Black Protest Thought and Education
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William H. Watkins' "Black Protest Thought and Education," represents a much needed look at the reform and revolutionary efforts within the African Diaspora to teach oppressed people to challenge the social, economic and political system containing an array of obstacles preventing the ruled from challenging their rulers.
While the book is decidedly written in academ-ese, it is worth the effort. I grew up, one of four children of former share-croppers who made the migration to the north with my father landing at General Motors in Flint, MI. Whatever we had my father earned through diligence, thrift, hard work and delayed gratification. Education was our ticket into the promise of middle class security. Therefore, my parents and their friends had no time for the likes of Black Panthers, or other black folks creating discord, demanding revolution. Little did they know that the discord from the likes of the Panthers, Nyerere, Garvey and Lorde was forging another America, where not only could we attend college, but we could get there from the front of the bus rather than the back. This gem of a book points out the fight for a pedagogy that endeavors to create an environment where existing power relations can be examined, analyzed and challenged from the perspective of the African American's social, cultural and experiential position in a capitalist/colonial system.
Originally from Flint, Michigan, Sheilah Garland-Olaniran lives in Chicago. A former substitute teacher, she now works as a union organizer.
The White Architects of Black Education: Ideology and Power in America, 1865-1954
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This study is a historical and cultural examination of the political and ideological tenets used in the 19th and 20th centuries to defeat the broader educational purposes of the "architects of black education." Because formal education was viewed by most black leaders as one of the main avenues toward permanent liberation, Watkins demonstrates how white leaders who sought to maintain a "caste-like" segregated educational system in the US systematically undermined black leaders' vision. The author suggests that the present educational system continues to keep African Americans in a subservient and unequal state. This work is recommended for students of educational policy and multicultural education and those interested in a broader analysis of race and culture in America. Upper-division undergraduates and above.
L. B. Gallien, Spelman College
Race and Education: The Roles of History and Society in Educating African American Students
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This book is comprised of fifteen in-depth, research-based essays in which noted educators discuss the history, politics, challenges and progress of the education of African Americans. Race and Education promotes culturally sensitive, developmentally appropriate and individually supportive learning environments. This book brings together the contemporary thinking of leading scholars who believe that the achievement of African American children will be improved best by the understanding of the history of African American education and the direction in which it is headed. Anyone interested in African American studies, specifically on the topic of education.
