Chicano Education in the Era of Segregation (Al Filo: Mexican American Studies Series Book 7)

Chicano Education in the Era of Segregation analyzes the socioeconomic origins of the theory and practice of segregated schooling for Mexican-Americans from 1910 to 1950. Gilbert G. Gonzalez links the various aspects of the segregated school experience, discussing Americanization, testing, tracking, industrial education, and migrant education as parts of a single system designed for the processing of the Mexican child as a source of cheap labor. The movement for integration began slowly, reaching a peak in the 1940s and 1950s. The 1947 Mendez v. Westminster case was the first federal court decision and the first application of the Fourteenth Amendment to overturn segregation based on the “separate but equal” doctrine. This paperback features an extensive new Preface by the author discussing new developments in the history of segregated schooling. “[Gonzalez] successfully identifies the socioeconomic and political roots of the inequality of education of Chicanos. . . . It is an important historical and policy source for understanding current and future issues affecting the education of Chicanos.”—Dennis J. Bixler-Marquez, International Migration Review