It seems to me that segregation is typically studied in schools as an investigation of an historical artifact, something that was terrible and that happened in the past. Certainly studying Jim Crow and related issues and events is important, but we can not ignore the many examples of segregation and racism in our present. I've enjoyed using this powerful piece from The New York Times in my English education courses. Typically we read the article and watch the story embedded above. I find hearing the student voices and opinions especially moving - the clip and the article work well together. I'll ask my students to jot down anything they read or hear that is powerful to them and we build a discussion from there.
But how to study the past? It seems to me the present is the best starting point. Engaging in this shared reading of the present provides us with a base - a central gathering point for our inquiry. From there we can explore the idea of segregation as both a present and historical problem, turning our attention to local, regional and national issues.
I also think it's useful to examine this list of the most segregated cities in the US. It would be interesting to begin a discussion with students about segregation locally and then ask them what they think the most segregated cities - or areas of the country are.
Another piece I've used in the past to talk about these issues:
What other examples of contemporary segregation might we use when reading TKAMB?
I don't remember reading much of Martin Luther King's work as a high school student. Certainly we read the I Have A Dream speech - and I remember the movement to have his birthday declared a national holiday - and the movement to resist it.
I wasn't made aware of his move towards a broader call for social justice and civil rights for poor people until college. It fascinated me though and engaged me. As a high school teacher I used "Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam," and students were always surprised that Dr. King talked about the Vietnam War. It seemed Dr. King had been celebrated and canonized and stood stagnant on the I Have A Dream posters hanging in classrooms, relegated to the January holiday that celebrated his life and as assigned reading during African American history month.
Taking up Dr. King as a common talking point with students - as both as a person and as a symbol of the movement - to begin an inquiry around civil rights in the time of TKAMB and in our own time.
I often use Marc Bamuthi Joseph's Savage Inequalities from NPR - a piece that does a nice job problematizing our engagement with Dr. King's legacy - to begin a discussion around these issues. In tonight's class though, I think I'm going to start with this ABC news clip:
I think we will also listen to some of "Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam," listen to the Bamuthi Joseph piece, read some Langston Hughes and maybe even watch this Kanye WEst video:
Of course we'll do some of our own writing about MLK - some reflecting and talking about how we were asked to engage with him as students and what cvil rights means to us. I found this short piece (which I think would eb good to use with students) written by a young white male about MLK, Public Enemy and what it all means to him. Later we'll look into some of the youtube clips and writing around Occupy Wall street and ask ourselves if this movement is part of Dr. King's legacy. We'll also look at my all time favorite teacher created site about a year-long inquiry project in Detroit.
This should help frame our inquiry around issues of race, socioeconomics and the ongoing civil rights movement as we start reading TKAMB.
I'm reading To Kill a Mockingbird this semester with my students in LAI 513. I picked the title because it is still widely taught in schools and many of my former students have commented over the years that, for many of their own students, the book can be tedious and difficult to follow. This past week I started planning how I might "teach" the book this semester. My goal is to work through the book with my pre-service teachers just as a I would with high school students.
So I took to the web, as I often do, to check out what's been going on in pop culture. For the past two years I have had success teaching Of Mice and Med as an inquiry into gender, race and class, using Katy Perry's video for "California Gurls" as a starting point and I thought there might be some popular song out there that might lend itself to an inquiry into the larger ideas, themes and issues TKAMB raises. Certainly issues of race, class and power come into play and I'm sure there are a few videos out there that would be interesting to use.
I can't stop thinking about Atticus though. Reading the book this time around his role as a white savior seems troubling to me. These white saviors are, of course, everywhere in popular culture. Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds, Hillary Swank in Freedom Writers, Sean Connery in Finding Forester, what's her name from Speed in The Blind Side and, more recently, The Help (here's a nice oped piece critiquing that movie from the NY Times). And here's an extensive list of these types of films.
White people to the rescue
Examining race in the novel
Is Atticus Finch drawn in the same vein? Would this question be enough to jumpstart some meaningful inquiry? I don't think so, but it certainly would be an important component to examining race in the novel. I can't, for example, imagine not discussing Scout's early references to "Negro's."
"A Negro would not pass the Radley place at night. He would cut across the sidewalk opposite and whistle while he walked" (p. 11).
"The Sheriff hadn't the heart to put him in jail alongside Negros" (p. 14).
These, and many other passages from the book, are part of a much wider, and ongoing theme in American culture: White people talking about race.
Newt Gingrich, for example, had this to say the other day:
The NAACP responded, clearing up some of the misconceptions embedded in Gingrich's statement"
"It is a shame that the former speaker feels that these types of inaccurate, divisive statements are in any way helpful to our country. The majority of people using food stamps are not African American, and most people using food stamps have a job."
I'd like to spend some time looking at Scout's talk about race - Newt's comments here would be useful in examining this theme as a contemporary issue.
The Help
White people should comment less about race and they should listen more. Scout's comments about Calpurnia are worthy of some focus:
"Calpurnia rarely commented on the ways of white people" (p. 15).
It would be interesting - and important - to ask students why they think Calpurnia, at least according to Scout, doesn't have much to say about white people. A scene from The Help might be useful here.
Certainly examining the historical context is important. We need to know what happened. The danger is, of course, leaving it there. Any inquiry worth doing directs students attention to the present. This is exactly the danger of The Help. "Yes, things were bad back then, so glad everything is OK now!"
The clip below, a short piece about recreating the historical Jackson for the movie, is a good example. Scroll to the interview at 40 seconds:
I think her comments do a nice job capturing some of my problems with this movie. Was it all bad? I guess it depends upon who you ask...
So that's my initial thinking. Next I'll need to develop some big questions to guide our inquiry, and look at what other texts might be help us explore those questions.
Below are a few University at Buffalo English Education graduates' presentations from National Council of Teachers of English 2011 conference in Chicago. These research projects were conducted while students were enrolled in English education courses at UB. Students conducted research in secondary ELA classrooms. All names are pseudonyms.
Christina McGee - Imagine a word that could unlock the human potential: encouraging students to develop voice beyond the ELA classroom.
A student played this in class yesterday for a presentation on conflict resolution. Not to over simplify, but it might also help us think about classrooms as communities of practice and how teachers might approach issues of classroom management and interactions with their students.
