In 1985 the state of Georgia introduced the Quality Core Curriculum (QCC) in accordance with the Quality Basic Education (QBE) Act. These learning standards identified the content knowledge that students were required to learn in each subject area at all grade levels. The QCC was replaced by the Georgia Performance Standards (GPS) to identify the content knowledge to be taught and learned in the state of Georgia, which serve an ethnically diverse student population. In seventh grade Social Studies both of these sets of standards identify content related to the study of the regions and people of Africa and Asia. To date there has been no study investigating the content knowledge in these documents exclusively. The purpose of this contextual analysis study of the QCC and GPS for seventh grade Social Studies was to reveal the essential content in each. By conducting a close reading of the language in both texts the researcher identified the essential themes covered in the standards collectively. These themes were used by the researcher and another rater as codes to analyze each standard found in both documents. The responses for each coder were compared using Cohen's Kappa to determine inter-rater reliability. The researcher analyzed the language in the QCC and GPS based upon the findings of both coders. Then the researcher interpreted the findings of the contextual analysis using Critical Race Theory as a framework in order to understand the potential impact of the language of the standards on African American student learning. Physical Geography, Cultural Geography, History, Economics, and Geography were the five emergent themes that were used to code both sets of standards. Contextual analysis revealed a significant difference in the language used and the amount of content covered in each document. The QCC contained broad language that focused on Geography and History. The GPS used specific language that focused on Economics and Geography. The language of the QCC provides space for connections to diverse students as opposed to the GPS that emphasizes certain content. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]