From: Christine Taylor-Butler <kansascitymom_at_earthlink.net>
Date: Mon, 01 Aug 2011 14:16:27 -0400 (EDT)

There is no polit ically correct way to say this&nbsp; so I'm just going to put it out there. It is a positive thing that there is so much passion around what "k ids need to know" but there is very little thought to the fact that much of the discussion comes from people who are not of the "race" that they are p ublishing books about.&nbsp; So I'm asking for some sensitivity when author s rush to showcase their books on civil rights and explain the positive rec eptions they get from children during school visits.&nbsp; It's a one hour snapshot in the life of a kid who may or may not internalize the message bu t will give a positive response just the same.&nbsp; It's commonly known - for instance - that you can't include a child's reaction on a book submissi on.&nbsp; Because children love the attention they get from adults and want to please them.

For children of color - having someone white come i n and teach them about intolerance and the injustice is fraught with minefi elds. For many urban children, they're still seen as the "face of the oppre ssor."&nbsp; Especially if their parents are old school or still struggling .&nbsp; Urban districts used to be filled with teachers of color - many of whom lived in the children's communities.&nbsp; Emphasis on desegregation n ot only eroded that, but resulted in lower academic achievement.&nbsp; So w e talk about injustice, but only from the framework of the oppressed - not from an analysis of why someone would do such a thing to another human bein g.

And does it change anything? If so, we wouldn't have sweat shops, we'd stop buying our goods from a country where we'd be outraged by the slavery in India where children pay off debts as low as $1.00 incurred decades ago by a distant relative, etc.&nbsp; We'd get past "Slum Dog Mill ionaire" moments to really look at the fact that those conditions still exi st in Inidia (and here) for a large portion of the population.

So th at is not to say don't teach it. It should be taught.&nbsp; But by whom and in what context? And why limited to African Americans when US history has similar examples of other injustices of ethnic minorities?&nbsp; But as I'v e said at numerous writing conferences when everyone wanted to jump on the diversity bandwagon - you can't possibly know what those children are think ing once they go home.&nbsp; And hence my comment that you leave parents li ke me to unravel the soundbites and deal with the aftermath. These kids want to read stories about empowerment.&nbsp; They don't "reach" for "those" books voluntarily because they're neither enlightening or upli fting.

I find, however, that ELLINGTON WAS NOT A STREET is a favorite when I'm on school visits (I don't always read my books - I read the works of other authors to the children).&nbsp; The language is spa re allowing the child to bring something of themselves to the story.&nbsp; It doesn't mention oppression at all.&nbsp; And yet the biography at the ba ck of the book opens a wonderful landscape of opportunities to discuss the important things those individuals went on to do in the world.&nbsp; Withou t overloading the child with negative images born of adult guilt.

I was perusing some of the poster's sites when I came across this gem from N ancy Tolson:

 Teaching children's and adolescent literature at universities that are predominately white is not just a job but also an adventure when you are a Black professor. I knock out walls to insert new rooms of thought in order to reevaluate the books on my students' childhood shelves.

Exactly. Absolut ely.

Go back and read her post again on this thread about her job as a mother and how she frames her library for her children.&nbsp; It is vita l - if we are to get this right - for "gatekeepers" to understand that you have that child's attention for an hour.&nbsp; You leave us with weeks and months of debriefing afterwards. Kids "get" injustice. They see it ever y day in television images, and people's reactions to them on the street an d . . . .(fill in the blanks of that child's daily existence). The following is why I'm so passionate.

I spent a we ek at the Children's Public Library in Rogers, Arkansas.&nbsp; 4-5 classes each day.&nbsp; On Saturday, a teacher returned to say one of her girls was all fired up because I'd done a presentation on where to get good "facts" for a nonfiction book and mentioned MIT.&nbsp; She was Hispanic and questio ned whether I was "Black." (I"m pretty brown so there's no wiggle room ther e :-)).&nbsp; When the teacher confirmed it she said "So you mean they let her go?&nbsp; She's Black and it was okay?&nbsp; Does that mean a kid like me can go?"&nbsp; She asked to shadow the teacher who was working on an adv anced degree and "test drive" a college campus. She was a 4th grader. I cry every time I tell that story, because it's the 21st Century and we still have kids like that.&nbsp; Not because we aren't introducing the "lan guage" and doing the "exercises."&nbsp; But because until they see - with t heir own eyes - someone who had to walk the same minefields and suffer the same road blocks and indignities - it
 doesn't ring true.

It isn't th at they don't know the history - or that life is unfair.&nbsp; They want to know how to navigate it in practical terms they can apply right away.&nbsp ; For many of these kids it's the difference between eating and not eating. So yes - slavery and civil rights was a horrible period of history. But absent of all the amazing things people of color did -&nbsp; have gone on to do (with or without the obstacle of oppression) it's just an exercis e whose meaning will not be internalized long term.

Which begs the q uestion - why the rush to tell "the stories of our ancestors" rather than y our own?"&nbsp; Would we be as enamored if the stories of the Holocaust sur vivors were mostly told by Germans ?..............C
Received on Mon 01 Aug 2011 02:16:27 PM CDT