Afrocentric Idea In Education Analysis

In Chapter 1 and 2 of “Creating Black Americans,” author Nell Irvin Painter addresses an imperative issue in which African history and the lives of Africans are often dismissed (2) and continue to be perceived in a negative light (1). This book gives the author the chance to revive the history of Africa, being this a sacred place to provide readers with a “history of their own.” (Painter 4) The issue that Africans were depicted in a negative light impacted various artworks and educational settings in the 19th and early 20th century. For instance, in educational settings, many students were exposed to the Eurocentric Western learning which its depiction of Africa were not only biased, but racist as well.

Tyna L. Steptoe’s book, Houston Bound: Culture and Color in a Jim Crow City explores the significance of Wheatley High School, a public secondary school located in the heart of Fifth Ward, Houston, Texas, established in the 1930s to serve black and Creole students during the Jim Crow era. Despite being segregated, the students at Wheatley did not let this hold them down and instead made the best of the situation by getting heavily involved in their school. Wheatley High School gave their black and creole students tools for advancement and helped strengthen their cultural identity and in a historic period in which racial discrimination attempted to curtail their political and economic potential. In this Jim Crow era, the institutions of the city were divided by the racial categories of white and black, which would force everyone into one or the other category, even if they did not necessarily associate themselves with it. Accordingly, racially ambiguous people would either receive the benefits that accompanied the white label or the grim treatment that accompanied the black label.

Although the roots of this movement date as far back as the 1900s, the legacy of the African American’s role in World War II sparked the catalyst needed to promote the legislation that eventually led to their equality. “On May 17, 1954, The Supreme Court announced its decision in the case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka” (Brinkley 772). This regulation overturned the Supreme Court’s earlier decision in the Plessy V Ferguson case. The separate but equal doctrine was a prime example of domestic policy that did not uphold the government’s constitutional promise to promote the general welfare of society-to include all that fall under the definition of an American citizen. The affliction put on children who had to travel to segregated public schools placed an unequal burden and damage done to those who it pertained to.

There is an importance in the black community of embracing Afrocentric Cultural Values and sharing to our younger generations and adolescents. I chose a scholarly article that utilize this factor in its hypothesis. From the Journal of Black Psychology, the article is titled Examining Afrocentric Cultural Values, ethnic Identity, and Substance Use Abstinence in Low-Income, Early Adolescent, African American Girls. This very extensive article was written or experimented by our fellow professors at the University of Austin: Delida Sanchez, Emma Hamilton, Dorie Gilbert, and Elizabeth Vandewater. Their study is about finding a possible link of cultural factors and substance use abstinence among low income African American girls.

What is the purpose and mission of universal schooling? Why are philanthropic white Northern reformers’ supportive of African-Americans’ goals of literacy and universal education? How can historians reconcile the educational advancement of African-Americans with their status as second-class citizens throughout the Eras of Reconstruction and Jim Crow? In The Education of Blacks in the South (1988), James Anderson explores the race, labor, and education questions through the lens of black educational philosophy. Anderson challenges the prevailing narrative that universal public education emerged from white Northern missionaries dedicated to civilizing newly emancipated Negroes in the South.

White and Black students do not attend the same schools, African Americans do not always have access to the same services as Whites, and a vast majority of the Black population is ultimately restricted to limited housing options in stipulated locations, commonly referred to as the “projects” or the “ghetto”. It is through structural racism that the Black community is redlined and confined, basically ghettoized into a prescribed area of a city. Most studies and accounts of structural racism and geographic containment within Black Belt territories have been dedicated only to the trends of division within America’s metropolitan cities. For example, Richard Wright’s novel, Native Son, establishes the relationship between environmental deprivation and cultural oppression through the portrayal of White forces restricting the spatial aspects of African Americans, thus resulting in racially divided communities, schools, and political systems as represented through Chicago’s inner city Black

The educational system in America contains numerous racial disparities that affects the very core of the children who is suppose to benefit from education. This disparity comes in many forms in primary schools, a teacher’s attitude being one of them (Epps, 1995). A teacher’s attitude in a classroom consisting of a racially diverse children is a large contributing factor to the academic success of their students, more specifically, the minority African American students. It is a given that all schools should employ qualified teacher who are passionate about their students and the quality of education they provide to these students. Unfortunately, that is not the case for many urban schools that house a large proportion of African American students

Both of these men were contemporaries and without a doubt their personal experiences and perhaps the overall black experience in the United States guided their conscious to adopt certain strategies and tactics in order to uplift black people politically, economically and socially. This is where these two leaders fundamentally disagreed, which was followed by suspicion, name calling, distrust and an unwillingness to concede and perhaps recognize the strengths and weaknesses that existed in both of their philosophies. They were divided and they left black America divided and yet their arguments are still highly debated in academic circles and laypersons circles alike throughout America. Lastly, this research study is limited in scope and has not met all the academic restraints consistent with a scholarly paper, nevertheless, at the same time, it will display objectivity and sound research methods by briefly exploring in an unscientific manner, the slave plantation personalities (giving in the seminal study by John Blassigame) and how perhaps those historical values—culture) impacted slave behavior, as well shaped black personalities that proceeded from this peculiar institution.

The first three chapters of the reading, The Struggle for Black Equality, Harvard Sitkoff runs through the civil rights movement in the 20th century; outlining the adversities facing black people, the resistance to black equality, hindrances to the already progress and the achievements made in the journey for civil rights. John Hope Franklin, in the foreword, dwells on the impact of the time between 1954 and 1992 and the impact it had on American Society, how fight for equality is far from easy and patience is required in the fight to "eliminate the road blocks that prevent the realization of the ideal of equality". In the preface, Sitkoff is clear that that history does not speak for themselves and attempt to detail any particular will be influenced by the author 's personal beliefs. Sitkoff, who associated and identified with the movement, believed "that the struggle was confronting the United States with an issue that had undermined the nation 's democratic institutions". Sitkoff elected

The African – American 's Assimilation into White America America is often considered the land of opportunities, a place where people can have a fresh start, a clean slate. America is a land that is made up of immigrants. Over the centuries America has been a place where people dream to live in, however the American dream wasn 't as perfect as believed; there were issues of race inferiority, slavery and social inequality amongst other problems. When a person arrives into a new society he has a difficult task ahead of him- to assimilate into that new society- which includes the economical, cultural, political and social aspects. In the following paper I will discuss how the African American, who came as slaves to America, has fought over the centuries to achieve equality in a white society that discriminated them.

List of traditions of your culture and how it related to your family The culture I identify is African American. The African American culture have several traditions that my family and I practice. The traditions of the African American culture that are practices among my family are maintaining family relationships, practicing Christianity, maintain hospitality, gaining education, and cooking.

(NAMI p. 3) Furthermore, Cultural Trauma probes the internal conflicts over the form and meaning of representation and culture in successive generations of black Americans after slavery. (Washington p.2). Black identity stemmed from cultural trauma during slavery. “African American”

Obama continues her historical account as she describes the travail and bravery that a few people possessed that led them to afford educational opportunities for black people even when “Teachers received death threats.” (289). She evokes these historical events, not only to show the stark difference between the past and present with regards to educational opportunities for African Americans, but also demonstrate how the people who fought tirelessly so that they could gain an education did so because of they were aware of the value of education as it brings freedom and opportunity to those who have it. To bolster this assertion, Obama quotes Fredrick Douglas, “Freedom is Emancipation” (289) Obama details even further as she

Lastly, “the defenders of segregation claimed that African-American students were living with the effects of slavery, and were not able to compete with the white children.” (Benoit, 10) The arguments against segregation

Racism can be followed throughout history to the colonization of America to the Age of Imperialism in Britain. To this day the way that African Americans have been depicted has determined how they are treated. To fully understand the effects of propaganda, it is necessary to be able to answer the question, To what extent has the marginalization of African Americans contributed to social and political movements in the Civil Rights Era? This is significant because the racial tension in the United States has strengthened with the birth of the Black Lives Matter movement.