qjules's blog

            In David Nurenberg’s article “What Does Injustice Have to do With Me? A Pedagogy of the Privileged” the educator discusses his experience being raised in the upper middle class, while being knowledgeable about the hardships his Jewish family members encountered. He discusses his own accounts of harassment growing up, and brings readers into his struggle of teaching suburban white privileged students multicultural education and social justice education. “I specifically wanted to work with a suburban population, with the young people who would grow up into the college roommates and friends I had known and who had frustrated me… I felt I could act as some sort of bridge between the worlds to which my parents had exposed me to, and the one that produced the CEO’s and policy makers who I believed unwittingly perpetuated this unfair system.” (Nurenberg 53) This paper will act as spokes around this quote and highlight other figures who share this ideology and act as ‘bridges’ in the context of white consumers of Hip Hop industry, and what multicultural education can do for the white, privileged, and impressionable.

In Levinson's "No Citizen Left Behind"  as the students converse about Bush's intentions, Levinson had superior doubt before realizing her students were partially correct about 9/11. Reading their sentiments did not surprise me at all, for the fact that 1. I share a neighborhood and city with the students in this piece and I did not know the New York Bourroughs or the Pentagon and as a child, and 2. I shared what seemed to be common knowledge in our community: That Bush was not fond of us. Our parents said it, Kanye said it, voting said it, Hurricane Katrina said it; so to me the students did not sound ridiculous, they sounded quite aware. Today it seems the message blacks recieved from their president in 2004 is the same message they are getting from their legal system in 2014.

Before the break I overheard two friends discussing some facebook drama surrounding a status about teaching that a student posted. “Wait what happened?” I asked. My friend turned to me, “I didn’t tell you because I know how passionate you can get.” She said, “Just tell me, I wanna know!” She eventually paraphrased the status to me; the gist of the remark was a student said she needed to take martial arts classes before she began teaching at a school in an urban setting. This is not the first time I have heard an ideology like this and I can guarantee it wont be the last.

I believe that if this student enters a urban public school classroom with this attitude she is likely to reap what she sows. I don’t say this to be threatening or cruel, but realistic. I think there are no better detectors of authenticity and intention then children, and they deserve to be led by someone who has only the greatest expectations of them-not someone who expects disobedience, and worse, violence simply because of the location of their school, or the implied the race and class positions of such students.

When I was in my sophomore year of highschool I decided to do a portrait of our new home for my mother for her birthday. At the time many houses in Boston were being foreclosed, the house we moved into was one of them.  The house was a beautiful victorian and represented a new begining for my family. My mother, who raised me alone for the majority of my childhood had re-married and this was her first time being a homeowner, and my first time living in a house. As a visual art major at school, I brought my painting to school to use some of the school's materials and get feedback from the teachers on my anticipated gift. Before going to the art department I had one more class and had to take my painting with me. As I sat in my spanish class the room was abuzz with chatter. "i'm tryna go to the snack machine, you got a dollar?"', a classmate asked me. "no, sorry" I said. Looking at painting he then said "yes you do, you're rich, I seen your house!" After he said that I didnt know what to say. I had no idea what my family income was, and why would I? Not only that, but my parent's money was not mine, their income did not affecct the change in my pockets or lack thereof. Growing up in Boston, class distinctions were hard for me to explain and still are. How do I explian that I dont live in "the hood" but next to it?, that I live on a quiet street, but hear shots and sirens from two blocks over? my class has been on an upward shift my whole life and I take experiences from every instance of my poor to middle class journey.

Reflection #2

Freire and Ebonics

Quela Jules

2/20/13

            Two friends came to me outraged last week about a heated discussion regarding the use of Ebonics in the classroom and whether or not it should be fostered, or tolerated in schools. A white male student blatantly said that Standard American English is the only acceptable form of English in the United States. I am not here to say whether I agree or disagree with his stance on the topic, but rather to provide a series of images related to it. What was difficult about hearing the man speak was not the words he was saying, but the position from which he spoke, he was white, privileged, and conservative, and one could infer that his main contact with African American Vernacular comes from Hip Hop, or the words that have somehow made their way into the vocabularies of the young white and privileged. He is speaking as someone who has only had to master one language his whole life and fully understands the privilege in that.

Table of Contents

1. The First Grade

2. My First Kiss

3. America’s Next Top Model

4. A Peoples History Of The United States

1. The First Grade

This Christmas in my mother’s stocking was a clear square box full of cards. On the label the words said “table topics”. On each card was a question intended to spark either debate or conversation at any family gathering. My mother likes to be the one to ask the questions so one day on the car, with her cards in hand, she turned to me and asked “what was your worst fear as a child?” I didn’t know, I didn’t remember. I then returned my question to her, “I don’t know, do you remember?” “Yes I do” she nodded. Through a smile she said “It was Harriet Tubman. You used to make me check under your bed every night.” I laughed hard, that is hilarious! A little black girl terrified of Harriet Tubman! Hahaha! But after the laughter I started to remember, and I started to think, I was afraid of Harriet Tubman. I think maybe I was too young to be taught slavery when I learned it. I was in the first grade.