Teaching about Race and Racism Across the Disciplines

Content:

“To what degree will schooling serve African Americans if it teaches them to respect and honor the cultures of others and not their own?”¹⁷

This is a timeless statement, from historian and scholar Carter G. Woodson, that directly says that African Americans learn more about cultures of others than their own and more about the history of others than their own. When they do learn about people who are their same race, they may not be learning the truth of them. These are grave examples of colorblind ideologies and mindless approaches to change. “Colorblindness is the act of pretending that racial recognition rather than racist rule is the problem to be solved.”¹⁸ Colorblind ideologies and pedagogical approaches do not teach the truth about history and it undermines the validity of the experiences of African Americans and people of color. Racism, racial injustice and colorblindness have been a force at the core of the European colonization of America. It has affected every area of influence from religion, family, education, government, media, arts, and business. It has to distorted truth, mutilated minds, annihilated billions of people, and disrupted families. It has also affected every discipline from criminal justice and law, music and arts, to health, math, languages, and English Language Arts. To critically understand racial rule and racial dominance throughout the disciples one must know history.

Post-Civil War Era

As stated previously, students in inner-city/urban environments are more susceptible to various obstacles that attempt to inhibit the progress and success of their life. Though the history of African Americans and people of color did not begin with slavery, we can begin in the history of slavery, where innocent lives were forcibly removed from their homeland to work as free/cheap labor on stolen land. Fast forward to the Civil War. In post-Civil War America, African Americans were offered schools before they were offered housing and employment.¹⁹ Why is this important to know? This was another race neutral and colorblind way to maintain control over the minds of newly freed slaves.²⁰ Instead of having the pure intent of building up the newly freed African Americans, white people saw an opportunity to maintain racial hierarchy covertly. The colorblindness in this situation is found in the attempt to control freed people by way of education. The mindset of education then was field and factory work.²¹ Over time, people realized that this was another method of oppression, by indoctrinating people of color as a means to help maintain white racial power for economic gain. Education wasn’t the only way African American’s were oppressed.

Great Depression, Injustice in Housing and Education

In the 1930s, after the Great Depression, the housing market was entangled. There were many people who lost their home or were in danger of losing them. In order to prevent many foreclosures and to stimulate home ownership and employment, The Federal House Administration (FHA) of 1934 was formed.²² The FHA created “residential security maps” for over 240 cities to prevent people of color from purchasing homes.²³ This is the progress of redlining. How does this affect our students in society today? Students have their ecological system. Education, housing, food, family and more are a part of that system. When their system of life has been disrupted by white supremacy and injustice, the whole child is not covered therefore has now roadblocks to overcome. Does this mean that our students won’t succeed? By no means will our students fail in life knowing their history, having their internal fortitude and understanding that inspire roadblocks they can overcome. With knowing this history of systemically infiltrating all disciplines and livelihood, many people realized the need for a paradigm shift from rote to creative.²⁴ A program that could shift the paradigm, highlights the need for students of color to be able to express themselves, learn how to function wholly in the world politically and socially and learn as a unit is called Freedom Schools.

Freedom Schools

Freedom Schools began during the heart of political and vibrant momentous change, The Civil Rights Movement. The Civil Rights Movement was an organized effort by African Americans to end racial discrimination and gain equal rights under the law.²⁵ It was an over - a - decade long struggle for justice and equality for African Americans that took place mainly in the 1950s and 1960s. This is not to dismiss the 400 plus years of fighting for injustice. The Civil Rights Movement was led by many prominent leaders, such as Martin Luther King Jr. Malcolm X, and the Little Rock Nine. ²⁶ African Americans, and other people of color experienced much overt racism during this time. The Civil Rights Movement was the momentous fight to end not only overt racism but covert racism that began during the Colonization of America.

Freedom Schools were one of many actions and solutions taken to expose racist, industrial model of education and impose creative, critical thinking education. While using this history in this unit, students will learn the power of community and unity to debunk the savior complex and Black exceptionalism. Freedom Schools were a six-week summer program that was designed to prepare disenfranchised African Americans to become active political actors on their own behalf (as voters, elected officials, organizers, etc.)²⁷ Freedom Schools, that began in church in Mississippi in 1964, promoted education for transformation and liberation, allowed students to learn about the history of the Civil Rights Movement beyond an individual hero, speech, or march and invited all of us to look critically at the purpose of education today and the possibilities for the future.²⁸ This style of pedagogy developed a new level of critical thinking for young African American children and even adults. This program empowered young people “to articulate their own desires, demands, and questions” and “to find alternative and ultimately new directions for action.”²⁹ One core element of Freedom Schools is community. Freedom Schools are concerned about the entire child; their ecological system.

For Black Mississippians, the schools were the first time they had been encouraged to think and act politically, and to explore their creative impulses. Freedom School students read books and poetry by Black authors and listened to stories of Black resistance in past times. At the Holly Springs Freedom School, Pamela Allen taught her students about the Haitian Revolution. “When I told them that Haiti did succeed in keeping out the European powers and was finally recognized as an independent republic, they just looked at me and smiled,” she recalled. “The room stirred with gladness and a pride.”³⁰

We discussed briefly how Johnathon is a young boy who despite all odds, succeeds in life due to his internal fortitude and ecological system, or community. During 1964, in a state of much violence, many white Mississippi residents were enraged with growth of African American critical thinkers. The thought of African Americans voting violated the sense of power and authority among white Mississippians. If African Americans voted they would invite the risk of possibly getting hurt or killed because white Americans registered African Americans voting as “messing with white folks business.”³¹ Numerous African Americans in Mississippi were murdered trying to vote and transform the political climate. In spite of the violence and radical acts throughout Mississippi during this time, young African American Mississippi leaders attempted for three years to mobilize the Freedom Schools.³² Because that was unsuccessful alone, they invited over 1,000 African American and white students around the country to come to Mississippi to help build the Freedom Schools These students came from colleges around America, including Ivy League schools and more.³³ Many of the students from colleges came with the dominant narrative that they were coming to save African American children.  They really instantaneously reminded that this was a serious matter. They were to follow directions from African Americans, live with African Americans and they were told that their life would depend on their listening to African Americans.³⁴ The dominant narrative was quickly countered as African American school leaders and organizers reminded them that we’ve they’ve invested in once caused some people their lives.³⁵ Through these efforts of honesty, volunteers and organizers were able to engage emotionally in order to unify for one goal and one purpose.³⁶ The goal of Freedom Schools was to alter forever the state of Mississippi, the stronghold of the Southern way of life.³⁷ The goal of Freedom Schools was to alter forever the state of Mississippi, the stronghold of the Southern way of life.³⁸ 

History’s Connection to Johnathon

The concept of Freedom Schools directly relates to Johnathon because Johnathon has a collective community. He has a mother, father, brother, dog, his classmates, a teacher, a principal, and later in life his professors and his own family. One situation of his community showing was in chapter 1 on pages 7-8.  Johnathon describes his mom crying and asking him:

“Do, ya’ know why we’re making ya’ go to school...cause we want to make ya’ somebody important. I don’t want ya’ to be like us, Johnathon I want ya’ to have a good fewchr, where ya’ can have a good job and be happy. Going to school will build ya’ a good fewchr.”³⁹

Miss Harris, Johnathon’s teacher, or “techr” as Johnathon says, teared up as Johnathon asked her,

Techr, can ya’ make me somebody important today so’s I can make mommy proud when I go home? Can ya’ make me a ‘specially good fewchr so’s I can have a good job and make my mommy and me happy? Can ya’, Techr?” ⁴⁰

This is a very great example of Johnathon’s ecological system. His mother, who wants the best for her child but struggles to want the best for herself, understands the value of education. Miss Harris, though not wanting Johnathon in her class at first, becomes vulnerable as she hears the passion and desire from his mother to himself. Like Freedom Schools, this communal life of Johnathon shows the connectivity of all things important to Johnathon, including literature and education. Did Miss Harris make him somebody important? She was an influence in his change and contributed so much to his future. But alone, Miss Harris could never do all that Johnathon needed to succeed. He needed the partnership of his willingness and others. Johnathon become a change agent for his future and his legacy as he became a successful doctor. In Freedom Schools, the students become the change agents in the world politically, as Johnathon did become a doctor. Within the unit, we will be creating a Freedom School environment within our individual classrooms that we can transcend throughout our schools and districts with the use of Johnathon. This is to allow students to connect history to present day in order to become knowledgeable of the approaches to liberation during the Civil Rights Movement, how community impacts a life and a movement, and the ability to overcome any and every obstacle that life presents.