Obama's American Graduation Initiative: Race,Conservative Modernization,and a Logic of Abstraction

The American Graduation Initiative stands as the cornerstone of the Obama administration's higher education agenda. To investigate the state of the politics of education in the Age of Obama, this article employs critical discourse analysis to unveil the hidden meanings and ideological commitments inherent in Obama's policy discourse. Read within and against the backdrop of what Apple (2006 Apple, M. W. 2006. Educating the “right” way: Markets, standards, God, and inequality , 2nd ed., New York, NY: Routledge.  [Google Scholar]) called the era of conservative modernization, Obama's policy discourse relies on a logic of abstraction that serves to promote a falsely “postracial” society in which hegemonic notions of education are perpetuated.