03 August 2020
K-12 Textbooks and Racial Bias
I didn't
have any black or even non--Eastern European-heritage classmates in
Chicago until I went to high school. "Amos and Andy" was the
most exposure I had as a kid to African-American culture. I don't have any
of my grade school textbooks, but I'd be surprised if they even said anything
about the treatment of slaves in the American South or of the Jim Crow
era. My only vague recollection is of scalawags and Carpetbaggers during
Rcons
truction. I was
in grade school during the last years of the Great Migration. We
were influenced by our local community to stay away from the southeast part of
the city dominated by blacks, as much because of fear as because of
discomfort, if not embarrassment. I don't remember any African--American
classmates at Georgetown University; I had two African-American classmates in
graduate school. So my exposure to the non-white population only really
began when I started to work for the dederal goverment in D.C. Even after
that, I was cocooned in a nearly uniform white and Asian environment throughout
my years of work and living. My children had few African-American
classmates in their school careers, but now they are both married to
Asian-heritage spouses.
That's a long
introduction to my belief that cultural exclusiveness is as efficient a method
of inculcating racial bias as government propaganda, like textbook
editing. The "South Pacific" song, "You've Got to be
Carefully Taught," applies equally to social and to formal
education.
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