Bring the Noise: Black Men Teaching (Race and) White Privilege

In this article, we use autoethnography to reflect critically on our experiences, teaching race andWhite privilege at the collegiate level. Given our experiences as two Blackmale professors, we argue that teaching about race along with variations of race talk is treated as and translated into ideologies of "noise." Thus, race as subject matter along with our raced and gendered identities all contribute to how students hear, receive, and respond to our teaching. In our pedagogical approach, we desire to "bring the noise" by using critical pedagogy and asserting White privilege as the cornerstone for understanding social, cultural, and structural realities in the United States. Additionally, we unravel some of the nuances of our experiences in teaching White privilege and the ways that some students resist within the classroom setting. Wefind that many students contest our race and gendered presence in the learning environment, seek to reframe conversations about race and privilege, and resist discussions that focus onWhite privilege. In offering our experiences, this article is intended to encourage educators to (a) incorporate critical pedagogy that challenges and confronts student resistance and (b) better understand how their roles and identities contribute to classroom learning and instruction.