A Necessary Lesson

I'm sure I've mentioned my issue with the need to have black history month or African American studies courses that are separate from regular history lessons, and invariably, only end up being presented to black students. However, statements like the ones from this gentleman prove that too many people still don't get it.

In the letter, the Northeast Philadelphia Republican called the new African American history requirement 'unnecessary' and asked the commission to reconsider its mandate. Perzel wrote that he was concerned the mandate would 'divide, rather than unite, the district's student body.'

In an interview, Perzel went on to say, 'Most of these kids will never go to Africa. They have no affinity toward Africa.'

WTH? Black/African American history classes aren't about studying Africa. Generally, they are about making sure that black kids understand that they are just more than blips - about slavery and the 60's - on the timeline of this nation's history.

'We want to make it clear that we are very much in support of the teaching of African American history in the Philadelphia School District and throughout Pennsylvania,' said Rep. Thaddeus Kirkland, (D., Delaware), chairman of the Black Caucus.

To illustrate his point, Kirkland held a copy of the front page of yesterday's Inquirer, which featured stories about Perzel's letter and also about the manslaughter conviction of a man in the 1964 killings of three civil-rights workers in Philadelphia, Miss.

'This shows how important it is that African American studies are taught in our schools,' said Kirkland. 'So that things that happened 41 years ago won't repeat themselves today.'

Kirkland said the group wanted to meet with Perzel to let him know how strongly they feel about the need for African American studies.

He said Perzel agreed to the meeting, which would likely take place Monday.

Beth Williams, Perzel's spokeswoman, said that he 'respects the opinion' of the caucus and that in the letter Perzel was 'just expressing his opinion to Nevels.'

Nevels said he was in the process of drafting a response to Perzel. 'The SRC has made a determination as to curricular policy in respect of African American history and will be seeking the implementation in the upcoming school year,' he said in a statement. 'The African American history course will intersect with U.S. history within a multi-cultural framework.'

In college, I took one of the required American History classes and ended up having a white professor who decided that standard American history classes were lacking information on black Americans. During each and every lesson, he made a point to mention the part black Americans played - a far cry from the usual blips I mentioned above. I am sure it had something to do with the fact that he'd recently acquired a black nephew via marriage (some pro-ball player) and wanted to learn a few things himself. He mentioned that prior to that liaison, black folks had only been allowed at his parent's back door. However, while I was inspired that he'd interjected black countributions throughout each era in the country's history, I was sad to find out (the next semester when I took a another history course from him) that my white peers from that class were not too enthused about finding out what black people meant to the creation and development of this country. He shared that he received many comments from his student evaluations that echoed the sentiment: "I didn't take this class to learn about a bunch of niggers." (I still marvel that my worst experiences with racism were at the hands of white Catholics at a Jesuit university - but that's another story).

In any case, the fact that people still feel compelled to create sites like this this (created by white siblings with a black step-mother) and this (created by a black woman who just got tired of dumb questions) means that people still don't know enough about each other and that has got to change - hopefully sooner than later.