It is African American History
Month again and I find myself with the same anxiety that I feel every year about
this time when my students start getting restless, questioning why they must
endure my lessons, answer my questions and read my required texts. And although keeping them motivated is a monumental
task, it is a labor that always bares fruit.
I am no psychologist but I am certain that each time I lead my students
through the tumultuous annals of our complex history there are distinct psychological
effects. Students rebel against this
history in ways that are both varied and intriguing. It seems that the very thought of reading any
piece of literature that involves Jim Crow, slavery or racism sometimes hurls
even the most docile African-American student into attack mode. These assaults fluctuate between the passive
aggressive to the overt, ranging from students falling asleep to flat out causing
disturbances aimed at the primary goal of removal from class. At first, I thought that I was imagining such
behavior but now that I am in my ninth full year of teaching, I know that the correlation
between the month of February and student behavior is real.
But there is one variable in these
occurrences that I have not mentioned; me.
Although I have often questioned my part in all of this, I am only just
now discovering that I am just as affected by oft-difficult to-digest parts our
history as my students. The beginning of my discovery began in AP English class
when I introduced Ralph Ellison’s Invisible
Man.
In week one of the text reactions were mixed. Although some were excited about the aspect
of finally leaving Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit
451 behind, they soon discovered that in terms of complexity they might
have been leaving the frying pan meeting the fire. What I didn’t expect however, was the level
of resistance that I would receive in getting them to accept it. Much of the rebellion came from the promise
of reading The Color Purple, another
African-American classic, which many of them were familiar due to its Hollywood
interpretation. Although I could blame my decision to teach Ellison on my
principal’s suggestion, I must confess I was more interested in giving my
students a literary experience that was not as influenced by the big
screen. And not to discount Alice Walker’s
work, what I have discovered is not only can Ellison’s writings cause discomfort
in students, but in educators as well especially the educator is Black and
male.
About two days ago I gave these
students the task of finding a pivotal moment in the text that marks the beginning
of the narrator’s journey to maturity. One
such moment is in the prologue when the narrator’s grandfather gives him
deathbed instructions on how to survive in the white man’s world. My first reading of Invisible Man was over twenty
years ago. And although I cannot recall
any deathbed instructions from my elders, I remember my father once telling me
that my life would always be difficult and that things would never come easy
for me. His words have now come full circle
especially in my last five years as a teacher where I have met at least three
incarnations of Dr. Bledsoe, the head of the college where the narrator
attended and the man who later removed him from that same school teaching him
the true meaning of power and the trappings and disappointments that admiring
our own can sometimes entail. It is only
now at age 43 that I am able to recognize my father’s words as a pivotal moment
in my life. And because of that moment, much of my life’s journey has been a
quest for confidence. On the other hand, my students are in the middle of their
pivotal moments and I can only assume that many if not most don’t grasp their
significance. And it would seem that they
resist any connections that they may have to Ellison’s text because many of the
pivotal moments that his main character experiences are painful at best. Either
they don’t think that the events that render this character invisible are
possible in their lives or they choose to ignore them if they are. I cannot find fault in this because it is a
symptom of youth. But even my awareness of
this does not alleviate the tension that exists in my African-American and
Afro-Caribbean classroom; a tug of war between what the world was and what it
will be for blacks in this country; one side pulling for the memories no matter
how tragic to remain alive, the other pulling with all its might to
remain unaware.
My awareness of this tension was
further enhanced when I introduced my tenth graders to text called A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines
where the main character is an African-American teacher in the Jim Crow south
that has been given the task of helping Jefferson, a native of the town a
chance to die with dignity after being wrongfully accused of murder and
sentenced to death. In contrast to the twelfth graders, tenth grade students
are a bit more expressive about their feelings about the goings on in a
classroom and unlike the seniors, they expressed their disdain for this book from
day one. I have come to expect this from
them. In fact many of the comments that I
have heard since we have started have been somewhat innocuous. But other
behaviors such as sleeping in class and incessant talking have increased. In addition to these behaviors, two recent
comments have provoked my interest. They were both related to my blackness and
they both questioned its authenticity. Again,
I must state my biases. Like the main character,
I have experienced many moments of frustration working for a system that doesn’t
always have the best interests of the students at heart. And there are some passages in this book that
echo my occasional feelings about my job in general. For example, the main character Grant often reflects
on the lives of his former students that have been stifled by Jim Crow and
wonders whether or not he is even making a difference. Although the Jim Crow era is long past, I
have still witnessed my students fall to unemployment and the criminal justice
system. And coincidentally one of the comments
I mentioned earlier was made by a student who is currently facing such a
dilemma. I don’t think I will ever forget
the look of sincerity in his face when he asked me “are you black?” simply
because I used the word “outstanding” in class.
The other comment of course was that black men don’t use that word. I thought about this later and thought to
myself how can I teach my students to be outstanding if they can’t even say the
word?
These occurrences have taught me
that there is an abundant fear of words in black class rooms; words that tell
where we have been and words that tell us where we should be going. This is why as a black male English teacher
there are times when I feel just as invisible as the narrator in Invisible Man and just as disillusioned as
Grant Wiggins in A Lesson Before Dying;
but not every day, just the bad ones. So with that in mind I can only hope and
pray that the pivotal moments in my student’s lives involve words of
encouragement that alleviate fear and that the good days outnumber the bad. And if I’m lucky, maybe some of those good
days and pivotal moments happen in my classroom.
