eighth grade gifted class, if she hangs out with students in the class outside of class. She said, "Only a couple," explaining that she doesn’t "get along" with some of them "at all." She called these students "the other group…the preps" and added that "some can be snotty at times." According to Crystal the preps are "rich people," "white," and "they, like, live in the Winston neighborhood." Crystal’s narrative indicates that she perceived many of the other gifted students to be very different from her, but she did not seem to allow it to bother her enough to opt out of the class. The seventh grader was one of two minority students in her gifted classes and she reported that she liked her classmates.

We interviewed two black boys at Jackson, Marc, participating in the gifted program, and Les, not participating. The latter, a seventh grader, reported dropping out of the gifted program "because, like, some of the things I couldn’t get it" so he decided to "start back on general - on the basics." He also opted to take general math instead of pre-Algebra when he had the chance. However, his grades were not as good as most of the other black participants’ grades (his included Cs and an F). On the other hand, Marc, a seventh grader, reported that in the sixth grade he requested, on his own initiative, to be tested again for gifted placement (he had not qualified in elementary school).

Marc: Nobody. It was my choice…. I went, um, to ask them to take the test again. ‘Cause I figured if nobody asked me, then I would never be in AG, so, I decided to take the test over again. I decided that, I guess if I didn't take the test in sixth grade that I wouldn’t have another chance to take it again.

Marc insisted that his decision was not influenced by anyone, not even his parents. According to Marc, he took the tests (IQ and achievement) to hold himself "to a higher standard." At the same time, though, he opted not to take any honors courses.

Because I have trouble with the work I have now. I mean, I don’t—I’m really lazy, and I don’t like to do my work and stuff, so if I did the um, if I did go to Pre-Algebra, I probably would have a hard time keeping up. But I’m probably, if I had the choice, I wouldn’t go…Because it’s just a lot of stress…And it's a lot of stuff to do now. And then if I went and did Pre-Algebra, then it would build onto that.

The course choice decisions black students are making here appear to have more to do with their perceptions of the workload and their perceptions of their own weaknesses and capabilities (for example Marc’s lowest grade, a D, was in math, which could explain his hesitance to take the advanced math class). Nothing in these young people’s statements allude to ambivalence about achievement or fear of peer sanctioning for the same.

At Kilborn we interviewed one black student, Pelham. Pelham came into Kilborn as a gifted student and continued to take advanced courses, including the pre-Algebra/Algebra sequence and the available AP classes (for which he would earn high school credits), and boasted a GPA of 3.8. Pelham may not represent the general experience of the small black population at Kilborn, but his narrative is not very different from the black students at Jackson. For instance, he reported that his friends had no reaction to his being in the gifted program in elementary or middle school, or his taking honors classes. Yet, as one of only two black students in his gifted classes, Pelham reported feeling "a little bit odd" when the topic of one class was slavery; he felt as thought everyone was looking at him. He also reported having similar experiences in the gifted program in elementary school. In middle school, though, Pelham described an incident in his language arts gifted class in which they were enacting a scene from the Civil War and some of the white students, as a joke, made a flag "with three Ks on it." Pelham was not amused, and he told the students as much.

Pelham’s comments represent one of the few instances in which middle school students discussed issues of race, but in each case, the topic was raised by the interviewer rather than the respondent. Like the elementary school students, middle school students did not identify students according to race when they were asked to describe people. However, with the older group we introduced the topic of race late in the interview, usually in inquiring how different groups got along at the school. Among the black middle school students, Crystal, Marc and Pelham were the only ones who discussed race, and Marc was the only non high school student among the respondents to mention "acting white." The students’se findings narratives indicate that although students they may not raise the topic of race, they are aware of it. For example, if we had not specifically asked about race, Crystal would may not have told us that she was the only minority student in her gifted class or that the preps were white. Does this mean that race was not salient to these youngsters? Given how Pelham described his experience and that he even remembered feeling awkward when the topic was slavery in the gifted program in elementary school, we doubt that, but it does suggest that we may have missed something by not directly asking younger students about race.

Again, Marc was the only student to refer to issues related to acting white, but he was careful to say that the term was only used with respect to the language students used or activities in which they engaged, excluding school. He acknowledged being the target of some teasing from other black students, but was quick to add that it was not related to his being in the gifted program. The discussion is worth quoting at length.

Interviewer: What about different racial groups in this school? Are there, is it integrated, do black and white students hang out together all the time, or are they more separate? How does that work?

Marc: Most of the time, but a lot of the black people think that they’re better than the white people, or vice versa. Or the black people will always pick on the white people about what they do [inaudible] and if you’re black and you act like you’re white, then they would hold it against you. The black people would not like you as much. … Well if you’re black and you act like you’re—you do stuff that the white people do, then, then, like skateboarding and stuff like that, then they say that you’re white and that you, I don’t know how to really say it, they just say that you’re really white and that you don’t care about everybody else that’s black. And stuff like that. Like if you surf or if you talk differently, like "dude" or something like that. ‘Cause sometimes I say that.

Marc: AG is really mixed up. I mean, most of the people in AG that I know of are white. I’m one of the few black people that are in AG.

Interviewer: Okay. So, does anybody say, "You’re in AG, you’re white, you act white?"

Marc: No.

It is unlikely that Marc’s experience was unique. Because none of the seven other black respondents at Jackson, those identified as gifted and those not, reported any social (as opposed to academic) fear or ambivalence with respect to advanced classes or achievement, we are inclined to believe Marc’s assessment that the things that are associated with acting white at Jackson have little to do with achievement per se.

Thus, in the middle schools, again we find no evidencethere is little support for regarding a "burden of acting white" with respect to achievement among black students. Two points are becoming clear in middle school: there is evidence that (1) previous achievement and self-perceptions of ability affect are connected to students’ course choice decisions, (where available); and (2) racial isolation in advanced classes begins to be a problem for black students.

In addition to regular academic courses, each high school in this study offers AP, honors, and dual enrollment courses (see Tables 1 and 2). Banaker High School, which was 88 percent black at the time of the study, also offered an International Baccalaureate (IB) program. A few schools also offered college prep classes. Most schools offered an average of six AP courses per year, but Avery offered just three and Banaker offered ten. All six high schools offered AP English along with at least two of the following: AP Biology, AP History, AP Calculus.

At least one AP course of the four at Banaker, East, Avery, and Franklin approached parity in minority representation (DI score ≥ .90). At Banaker, although underrepresented in each course under investigation relative to their enrollment in the school, blacks nonetheless comprised a majority in each course. At Clearview and Dalton, DI scores did not exceed .28 in any AP course (Table 1). At Dalton, with a forty percent black population at the time of the study, black students comprised less than ten percent of each AP course, and two of the courses had no black students. DI scores for the honors courses at Dalton also were low, .15 and .31 (Table 2). The situation was only slightly better at Clearview, where blacks comprised 60 percent of the student body but less than 20 percent of the three AP courses offered; however, blacks fared better in the honors courses (Table 2).

The black high school students in this study, similar to their younger counterparts, desired high achievement. Respondents believed in the achievement ideology; they expressed a sense that doing well in school has important consequences for later outcomes, including getting into a "good college" and getting a "good job." The desire to do well was unmistakable among black adolescents; however, what that meant varied for individuals. For some black students, doing well meant taking higher level courses to improve college options and/or grade point averages.

Interviewer: Now, moving from middle school to high school, how did you come to be--well

have you taken AP or honors classes all through high school?

For other students, not quite confident that they could do well in accelerated classes, the desire to do well meant selecting easier courses.

Paul: Everything. I mean—I can do honors, but I don’t know if I could be working that hard. I’d probably slack off. So, I just take regular college prep. (Avery High; junior)

~~~

There appears tomay be a "cooling-out" process operating for some students such that; by the time they reach high school many are resigned to their earlier academic placement, believing that they are not capable of advanced work and that they belong in lower level classes (Karabel 1972). According to Entwisle and Hayduck (1978), children have "fairly stable self-images by the end of 3^rd grade." For the students in this study, and across the state more generally, that timing coincides with gifted identification, as most testing occurred in the third grade. Being identified as gifted served as a powerful indicator of intelligence for students. Once labeled, gifted students believed they were smarter than the average student and required more "challenging" curricula material than regular courses offered. As other researchers have noted, these labels are usually relatively static (Entwisle and Alexander 1989). The self-assessments of the following students are similar to that of other gifted respondents.

~~~

Kimmi: I like doing advanced work because I know I’m cap…I, I can do it. (Banaker, gifted; black junior)

~~~

Interviewer: Do you like being in those classes?

Michelle: Yes. I love being in those classes. Because—you want to know why? Okay. Because it’s really, um, I don’t know, it’s just, it gives me like a sense that I’m alright, you know. And it’s not even the people in the classes, it’s about challenging myself. And I know that’s what, you know, that’s what you have to do out here in the world. So I like being in those classes. Might get called a nerd a couple times, but… (Banaker, gifted; black senior)

Students who had not been gifted identified were less likely to seek to an academic "challenge." For instance, students who had not previously been identified as academically gifted were significantly less likely to be enrolled in AP courses than other students. These students expressed greater self-doubt and less confidence in their ability than gifted students.

Interviewer: So, when you were in the honors classes, did you think that you belonged in the honors classes?

times I felt like I didn’t because I felt like maybe I was the only one who wasn’t catching on to the stuff and they made me feel bad or whatever. (Clearview; non gifted; senior)

~~~

worked out, I could be a carpenter, a builder, I could have some background in

high school. So maybe I took auto mechanics, maybe I might be a mechanic, so

I take those classes. (Clearview, non gifted, junior)

Among the 31 black high school respondents, only four of the fourteen non-gifted students had ever taken an AP course, compared to eleven of the seventeen gifted students (29% and 65%, respectively). While all of the gifted students had taken at least one honors course, the same was not true for non-gifted students. Five of the fourteen non gifted blacks never had taken any advanced courses. The interviews revealed nothing to suggest that reluctance to enroll in advanced courses among these black students was connected to an oppositional peer culture. Rather, reluctance was connected to students’ self-perceptions of ability, informed to a large degree by the schools’ labeling of giftedness.

None of the black students at Avery, Franklin, Banaker, East or Clearview reported problems with black peers related to high achievement. In fact, generally, they reported receiving support for academic accomplishments and striving, especially among friends, just as the black females in Horvat and Lewis’s (2003) study did. One AP/IB teacher at Banaker reported that her regular instruction students "looked up to" the IB students because they "appreciated" the fact that those courses were tough and "admired" the students who were able to meet the challenges of the program.

Respondents at the predominantly black Banaker, in particular, dismissed any suggestion that high achieving black students were ostracized by their peers:

Interviewer: Did your friends have any reaction to you being in the IB program or at any time during elementary and junior high?

Tyler: Not really, not any negative reactions. You know, they always, you know, say, "You’re so smart," stuff like that, whatever. I don’t think any had animosity towards me. (Banaker; junior)

~~~

Interviewer: Did your friends have any other types of reactions to you taking these classes?

Michelle: They thought I was crazy! for taking— (Laughter) especially taking like the AP class, and plus honors classes. They thought I was crazy. And it was like, ‘Well, I just gotta handle it." But they were pretty much supportive. (Banaker; senior)

~~~

Interviewer: …Have your friends had any reaction to you being in these (advanced) classes?

Kimmi: Well, you know how your friends do. They just feel like, "We know you’re going to take the honors classes or something." And they’ll be like, "Don’t let yourself go down (in the rankings) because we know you got to be third, fourth, or do something." And they’ll try to be like, "Yeah, you got the highest grade" or something. But not anything like, "You’re a nerd." Nothing stupid like that. (Banaker, junior)

We pressed our black respondents on the question of peer and friend response to achievement to be sure that we were not missing some part of their experience. Some of our respondents found our questions about this somewhat amusing, because it simply was not an issue among their friends and peers.

Interviewer: And here, do you get any sort of reaction from any of your friends about being in the honors classes?

Comments from school personnel supported the students’ reports. A n new assistant principal at Avery said commented that she had not seen as much peer pressure to underperform among minority students at this school as she had seen at her previous schoolelsewhere.

I was really impressed, last year, the first time report cards went out and many of the minority students…walked up to me and said, "Ms. H, look at my report card," and I saw A's. That was a different experience.

At these five high schools, the interviews revealed no evidence of peer sanctions for high achievement among black students. In fact, the black students welcomed public recognition of their achievement; some even sought it. Whitney, a black senior at Avery, reported taking honors classes solely for the purpose of meeting the requirements of the North Carolina Scholars Program so that she could "get recognition at graduation plus a seal on your diploma that you took all these classes." We heard similar comments:

Natalie: …I am in the Beta club.

We did discover, though, that black high school students were teased about achievement or being smart, but in most cases it was perceived to be in jest (except at Dalton). Thus, being made fun of for high achievement did not always constitute a problem for the black students.

Interviewer: What kind of reaction did your friends have about you being in this (IB) program? You said most of your friends are in it, right?

SheilaBarbara: Yeah. But like people that were my friends before I came here and stuff, are like, "Oh, she’s a smart girl now." And like, when someone needs help, everyone comes to me and like, "I know you know how to do this, cause you’re in IB." And every—a lot of people joke about it and stuff. (Banaker sophomore, black)

This experience was similar to those shared by white adolescents. For example, a white AP student at Avery described for us her friends’ reaction to her taking multiple AP courses:

They’re like "Geesh, what’s wrong with you?" [Laughter] I don’t know. They make fun of me a lot for my grade point average. They call me by the number instead of my name. But, I don’t know, it’s a lot of playful joking. (Lila; Avery junior)

Comments from other white students indicate that academic striving is not considered the norm among white adolescents.

If they know you are in honors or AG, they think you are a genius. People see you in different ways, mostly it’s a good way, but they also see you as limited in scope, like someone that does nothing but study all day long. (Ned, Franklin white junior)

There were like five of us in the [gifted] class, and then in my [gifted] math class there was about ten, it doubled for math, but it was like I felt kind of left out from everybody else, and people would like, be like "You guys are too smart, y’all smarty-pants." And it kind of got better like in the eighth grade because a lot more people came into the AG program, and so it was like that’s when I started making my friends in the program, and then we all moved to high school, and we got in honors together, and in high school it’s like more accepted and it’s okay to be in honors, but in fifth grade it was kind of like a funny thing. (Maggie; Avery white junior)

Thus, contrary to the belief that white students generally have superior standards for achievement and excel academically, which the "burden of acting white" and oppositional peer culture hypotheses imply, the experiences of our white respondents illustrate that high achieving whites face similar ridicule and ostracism from their peers because of their achievement behavior that black students do, and at times also have difficulty coping with that situation. One of the most acrimonious accounts of an experience of ridicule among whites was reported by Hannah, a senior at Clearview.

Hannah, who described herself as one of the "normal" people but admitted that other people might see her as "preppy," spent much of the interview lamenting how she had fallen short of her quest to be number one in her class and had to settle for number ten. With statements such as, "I never had to study…I always got hundreds and that’s all I cared about," it was not hard to see why other students might find her arrogant, even as she attempted to downplay that by acting "wild" in school.

Interestingly, Hannah’s strategy was similar to that ascribed to the black students in the Fordham and Ogbu (1986) article. Although it is not clear that Hannah intentionally acts "wild," to camouflage her achievement, she does admit that that behavior deflects attention from her achievement striving and reminds people that she is not "perfect." Hannah is well aware that arrogance will not win her any friends.

Across the six high schools, we would have expected to find more anti-achievement attitudes and evidence of peer-sanctioning of high achievement among the 31 black respondents than we did among the younger respondents. However, we found very little of this. Only at one high school, Dalton, was there any mention of "acting white" and peer problems related to high achievement for black students. We discuss the process by which this problem may have developed in the next section.

BREEDING ANIMOSITY

Hannah was not the only high achieving student concerned with appearing arrogant to her peers and being disliked because of it. In our interview with Mae, a black third grader at Holt, she hesitated before calling herself intelligent because, she said, "I don’t like to brag on myself much." Mae had learned that bragging on yourself around your friends could make them angry. She described an incident in which a friend was in that situation.

Mae: The person that was bragging on they said, they was at their friends talking … and said like—and the person that was bragging on said how they were so good at mathematics, like the stuff that I was talking about. And they were just bragging on, like some of their friends got really angry and just said, "Now I don’t want to be friends with you anymore." And so the person that were bragging on, they just felt very bad.

Mae’s comments informs us that being smart is valued, but it is precisely because of its value that the uneven distribution, particularly through the designation of giftedness, becomes a problem among friends or peers; for everyone wants to be "smart." Jealousy and other problems of animosity are most likely to arise among students when those fortunate enough to possess or have access to the desired "personal quality" that merits the rewards of the system are perceived to be arrogant (Sen 2000).

When we asked Tiffany, a white gifted student at Inkwell, what her friends thought of her being in the gifted program, she said, "They’re fine with it," and that "some of them don’t even know." She added: "I’m not real big on sharing it with anybody or bragging about it…" When we inquired about her friends and observed that she seemed to have friends in every grade, Tiffany told us that she does not get along with some students "because they think they’re better than everybody else…" Tiffany was clearly aware that there are negative consequences to bragging and appearing arrogant, as she herself disliked other students who displayed such behavior.

We asked Kevin, a white gifted student at Holt about how students who were not in the gifted program reacted to his being in the program, he responded, "They’re sort of jealous." He told us they said things to him such as: "You need to do normal work. You need to stay in class," which he, understandably, interpreted as jealousy. Kris, the only black gifted student at Holt, also reported that other students reacted to his being in the gifted program with jealousy, though he did not explain how.

While other people’s jealousy may be harmless if ignored, it is sometimes hard to ignore and can lead to feelings of guilt. Josh, a white fifth grader in the gifted program at Holt, expressed some guilt as well as anxiety about his achievement and the consequences for his relationships:

I feel like kids don’t appreciate me ‘cause I’m in higher classes than them, and I’m afraid that I might lose some of my friends because they think that they’re too, uhm, not very, well I guess you say "dumb," to be my friend and uhm, I just don’t want them to think that, cause they’re not too dumb to be my friend. Uhm, nothing matters but what’s inside. …Well, my friend in the sixth grade, he was in STARS; STARS is the program for the kids who aren’t very smart—his name was Mark. He got mad at me and wouldn’t be my friend for a while and then I said that I was sorry that he wasn’t in there [AG] but uhm, it’s not my fault that I was, that I was recommended for that, I was just doing my best in school and I got recommended and he said, and told me he was sorry for, uhm, not liking me for that long ‘cause I was in AG and, uhm, that was basically the only person that was affected by me going into AG.

As Josh’s statement indicates, concerns about alienation and ostracism due to high academic achievement are not peculiar to black students. If smart or high achieving students appear conceited or arrogant, envy or jealousy can turn to animosity as others express their hurt feelings. However, in the absence of conceit and arrogance, smart and high-achieving students are usually admired and supported by friends and peers, like Tiffany. Horvat and Lee’s (2003) work with high achieving black females substantiates this view.

Hurt results in the face of boastfulness or arrogance because the value of high achievement and being smart is not lost on students; they are well aware of the advantages that accrue to the smart and high achieving. For younger students the advantages include having family members be proud of you (and consequently reward you), winning awards, and leaving the classroom for special instruction. Adolescents also recognize these advantages, but the consequences for adult outcomes are becoming increasingly important. These students understand what researchers know: track location has implications for college access, and subsequently, better occupational opportunities (Lucas 1999). For older students the stakes are higher, thus the animosity, apparently, becomes more intense.

We found tThe theme of arrogance to bewas more pronounced among adolescents, and to included distinctions based on race and social class, which were missing in the narratives of elementary age students. Black students were more likely to reference racial distinctions than whites. Among whites, discussions focused on wealth or social class.

We have like, out here we have like the high spots [?], I guess you would say, the ones that were well brought up with the wealthy parents and things like that. And then we have the middle class and their parents work for what they get, they work hard and everything, but they’re just not as well off, and then we have like the low class, the ones that have hardly nothing and things like that. I would say, I’m not being judgmental, not trying to be, but the majority of the smarter kids taking the honors courses, are the well-off kids because I think a lot of them are pressured into it maybe by their parents…(Ingrid; Clearview senior; white)

At Jackson Middle, where the DI score was .18 and the income gap between whites and blacks was largest among the counties, there was evidence of some race-based animosity among blacks, as well as social class-based animosity among whites. Recall the comments of the black students at Jackson, particularly Marc’s comment that blacks at his school think that blacks who act white "don’t care about everybody else that’s black" or Crystal’s comments about the "snotty" white prep girls in her gifted class. Marc, like Crystal, also mentioned "preps" in the interview when asked about the different groups at his school. His description of them: "people that put themselves higher than—that think they’re better than everybody else" again highlights the concern with arrogance. It is not entirely clear that these comments are specifically related to achievement distinctions among the students, but given that the "preps" tend to be in the accelerated classes, they very well may be. Other black students at Jackson also made reference to the arrogance of others, e.g., "Girls that are jealous of other people, and talking about ‘em because they don’t have what they have," and "some act like, well, they are better than other people."

At Kilborn, where the DI score just barely exceeded parity and the county income gap between whites and blacks was among the lowest, the interviews revealed only social class-based animosity among whites. For instance, we learned that there was great resistance to gifted placement among low-income white students and their parents. School personnel reported that parents in the rural farming town sometimes refused the invitation to have their children tested to participate in the gifted program because "they don’t want their kids to feel like they’re better than anybody else." The principal reported hearing this from parents "all the time." A teacher also spoke about the presence of this attitude among parents, but she added that it came mostly from low-income parents. This teacher believed that expectations among low-income parents tended to be low, and she cited this, and the fact that the parents did not want their kids to be identified as smart, as possible explanations for the under-representation of low-income children in the AG program. The existence of a gifted program in addition to AP courses at the middle school probably increased the image of an academic hierarchy.

Interviews with white students at Kilborn provided evidence of growing animosity toward students taking accelerated classes. Although one teacher reported that the only time she heard "students talk about" students in the accelerated classes was when they called them "the smart ones," the white students we interviewed identified a "high and mighty" attitude, described as "acting like you are better than everyone else," among students in the accelerated classes at Kilborn. For instance, when we asked his thoughts about the other students in his AP classes, one white male responded: "There’s a couple of them that are kind of snobby."

We asked another white student, who was not taking any advanced classes, whether the students who were in the gifted program in her elementary school were the same people currently enrolled in AP courses. Her response also calls attention to the animosity brewing in the school between the haves and the have-nots.

Sarah: Okay. There are people like me-just try and stay away from-we’re not really-we’re not the rich, rich people, you know - just like the normal, average kid, I guess you could say. And then we have preps, as we call kids who think they’re better than everyone else because they have more money or whatever...

When we asked Sarah what she thought about the students in the AP classes she admitted that she wishes she "was as smart as them," but also added that "some of them are really nice and them some of then are just snobbish." And Adam, another white student taking advanced classes, added these thoughts about the students in AP: "Some of them–they are pretty smart, but you know some of them are kind of—they think they’re high and mighty…they act like they’re better than you in some ways." We asked Linda, a white seventh grade gifted student, to describe the students that take the AP classes at Kilborn, and she said: "They’re put down by others…because they’re smart" and teased "about just the way they look or something."

The sense that students enrolled in the accelerated classes were arrogant may partly explain why those students were teased and put down by others and why being smart becomes more of a burden in some schools. In schools such as Kilborn, where a perception holds that the "rich people" dominate the high status classes, excluded low- status students turn academic striving and smartness on its head, a process of inverted social closure, ridiculing and demeaning what they once publicly valued. Earlier studies that examined what happens to students who are not able to realize the goal of academic success have made the case that some students constructed subcultures that rejected, at least outwardly, the school’s values and assessments (Sennett and Cobb 1972; Stinchcombe 1964). Subsequently, the students sought other ways to earn respect and esteem that did not depend on the school’s valuation. Sometimes, that respect and esteem are earned at the expense of other students—in this case, high achieving students. Thus, by middle and high school, these students become targets of ridicule.

Describing for us how she felt about being in the gifted program at Kilborn Middle, a white student reported that students are embarrassed to be known as smart.

Although Carrie insisted that she was proud to be in the gifted program and claimed not to understand why anybody would feel differently, she later admitted that in elementary school when she found out she would be in the gifted program she "didn’t really want to" at first, "because I thought my friends might not be my friends any more."

I was in third grade, so I didn’t – I mean now I know that my friends would still be my friends no matter what. But, I just thought that they might be embarrassed to hang out with me, because I would be one of the dorks. And so, now it doesn’t matter. But, I just – and then I told them about it, and I said, "It’s really cool." And they said, "Okay." They said, "How do I get in?" And I said, "Well, you got …" cause a lot of em got applications for it. But they just didn’t want to be in it.

In middle school Carrie feels comfortable in the gifted program, but in elementary school she was concerned that being smart would make her a "dork" and possibly an outcast.

In high school, students in accelerated classes are still dogged by ridicule. Here a white student at Clearview describes how "lower class" students who take advanced classes may be ridiculed for trying to be like the high status students.

The similarity in this account to the "burden" that Fordham and Ogbu describe as being peculiar to black students is unmistakable, again highlighting the importance of understanding the true origin of the burden, which appears to be borne of envy and jealousy fueled by visible inequality in tracking. The narratives of the black and white students at these schoolsWe conclude suggest that a burden of high achievement may become manifest for anyone, based depending on the degree to which high status groups are perceived to be privileged in a given school. We do not have data on the social class composition of courses to substantiate the students’ views that "rich" students dominated the higher level courses, but their perception that high-statusthese students have an unfair advantage in course placement is consistent with the findings of many studies on tracking (Gamoran and Mare 1989; Gamoran 1992; Hallinan 1994; Oakes 1985; Lucas 1999).

Our respondents described different strategies for dealing with the burdenanimosity. Carrie’s strategy of getting her friends to enroll in the gifted program was one. Another was to avoid the accelerated classes altogether. For instance, a white student at East High told us about a friend of hers in advanced geometry who she says:

…really didn’t want to be in the advanced class because she didn’t want to be categorized as one of the snobs. Because a lot of people in advanced geometry or the advanced classes are—this is kind of weird to put this—but they’re kind of rich and they really are snobs. (Anna Beth; sophomore)

And Ingrid, quoted above, reported that her mother would not let her participate in the gifted program in elementary school because "she said that she didn’t want me to think I was better than other kids." Ingrid admitted being "mad" at her mother at the time because for her, the gifted program was "my chance to show how smart I am." As she got older, though, she understood her mother’s decision.

I understand why she did that…[A] lot of the students, some of the smarter ones, think that they’re a lot better than the other ones that have learning problems and things… They just exclude you from them as far as like everybody has their own little clique, and they’re like, "Well, we’re the smarter people and the other people are dumb," kind of thing. (Ingrid, Clearview white senior)

To the degree that status groups clearly occupy different positions in the school, with high status groups occupying the higher level courses, tracking has negative consequences for attitudes toward achievement, especially among students who view themselves as outsiders to the high status groups.

Outsiders who are able to cross the achievement boundary, which is often established during the primary grades through gifted programs, are sometimes seen by others as interlopers, intruding on a world not meant for people like them. This should not be surprising, given that, as we heard from Maggie above, gifted students "all moved" together from one school to the next in accelerated classes. Other high achieving white students also mentioned that they had been with the same group of students since elementary school, starting out together in the gifted program and continuing to take accelerated classes throughout middle and high school.

I wish we could have um—a more diverse group of people in there (AP) because we’ve had the same people over and over again…The way we started off so early, like second and third grade, and that test right there separated the, um, academically gifted from those who weren’t. (Jenny; Avery senior; white)

As Jenny acknowledged, and our dataresults substantiated, gifted identification had consequences for students’ academic trajectory and the racial and SES composition of the high school classes.

Our interviews We found little evidence of animosity among students based on racial and social class distinctions at Avery, Franklin and or Banaker high schools, where students other than those who were white and economically advantaged had a visible presence in advanced courses (see Table 1) revealed less animosity among students than at the other three high schools. Compared to schools in the other counties, Avery had the lowest gap in median income between whites and blacks (see Table 3). At Avery, just one high achieving white student mentioned that other students might see her as arrogant, but she did not reference wealth in this context:

those classes they’re automatically like, "She’s not going to even talk to me."

Or that, you know, "She thinks she’s better than everybody else." And I don't feel like that, but I know that’s the opinion that a lot of people get of me.

However, no other respondent, neither black nor white, made comments that reflected concerns about arrogant high-achieving students at Avery.

Students at Franklin made no mention of students thinking they were better than others. At Franklinthis school much was made about similarities in economic status among the student population; most of the students came from similar modest backgrounds. For example, Wwhen asked for his take on what was perhaps unique about Franklin or its students that led to minority students being well represented in advanced courses, one teacher said:

Well, you know we’re from a very low wealth county and uh, it’s not, the wealth is not, the whites don’t have all the money, it’s just as many poor whites as there are poor blacks or poor Indians. We’re all in the same boat together. So in some areas it may be a racial, socioeconomic breakdown to it, it’s not here. We don’t really have an upper class.

Our Additional analyses support the teacher’sis assertion, as we found the gap in income between blacks and whites to be at the low end in this county. Moreover, students at Franklin made no mention of students thinking they were better than others.

Avery, Banaker and Franklin differed from the other schools in other important ways. When we look at income data for the six counties in which these schools are located we find that Avery and Franklin have the narrowest gap in median income between blacks and whites. Banaker, Franklin and Avery, all medium-sized schools, also report the lowest proportion of students receiving free and reduced price lunch than the other high schools. Relative to other schools, Avery and Franklin have small black populations (less than 30%), relatively less low-income students, and less disparity in income among black and white students. Banaker is an overwhelmingly black school with the smallest percentage of low-income students than most of the other schools. This combination of factors, school size and racial and social class mix of the student body may contribute to the degree to which tracking practices produce status group hierarchies in schools and subsequently lead to animosity among students.

At Clearview and East, as described previously, the animosity among students was evident, but at these schools it was mostly limited to whites and related to wealth.

Only one black student made pointed reference to racial inequality at Clearview.

James: …That's not true for all the classes. I'm not going to say that all AP classes harbor some of the better students. But, for the majority, I’m going to say that these are the people that don’t just want to take this class because this is going to look good on a college application. These are people that want to do work. They know they can do work and they go in there with the express purpose of that: I’m going to go in there and do this. And I'm going to succeed

At Clearview, although black respondents did not express much animosity towards whites, they were well aware of the racial pattern inachievement.

All enrolled in advanced courses, the black respondents at Clearview reported few problems related to their course taking choices. Like most other black respondents, Clearview blacks insisted that excelling academically was not a problem for them and that they did not feel any pressure to underachieve, even when they were the "only one" in a particular advanced course. According to these students, the most comments remarks their friends made concerned the difficulty of the classes of the advanced courses.

Interviewer: This may sound silly, well no. How do people react, and let's start with the

students in the school. How you think students in this school react to you

personally and the AP group generally with respect to your being involved in the

program?

James: That's a wide variety of reactions. It ranges from "Man, I can't believe you're taking this, this is really hard. Why are you messing with it in your senior year? You should be relaxing." To, "Oh man, you are taking that? You must be smart," and stuff. And that kind of thing. I think that goes for pretty much everybody in our classes, in our AP classes. (Avery senior)

~~~

on with, "Oh man, that's just too hard." You know. "You might fail this." (Avery

junior)

The racial disparity in courses was not lost on Hakim (nor James), but he insisted that being the only black student in an advanced class did not bother him. "It’s cool," he said.

Uhm, mostly in honors courses they’re mostly white people. And, and, it’s uneven really, mostly white people that take it. I think in one course I was the only black boy. … I noticed that one day when I was at the back. I just said (whispering), "Hey, I’m the only black boy." (Hakim, junior, Clearview)

The experiences of the black respondents at Clearview bore little similarity to their peers’ at Dalton. At Dalton our interviews uncovered much racial animosity among blacks students connected to achievementwas unmistakable. We interviewed two black students at Dalton, both high achieving females, enrolled in honors and AP courses. Both were dogged by accusations of acting white. The narratives of these two students were supported by the statements of school personnel, including one black counselor whose daughter, another high achieving student, graduated from Dalton a few years earlier.

When [my daughter] was in high school, I had a concern that she was the only black on the principal’s list. …and often she was the only black in the core courses, and I went to the principal at that time and she asked me to do a survey of the minority students as a whole. And some of the concerns that the students had was that they did not like being in honors courses because often they were the only ones… Also, some of the kids felt that if they were in these honors classes, that there appears, the black kids look at them as if they were acting white, not recognizing that you could be smart and black. A lot of white kids looked at them, basically, "You’re not supposed to be smart and black, so why are you here?"

In almost every adult interview at Dalton we find statements indicating a negative achievement orientation among black students. Asked why they thought minority students were underrepresented in the school’s advanced courses, teachers, principals, and counselors offered a variety of responses, all centered on the existence of an oppositional culture among minority students. The respondents offered:

It is not "cool for minority students to be smart."

Minority students "lack self-confidence" and are afraid of being "the only one" and isolated from friends.

Blacks, males in particular, are "averse to success," because success would be "betraying their brothers."

Black students "don’t place a high value on education."

Black students are "embarrassed" about their ability.

The focus on an oppositional culture among black students was pervasive in the at Dalton interviews. In fact, we learned that shortly before the introduction of this study an assistant principal at the school helped to start a club for high-achieving black students in an attempt to address the problems these students encounter. One of the goals of the club was to provide a space for the students to come together to support one another, to ease the racial isolation experienced by students like the counselor’s daughter.

The two high-achieving respondents, Alicia and Tamela, both had been taking accelerated classes since middle school and were currently enrolled in AP courses. According to Alicia, many of the black students attending Dalton lived in two nearby public housing projects while most of the white students were from considerably wealthier surrounding neighborhoods (Tamela told us something very similar). Alicia noted that because she did well in school, and, like many of the white students also came from a more privileged background (her father had a college degree and mother had some college), other black students seemed to resent her.

I think when you walk by a door and see one or two spots (blacks) in a class, I think that’s when you start perceiving, "Oh, they must be stuck up, rich preppy people." … I’ve changed so much since ninth grade. I came in here timid because I am black and I was the only black person in my honors classes. I’ve had to deal with things from other black students, black students who see that I am smart; they seem to think that I think I’m better than them.

This is one of the few cases (Crystal at Jackson was another) in which a respondent begins to articulate the problem that racial isolation in accelerated classes creates for black students, especially when compounded by the perception that "rich" people receive an unfair advantage. Alicia recalled being called "white girl" and "Oreo" by fellow blacks in middle school after being separated from her black peers and placed in an accelerated class with only whites. She also reported being told by white friends that they did not consider her black because of the way she spoke and her achievement, which Alicia found equally insulting. This was consistent with the experience of the counselor’s daughter. Alicia described this period of her life emphatically as "hell."

For some students who observe the pattern of placement Alicia described, it may mean little. For others, the pattern signifies the order of things, a racial hierarchy, bringing to mind ideas regarding the cultural system of white superiority. The role of culture in this process is, as Swidler (1986) has argued, as a tool for making sense of the observed disparity in tracking. Alicia described how black students at Dalton made sense of the pattern and how it affected her:

If you make all As you’re white. If you’re not coming in here with Cs and Ds and Fs then something’s wrong with you. You are called a betrayer of your race and then you start questioning your blackness as I did. And I was like, "Well what is wrong with me?" She (a black peer from middle school) still calls me white girl today, but now in a friendly way. They don’t remember and will say, "Oh, we were just joking," but it wasn’t a joke to me.

That we do not find similar comments among black students at the other five high schools further undermines the argumentprovides further evidence that oppositional attitudes are "learned in the black community." Given the pattern found among these students it appears instead that oppositional attitudes may largely be a result of particular school contexts. We use the narratives of the black students at Dalton to describe the process by which the school context contributes to the production of attitudes oppositional to academic striving.

Tamela shared with us a conversation she heard among a group of black seniors (only one of whom she said "is going to college") on her bus that seems to substantiate Alicia’s experience and our interpretation.

Well what they think that…, ‘cause they were talkin’ about this on the bus in the afternoon, matter of fact, they were like, "It’s a white man’s world," or whatever, "so there’s no need for us to even try and, like, take the SATs," and stuff like that. That’s seriously how they feel. "It’s a white people’s world, and we’re never gonna get too far in it." That’s their mentality, for some reason, and they don’t even try.

We know little about the actual behavior of these students, so we hesitate to say they operate by the rules of an oppositional culture. What we know from their statements, though, as told by Tamela, is that they believe that the odds of them succeeding are low, which they attribute to their black skin; thus they perceive no benefits to academic striving. Such comments would be consistent with the some propositions of Ogbu’s (1987) work.

Yet, given the extent of racial disparity in tracking evidenced in their school and the striking class differences along racial lines, and most likely, their own low achievement, the students’ belief that racial inequality pervades society and will limit their success is not surprising. From what we know about their school, it is clear that their beliefs are tied to concrete everyday experiences of inequality in school, and not simply abstract ideas about social inequality, past of present. Evidence from other studies suggests that these experiences and students’ objective assessments of available opportunities for academic and occupational success are important to understanding student behavior and academic performance (MacLeod 1995; Mickelson 1990; Steinberg, Dornbusch and Brown 1992). Tamela’s peers’ lack of motivation now seems understandable. Given the extent of racial disparity in tracking evidenced in their school and the striking class differences along race lines, and most likely, their own low achievement, the students’ belief that racial inequality pervades society and will limit their success is not surprising. These Black students at Dalton High School confront faced stark inequality daily in school. s.The same was not true for black students at other high schools in this study that had less underrepresentation of black students in upper level courses, or larger black populations, fewer low-income students, and less discrepancy in black and white family income in the county. A substantial gap in black-white family income surely produces additional experiences of inequality outside of school and conveys more images of the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots," which likely compounds the problem in schools, leading to greater animosity.

Alicia’s and Tamela’s stories highlight the reoccurring theme of animosity in the face of status group disparity in placement in schools. Alicia was conscious of the image that other blacks may have had of her because of her placement among the "rich preppy people" and she was cautious about behaving in a way that might confirm that perception. More than once during the interview she commented: "I don’t want to come off like I think I’m better than other people." Tamela reported a slightly different school experience. Although she also was accused of "acting white" she seemed less offended and more understanding of her friends’ reactions to her taking advanced courses.

Tamela understood the comments of her black friends as jealousy, a sign of their desire to achieve similar success. She was less understanding of some of her white AP and honors classmates’ attitudes toward her.

Tamela: I think that there are some people that just don’t want me in the classes. I mean, you just get certain vibes from certain people and you can just tell that they don’t want you in there. Not whether you belong, or whatever.

or whatever, you know they’ll make little gestures and snicker and stuff or

whatever. But I mean I don’t let it get to me ‘cause it’s really just ignorance.

But for the most part I think that everybody has… I mean they have to accept

me, you know what I’m sayin’? Because I’ve been in their classes since seventh

and eighth grade so they know that I’m capable of doin’ it. And I’m not just put there for… to be put there.

Tamela believed that her presence was not fully welcomed in the upper level classes; that she was seen as an interloper by some of her white classmates, yet she persisted in the courses. She may have tougher skin and greater perseverance than other black students who, understandably, may be less willing to endure this treatment. Somehow Tamela is able to ignore what she perceives to be her white classmate’s racism and continue taking upper level classes even though she is likely to be isolated from other black students.

Tamela expressed only contempt for some of her white classmates because of what she believed was their unearned privilege at school. Our question on how she would describe the students in her AP and honors courses gave her an opportunity to talk about that.

Tamela’s contempt for these students and the teachers, who, according to her, knowingly allowed the "cheaters" to be inducted into the National Honor Society is evident. As far as she was concerned, these students did not deserve the academic positions they occupied. This particular situation undoubtedly contributed to the perception shared by Tamela’s and Alicia’s black peers that the academic positions of economically advantaged whites were not in fact merited by either natural talent or hard work, but were instead part and parcel of the system of white privilege.

Cheating aside, Tamela’s comments about the clique of "snotty" economically advantaged white students in the advanced classes who live in the same neighborhood echo those made by Crystal at Jackson Middle. Interestingly, among the four white students we interviewed at Dalton, there was only a hint of the animosity theme. For example, when we asked Kara, a high achieving white senior whose parents both held advanced degrees, whether she ever was ridiculed because of her grades, classes or achievement striving, she responded:

Kara: Not really, and then sometimes people will look at me like I just don’t understand what it feels like to be them; you know, like they think I’m a genius and so I think I’m better than them. You know, why I am better than them? And that bugs me, even with my friends. A lot of times they’re just like "I wouldn’t understand what it felt like to be them."

Kara alludes to the possibility that jealousy or envy may be at the root of her friends’ behavior towards her. Lexie, on the other hand, another high achieving white senior, felt alienated from her peers in the advanced courses she takes. She indicated that she does not hang out with the students in her AP class. Lexie said that while they "don’t fight," her conflict with them began in middle school:

I was the rejected alien, the one in the corner, so it's not hard feelings between us, just not accustomed to the fact that "Oh, they're approachable."

Lexie, unlike Kara, was from a more modest background: both of her parents went as far as high school and currently held service jobs.

Thus, it is not surprising to find that some students would prefer placement in lower level academic classes, where at least they will be comfortable among peers of similar background, to placement in advanced courses and programs where their difference is marked in obvious ways and they may be perceived as taking on the arrogance of the more privileged students.

DISCUSSION

In this analysis we sought to assess the "burden of acting white" hypothesis in light of the ongoing debate and inconsistent research findings. We used interview data obtained from 125 students in eleven North Carolina public schools to shed light on this issue. There was only one school (Dalton) at which black students discussed experiences associated with a "burden of acting white" with respect to achievementEvidence of. Dalton, among the largest in the sample, also showed the most conspicuous pattern of black underrepresentation in both AP and honors courses. At a few of the other schools, where "rich" white students were perceived to be overrepresented in advanced courses, white students discussed similar experiences with a burden of high achievement.

This pattern suggests that Our explanation for this finding centers on the extent to which "rich" white students are overrepresented in rigorous courses and programs may contribute to the development of animosity among students, including accusations of acting white for blacks. In schools where there were conspicuous racial and/or perceived social class differences in tracking and achievement, race and SES took on meaning as stratifying principles and were viewed as mechanisms through which groups came to occupy different positions in the school. For many adolescents, this dated back to the elementary school experience with gifted programs.

Enrollment and placement patterns that appeared to be determined by race and social class were a more salient issue for adolescents in this study, perhaps because they were going through the developmental stage of trying to figure out who they are, for it is at this stage that fitting in and peer group membership become more important (Harter 1990). But adolescents also are more mature, and better able to make sense of the things they observe in the world, and more aware of the consequences of those things. As adolescents they are now equipped with more knowledge and sophisticated thinking to understand and articulate what they earlier could not. Thus the same patterns they observed as children are now judged to be unfair and consequently lead to animosity and resentment toward the "privileged" students in the advanced classes. White skin and/or wealth are perceived to afford students certain privileges, independent of merit. Thus Blau’s (2003:54) assumption that "the racial composition of a school’s body of retained students and low-track students sends a signal to all students in the school" seems quite accurate here; for when "rich white" students appear to be proportionally overrepresented in advanced courses we find a pattern of animosity directed at that group from other students.

Given our findingsthis pattern, we suspect that the evidence of an oppositional culture found in high minority schools by Farkas et al. (2002) may be explained by the racial and social class composition of the schools and the extent to which the minority and low-income students were underrepresented in the advanced courses, conditions that breed animosity and resentment among the many toward the privileged few. Thus, we would not be surprised to find that the students who were being "put down by peers" were the "only" minorities in their advanced courses. Our dataWe find show that that Ronald Ferguson’s (2001:352) assumption that, "honors and AP courses may be socially isolating for black students," (2001:352) is not off base, and it may indeed is not only accurate but appears tobe be part of the environment that produces animosity among students, including charges of acting white related to achievement.

We foundThere was a mix of under- and overrepresentation of black students in AP and honors courses at three of the high schools (East, Franklin, and Avery) in our sample, but thus black students at these high schools had some evidence of others like themselves who were high achieving—if not in AP then at least in honors courses. In a fourth school, Banaker, which was predominantly black (88%), although black students were proportionally underrepresented in many of the advanced courses, they comprised the majority in those courses. Thus, the extent to which an association between race and achievement is formed in the student’s mind may be reduced at each of these schools. In these cases, black students appear less likely to form the opinion that "it’s a white man’s world" in which they have no place.

There was one other high school (Clearview) in the sample where, based on the degree of underrepresentation of black students in the AP courses, we might have expected to find more racial animosity in the narratives of the black respondents. However, there were several other factors at Clearview that may have offset the effects of the underrepresentation and subsequently reduced animosity among black students. First, there was better representation (although still low) of blacks in some of the hHonors courses. More than one-third of the students in both hHonors courses were black. This may have helped to diminish the perception of inequality and unfairness among the black students. It may be the case that there is some threshold beyond which underrepresentation is more likely to produce animosity. However, our data do not allow us to test this possibility.

Second, the size of the school and its racial diversity also may have helped to reduce animosity. In an analysis of the racial climate of high schools in the NELS data, Blau (2003:144) found that racial diversity promotes a positive racial climate in schools, except in the largest schools (more than 1500 students). Thus, as a medium sized school with a diverse student body the students at Clearview should have had more opportunities for interracial contact than students at larger schools. Moreover, the narrower income gap between blacks and whites in the county may have served to reduce the perception of black-white inequality among black students at Clearview. Finally, that the principal of Clearview was black may have influenced black students’ perceptions of both their position in the school vis-à-vis whites and the degree to which they were treated unfairly. In sum, this combination of factors creates a somewhat different social environment at Clearview than that at the other school with significant underrepresentation of black students in advanced courses, so the disparities were perhaps interpreted differently by black students.

The difference in experiences with a "burden of acting" white between black students at Dalton and the other five schools in this study, especially Clearview, highlight what we believe to be one of the central problems with the theory. We address this issue in the next section.

Data from the present study suggests that the "burden of acting white" is not a problem of black culture, as Fordham and Ogbu (1986) impliedargued. The framing of the issue as a problem of culture may be contributing to the inconsistent findings. Although Fordham and Ogbu (1986) acknowledged the role of structural forces in the process of black students’ academic underachievement and failure, particularly the role of the employment and reward structures, they essentially posit a deficit model by implying that black culture promotes anti-achievement attitudes that diminish academic performance (Spencer, et al. 2001; Gould 2000). Fordham and Obgu (1986) posit that there is something peculiar to black culture—an orientation, a set of values in opposition to mainstream norms—that leads to the underachievement of African American students in schools.

Culture does have a role in the phenomenon of a "burden of acting white"; however, we argue that it operates in the way that sociologist Ann Swidler (1986) has developed the concept. Swidler argues that culture does not drive action because it supplies values (and she claims that this is why cultural explanations based on values have failed). Instead, culture supplies actors with the tools to give meaning to the situations in which they find themselves. These tools are used to help individuals construct responses or "strategies of action." Thus, for example, to understand group differences in patterns of behavior, rather than an examination of group values, we would instead first focus our examination on the social situation. For Swidler culture exerts its influence here, as individuals attempt to make sense of situations and respond appropriately. In this model, culture is a mediating factor rather than a first cause. People use the perspectives, world-view, stories, rituals, traditions, beliefs, etc., of their culture to help them understand and organize their lives.

Swidler (1986) proposes that instead of focusing on how much culture drives action, researchers should focus on how culture is used by actors. This framing is useful for understanding the construction of a burden of "acting white" and subsequently, the inconsistent findings related to it, because it acknowledges the intersection of culture, structure, and human agency, which, as O’Connor (2001) argues, is necessary in such an analysis. Using this framework, we understand culture to inform an individual’s response to a given set of circumstances.

Faced with a situation in which it seems that race and wealth determine placement and achievement, black students who invoked charges of acting white appear to have beenbe using the cultural tools available to them to both interpret and respond to that reality. One of those tools is a particular set of cultural stereotypical beliefs about behavioral and other differences between blacks and whites that get called up under these circumstances. Blacks are reminded of America’s history of racism and discrimination and the cultural differences between blacks and whites, in much the same way that some testing conditions trigger certain stereotypes for particular test takers (Steele 1997).

In the present study, particular school circumstances gave rise to particular "strategies of action" among students. Rather than blame themselves for persistent academic failure and underperformance, low-achieving black students, such as those at Dalton, relied on their understanding of the history of race in America to make sense of the racial patterns of achievement they observed. Therefore, their attitudes and behavior in high school are not based on cultural values but rather are a response to the particular set of circumstances they encountered in school. Different circumstances call forth different interpretations and different responses, even among individuals who share the same culture and values. Thus, analyses that fail to consider the social conditions of schools, such as the racial and social class composition of tracks and programs within schools, in addition to that of the general student body, and prior performance, are likely to underestimate the extent to which the school context figures into the development of oppositional attitudes. Consequently, they miss the nuances of the process by which some students develop these attitudes.

In sum, we contend that if and where we do find fatalistic and oppositional attitudes among black students, as we did in just one high school here, they are not likely to be a result of merely being born black.; ratherRather, such attitudes appear to emanate from be connected to the everyday experiences of institutional inequality in an affluent white society that purports to be meritocratic. The degree of inequality and how it is perceived by students varies across schools, as we found here, depending on factors such as the school size and racial and social class mix of the student body. Culture informs how students make sense of such the circumstances they face in school and how they should act given the situation. "What should I make of this?" "What should I do in the face of this case?" American blacks are well aware of the history of race relations in America—the position of whites vis-à-vis that of blacks—and that the struggle for equality has traditionally been a collective one. Therefore when some blacks are perceived to be achieving success at the expense of others, or with little concern for fellow blacks, resentment arises.

We identify a similar process among low-status whites, who use class-based explanations to understand the relative underachievement of their group. Like blacks, low-income whites make sense of and respond to the patterns in ways that allow them to maintain a sense of dignity and respect in the face of the insult. For low-income whites the pattern can become another marker of social class, marking the boundary between the "haves" and the "have nots". For blacks, academic achievement appears tomay become just one more characteristic added to the things that adolescents perceive to mark the boundaries of whiteness. Conspicuous racial patterns of achievement then become another marker of race—, similar to wearing shorts in the winter.

The resulting "strategy of action" for some black students may involve disparaging and/or avoiding advanced courses and the students who take them. Confronted with the overrepresentation of "rich" students in advanced courses, lower income white students construct similar narratives, but theirs center on wealth and social class inequality. Hence they accuse wealthier whites of being "snobs" and acting "high and mighty." The "strategy of action" for lower income whites, though, is the same—they avoid and/or disparage those things that are associated with the "Other."

The design of this study posed some limitations, especially in terms of the sample selection of student participants; however, there were some serendipitous advantages as well. As mentioned, although our student participants tended to beWith a good mix of higher- achieving and average black students we had the, this afforded an opportunity to hear from a large number of students who we would expect to have experienced ridiculing and peer sanctioning because of their achievement, consistent with the theory of a "burden of acting white." Additionally, the diversity of schools provided an opportunity to explore how school context matters for this problem. However, the shortage of suburban schools in the sample did prevent a more thorough analysis of the influence of school region. Interestingly, students at rural schools expressed more animosity than students at urban schools.

One other notable limitation was the lack of available student SES data by course, which prevented us from assessing the accuracy of the students’ perceptions of the SES composition of advanced courses. However, as we know all too well from W.I. Thomas, "situations that are defined as real are real in their consequences."

CONCLUSION

A burden of "acting white" does constitute a problem for some black adolescents. Thus it should be of concern to educators, parents, and researchers. However, the problem is not one of culture as the original theory implied, but one of status group inequality in schools. Contrary to previous assertions, black students are achievement oriented. When that changes for students, we note a corresponding institutional pattern of status group inequality. Early patterns of placement and achievement by race and social class within schools promote the idea that academic ability and achievement are for whites only, and rich whites, in particular and also undermine the confidence of low-status groups.

Some black and low-income students do avoid advanced courses because of problems of animosity among students. But more generally, students’ own perceived lack of ability was the most common cause of non participation in AP and honors courses at the high school level. However, our data suggest that high school enrollment patterns are to some extent predetermined by elementary school placement. Gifted placement is an important gateway to enrollment in advanced courses at the middle school and high school levels. In some cases gifted status is a requirement for enrollment in rigorous programs and courses (e.g., 8^th grade Algebra), but more importantly, gifted participation in the early grades builds the confidence and competence that better prepares students to succeed in upper-level classes, as it offers students more opportunities to learn. Thus, independent of the prerequisites to enrollment, particularly at the high school level, students who had not been identified as gifted were less likely to enroll in rigorous courses, perhaps because they lack the confidence and academic preparation of their gifted counterparts. The students least likely to meet gifted placement criteria were lower-income and minority students, thus explaining their relative absence in AP and honors courses in high school.

The patterns identified in this data suggest that institutional structures shape how culture is enacted or gets played out in response to a burden of high achievement among black students, whether it manifests itself in opposition to white norms or instead takes the form—common to most adolescents—of concern over being perceived as a "nerd," or a "brainiac" (e.g., Fordham and Ogbu 1986). As other studies have found, students in all racial and ethnic groups confront similar dilemmas of high academic achievement and they also tend to employ similar strategies of downplaying achievement (Harter 1990; Kinney 1993; Steinberg 1996). Thus, we conclude, borrowing the words of Mary Patillo-McCoy (1999:208) that "radical systemic changes, not the reorganization of people’s cultural beliefs," is the solution to oppositional peer cultures in schools.

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Table 1. Level of Disparity in Black Enrollment in High Ability Courses and Programs

Table 2. Level of Disparity in Black Enrollment in High School Honors Courses

Table 3. Selected Characteristics of Schools 1999-2000

Table 4. Selected Characteristics of Respondents by School Level

Table 5. Respondent Parent Education