The sacred educational purpose of African American studies is to provide a learning environment that explores how the wins and losses against systemic racism inform our present condition. Students deserve and need to know that they are a part of a long struggle for freedom, equality and inclusion.Walter Mosley, Luis Rodriguez, the coiner of #BlackLivesMatter and others sketch a hopeful future for L.A. and the U.S. after George Floyd protests.
African American studies is no stranger to attacks, which emerge from political expediency and rely on mischaracterizations of its curricular importance. These programs are constantly pilloried — from accusations that Black studies lacks academic rigor to efforts to shrug it off as an elective. As a graduate and professor of African American studies, I am all too familiar with the many battles. The history of our fight for curricular inclusion is rife with starts and stalls. The students in my course learn that Black studies emerged from post-civil rights student activism. They also learn that some, such as UCLA studentsand John Huggins, were killed in this struggle.
At many of the nation’s top schools, colleges and universities, these programs are an underfunded workhorse, among the few places where students learn of the Black American experience and contributions to the betterment of society. And just as often, they are the only place students can find and learn from Black instructors. As a result, any limits placed on African American studies are a bellwether for a campus’ climate, a barometer of its true level of diversity and inclusion.
To limit one’s history is to limit one’s humanity. The most egregious human violations, slavery and genocide, reside within these limits. Suppose we are to achieve a genuinely equitable curriculum or society. In that case, we need educational tools like African American studies to bridge the knowledge gap. Because — it bears repeating — the African American story is also the American story. Happy Black History Month.tudies at UCLA.
Fake news!!! It’s not about black studies. lying again.
Oh please
The purpose of an AP course is to serve an “act of contrition”? One might have thought that the purpose was to educate students.
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