Kids asked to create pro-slavery ad campaign
by Carmen Van Kerckhove
I have no words, really. Hat tip to HighJive.
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Is it bad that I found it funny that the black parent thought “there’s so many other ways to teach them about slavery” while the white parent said “You just shouldn’t bring that up”?
What was the point of the lesson? What were they supposed to take away from this (in a school where there are only EIGHT black students)?
I mean…I just….Wow…
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This is the same “curriculum must be ‘balanced’” horsesh*t that the NYC public schools have been pushing for a while for reasons of sheer political cowardice and mediocre academic depth. Even colonialism must be taught as a f’in balance sheet - an exercise in racist absurdity if ever there was one. I taught in NYC public schools from 2003-2005 (hoping to return a few degrees later…), and I will never forget the regents exam DBQ question for Global 4. A bunch of documents about irrigation and missionary Christianity were thrown in with some vaguely negative ones, and the students were to write about the effects of colonialism as though there was some sort parity between them. It was disgusting. Mediocre curriculum development that wants to walk the fence on controversial issues (read: slavery, imperialism, racism, sexism, the intersection of all these, and so on) rather than ENGAGE THEM IN DEPTH is the root of the problem. Timid teachers faced with conservative APs and Principals ought to gain strength by workshopping such material…by joining up with Radical Teachers…by any means necessary!
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Ok I can the issue in creating a campaign FOR slave labor. HOWEVER, as a diversity educator (hat tip Carmen for reppin’ like you) I can see a project like this actually be enlightening IF and only IF properly facilitated. For example what the role of moral campaigns, media campaigns argue/ spin issues to make the consumer think it is a good thing. The challenge though is the insensitivity of the teacher involved to not send home a letter to the parents explaining it. And of course, not adequately providing a context for children to understand why. To tell you the truth… we don’t know what prep the teacher made, what was or wasn’t sent home to parents/ families of the children in the class etc.
Teachers, for example, are often faced with the use of the N word in English literature… How do we teach that that informs students about the historical use of such terms? We can’t pretend like it didn’t exist. Slavery existed, too. What was used to promote the values around slave ownership? It was a social campaign… So let’s be mindful of social campaigns and see the potential power in them. This is a GOOD lesson potentially.
Context plays a major role in whether this activity could be positive or negative. Granted no one knows what else was discussed in the class prior to this activity to prepare the students.
The lack of information presented in the news brief was well lacking… I’d like to know the context.
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Anyone else feel violent?
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my bad for the long post.
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for the record, the piece was forwarded to me by Bill Green of makethelogobigger.blogspot.com
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I agree with Eva that context is important, that slavers’ mentalities must be understood, etc - ie, the question of slave societies must be roundly addressed. Hell, bring Adam Smith in to the discussion. Talk free labor and economics. Talk about whatever; do it well. The problem lies, I think, with the fact that the curriculum is waaaay too shallow, and so these discussions end up in wishy-washy “balance sheet” land, were timid (or tired or apathetic or/etc etc) teachers try to “present all sides of an issue” and end up with material that is at best meaningless and at worst racist, misleading, and shallow.
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Not to go on and on about this issue (sorry!), but I also think it’s less than fruitful to wait for the politically tendentious (not to mention slow moving) Boards/Depts of Ed to make strides in handling curricula better. Meanwhile, I think our best immediate hope in crafting anti-racist education lies in individual teachers. Teachers have got to work together on this stuff, be pro-active, forge ahead on the curricula in order to effectively teach about power, discrimination, and its effects while still sliding through the bureaucratic “apolitical” mess of standards in the humanities. Publishing stuff, working groups, blogs (like this one and others, of course, but also content-driven for other teachers), etc etc seems like the immediate grassroots way to develop the necessary talking points for class.
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What is up with teachers lately? Racist crossword puzzle anyone?
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=09a_1191444002&c=1 -
I saw this on the news the other day and the Wonder Showzen “Thank You Slaves” video post came to mind.
Re: “the black parent thought “there’s so many other ways to teach them about slavery” while the white parent said “You just shouldn’t bring that up”? I wonder what they would say about the Wonder Showzen video?
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Being fair to both sides sometimes means being not fair to the truth. Which is more important?
I don’t suppose these kids were also asked to make their own slave revolt army a la Nat Turner?
I wonder why.
The issue is that history continues to be taught exclusively from the perspective of whites and their concerns, priorities, and accomplishments. Until the history curriculum of public schools becomes less Eurocentric, more things like this will happen.
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As an Essex County resident I was just beginning to consider public school mainly because the taxes are INSANE! However, after seeing this my paranoia is back in full effect!
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… and another thing! Sorry I just finished thinking bout this on a long subway ride…
I think it is GOOD thing that public schools WANT to mention the existence of slavery to these kids. All too often kids get just a bit in history and maybe spend a day learning about it. This lesson, again we don’t know what the lesson plan was, could be giving a context that the students mught not otherwise learn. Again, questions in a classroom like “how does this make you feel after coming up with your advertisements? If you lived back then and knew what you knew now, what kind of counter advertisement would you created”
Questions sent home to parents for CONTINUED DISCUSSION would be helpful in order to continue to unpack this historical reality that more people (white people for example,) would prefer were left in the past…
YAY FOR BRINGING UP SLAVERY IN A CLASSROOM ENVIRONMENT OUTSIDE OF 11TH GRADE HISTORY!
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Well, this is stupid of the teachers to think that all the children’s parents would accept what ridiculous assignment they have, first of all the principal should talk with the teachers about their reasoning for the assignment (But of course if I was the principal I would mention to the school board about this issue concerning the teachers in question) not just remove it from the curriculum-because if this is the second account of assignments on pro-slavery, the principal is probably not doing anything to really stop it from happening again.
As well, it’s not just inappropriate, it’s completely and totally morally wrong. The principal is showing through his or her comments that she or he doesn’t really care about what’s happening concerning this issue, the principal probably just wants the media attention to leave the school and for the curriculum to continue normally as it was.
But what worries me most is that these children might keep the idea of pro-slavery in their heads, regardless of what else their told after, my biggest concern is that what damage these teachers had done might cause them to believe in such horrid things as pro-slavery, hopefully this will be straightened properly.
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Eva, I agree that it is potentially a very very good thing to be going into slavery so in depth, but I think the main complaint about this assignment is that the children may be too young to fully understand the irony behind it. I can see the spirit behind the assignment. The teachers wanted to give a lesson about slavery other than just saying “slavery was bad, bad, bad”, since, while that’s completely true, it still fails to grab the attention of the students and fully impress upon them how enormous the influence of this tragic institution has been on the United States and worldwide. So the kids are supposed to think, “so by using slaves, the plantation owner keeps all the profits while the slaves suffer. That’s really unfair for the slaves”. But I’m afraid some of them haven’t reached the intellectual maturity to think that, and all they’ll get out of it is that, sure, slave labor could be a great way to make tons of profit. Like Mr. Harris pointed out, children that age are still easily influenced, and these ideas could stick with them.
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I hate to say it, but this didn’t even really surprise me that much. I mean, I could almost imagine having to do an assignment like this in my middle school classes.
The way we teach history is so massively fucked up.
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I am in amazement at the number of folks that support this on here. Did anyone actualy read the topic, or listen to what was being discussed?Ill concede that in the proper format, this could be a useful tool to start an open forum on slave labor, its effects on society, and how it was beneficial to our economy at that particular time. That, however, was NOT what was presented. If all involved sides were viewed and discussed, ok. I might buy that. From one Eurocentric point of view, no. Thats not history. Its a point of view. In that context, it shouldnt be presented at all. If youre going to give a history lesson, give it completely. As a former history major, whom later became an ER Nurse, I cannot applaud this at all. This is not how how I would have taught class. The teacher is obviously teaching subjectively vs objectively. Thats wrong, no matter how you crack it.
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With the Nazi crop art and now this, it’s been a great week for NJ race relations.
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The way we teach history is so massively fucked up.
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I am glad that they are teaching slavery but that assignment is 100% inappropriate. 11 and 12 most likely wouldnt get the point and I think that could lead to them being insensitive about it. I think that type of in depth discussion should be saved for high school students. And they should stick to more details. It doesn’t have to avoid the subject but that type of discussion should be saved for students who are more mature and also have more knowledge on American history(though it can never be thorough because history is biased).
I had a discussion on colonization and the slave trade in my AP American and I can’t imagine that kids that young would have that leel of understanding.
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Hopefully the controversy can be used to positively influence the kids to see how evil people see this as, and how awful it is to suggest the necessity of injustice and inhumanity to another and maybe we’ll have some leaders more valiant than the current crop…*leaving political soapbox for now*
I think this will instead just highlight how self-congratulatory the educators and PTA will feel after kicking the crap out of a PRO-SLAVERY assignment in the media.
What I mean is, they’ll probably claim some sort of victory out of it and not move on other possible issues of concern for the students of color and their families, like a non-Eurocentric curriculum, a TWI program, or lobbying for more Headstart money.
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Like others have said, I can see where this could be beneficial - IF the teachers had discussed it correctly and IF the children were mature enough to understand the lesson.
**Am I the only one that noticed it was a ‘language arts’ assignment? WTF?!?**
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I see this alot these days. This is how today’s children are indoctrinated to believe racism is over, slavery was good, etc. It applies to the holocaust as well, QUESTION EVERYTHING. Then they go on believing it’s okay to hang nooses from their truck because they were taught to question history and justice. It’s just the new racism, so insidious and so much more dangerous because OUR kids (kids of color) are falling for it too. Esp. since many of us are teaching our kids any better. Damn shame.
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Just read this on GlobalGrind.com and I’m appalled. As if reading about the assignment isn’t bad enough but then to learn this is the second year this assignment has been given….WTF
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
Homework: Explain Why Slavery Was Good! / Stereohyped on 04 Oct 2007 at 11:01 am
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Yes Timmy, Slave Labor IS Cost-Effective - Global Grind: Social Issues on 08 Oct 2007 at 10:53 am
[…] uncomfortable reading about it, think how the very few black students in the school felt. Read More at Racialicious Published Oct 08 2007, 11:51 AM by sford Filed under: slavery, […]