Here’s a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man, which I regard as one of the greatest American novels of the twentieth century.
If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
American novelist and poet. Reed’s writing reflects his belief that the black American writer should function as a kind of conjurer of what Reed calls ‘neo-hoodoo,’ an attempt to pry the distinct qualities of Afro-American culture loose from Euro-American culture. In a language composed of black dialects, standard English, and hip jargon, he writes angry satires on an American society corrupted by racism and uncontrolled technology. Among his novels are The Free-Lance Pallbearers (1967), Mumbo Jumbo (1972), Flight to Canada (1976), The Terrible Twos (1982), and Japanese by Spring (1993). His verse collections include Conjure (1972) and Secretary to the Spirits (1975). Other works include Shrovetide in Old New Orleans (1978), occasional writings; Hell Hath No Fury (1980), a play; The Terrible Threes (1990), a collection of short stories; and Airing Dirty Laundry (1993), containing memoirs.
Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
[Addendum: Ishmael Reed entered my cultural cosmology when I heard the the percussionist and producer Kip Hanrahan’s projects to set Mr. Reed’s poetry to music, the first of which, Conjure (named for one of Mr. Reed’s books of verse) appeared in 1983. I continue to listen to that record regularly, now 35 years later. Two more records from Conjure have appeared, Cab Calloway Stands in for the Moon (1988) and a two-disc set, Bad Mouth, released in 2006.]
Posted in English Language Arts, Essays/Readings, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged black history, fiction/literature, music, poetry, readings/research
The New York Review of Books recently ran a review of two recent biographies of the the great Paul Robeson. I was glad that the article disclosed the fact that Mr. Robeson earned a law degree, and that on his first–and last–day practicing law, he suffered the indignity of dealing with a secretary who refused to take dictation (see the fourth paragraph of the article beneath the hyperlink above) “from a n****r.” That’s the kind of disgraceful fact that I think we need out on display when discussing, say, the Black Lives Matter movement, especially with those who dismiss the movement with rhetorically insipid and factually dubious claim that “all lives matter” in American society.
Anyway, here, on a Monday morning, is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Paul Robeson. I still listen to his music, especially the album Ballad For Americans, which includes his great song “Scandalize My Name.”
If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
“We will see that the true miracle was not the birth of the Constitution, but its life, a life nurtured through two turbulent centuries of our own making, and a life embodying much good fortune that was not. Thus, in this bicentennial year, we may not all participate in the festivities with flag-waving fervor. Some may more quietly commemorate the suffering, struggle, and sacrifice that has triumphed over much of what was wrong with the original document, and observe the anniversary with hopes not realized and promises not fulfilled.”
Thurgood Marshall, Speech, Maui, Hawaii, 6 May 1987
Excerpted from: Shapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.
Posted in Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged black history, readings/research, united states history
On a Monday morning, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Equal Protection of the Laws. As the squib at the top of the document will inform your students, the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees all citizens of the United States, regardless of the color of their skin. This might help students understand the galling and bitter irony of Jim Crow Laws.
If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
“Classic ‘novel’ of Jean Toomer (1894-1967). Cane was immediately hailed as one of the foremost pieces of the Harlem Renaissance of the twenties. A collection of poems, sketches, stories, and a novella (‘Kabnis’) built around dialogue, the book was inspired by Toomer’s visit to rural Georgia to teach. There he ‘heard the folk-songs come from the lips of Negro peasants’ and ‘saw the rich dusk beauty of the poor black South.’ The title refers to one of the book’s foci, the cane fields. Cane is divided into three parts: it begins in the cane fields, moves to the harsh streets of the North, and then back to the South. The black South is seen as a link to Africa and as a sensuous, soulful place of hardship, for example dealing with such themes as miscegenation, lynching, and the efficacy of the old Negro spirituals. The second section takes place mainly in Washington, D.C., Toomer’s birthplace, where blacks are estranged from their spiritual home. Though on the surface a potpourri, Cane as whole achieves a tonal and thematic unity through its recurring images and symbols, which suggest the beauty, vitality, and pain that Toomer saw in the agrarian South, a way of life he felt was passing and for which Cane is his lament.”
Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
As I’ve said before, perhaps ad nauseum on this blog, every month is Black History Month in my classroom. I’ve always had mixed feelings about a single month set aside for Black History, mainly because it has always struck me as a form of segregation; I say we integrate Black History into every lesson we teach, particular when we teach the history of the United States. That said, I am decidedly circumspect in second guessing a scholar of Carter G. Woodson’s stature; Dr. Woodson launched “Negro History Month” in February of 1926. This is the month in which we now justly and appropriately celebrate the many and diverse achievements of Americans of African descent.
The first Weekly Text for Black History Month is a relatively high interest reading on Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls with an accompanying reading comprehension worksheet. Rappers come and go, and I’m old enough to remember a time when rap wasn’t part of the cultural landscape of this country. Tupac and Biggie, I think, are icons of the genre, and martyrs to it as well, I suppose. While my students look at me blankly when I ask them if they’ve heard of Kool Moe Dee, (I really liked “How Ya Like Me Now” and was pleased to hear it shuffle up at the gym recently) they’ve all heard of Biggie and Tupac. You might find useful this Everyday Edit on African-American History Month (courtesy, as always, of the good people at Education World, a world-class hub for instructional material).
If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
Addendum, February 6, 2018: While waiting for the train in the Bowling Green station late yesterday afternoon, I noticed a poster advertising the USA Network’s upcoming series on the investigations into the murders of Tupac and Biggie. This Text, as it turns out, is timely.
Today is the first day of Black History Month. In my classroom, every month is Black History Month, simply because Black History is American History. Mark’s Text Terminal always observes Black History Month, mainly because the history of the African Diaspora in general, and its salubrious effect on the United States in particular, has always been of keen interest to me.
This year’s Black History Month arrives amidst a social and cultural atmosphere that has become especially ugly. Thanks to nativist loudmouths like Stephen Miller (who, incredibly, holds the position of “senior policy advisor” in the White House) and Steve Bannon, as well as the egotistical, foul-mouthed, and self-pitying “president” of the United States, our nation’s ugly bigotry is right out in the open once more. I suppose that’s a good thing–at least we know our adversaries. But it is unpleasant at best to live with.
Words are words, but the fact is that some police forces around our country appear to have declared open season on citizens of African descent. Personally, I remain bereft of the loss to our country of Trayvon Martin, a victim of the brazenly murderous instincts of a disastrous human being named George Zimmerman, who continues to have scrapes with the law.
For almost 15 years, I have lived in diverse neighborhoods in New York City. For the first seven years I was here, I lived on two different blocks in Harlem–once known as the capital of Black America. Across those seven years, I was treated only with respect by my neighbors. I ask you, rhetorically, this: if a Black man moved into a homogeneously white neighborhood, could he expect similar treatment? I rather doubt it, and that says nothing good about our country.
I continue to live in a diverse neighborhood, and I worry that the Eurocentric rhetoric emanating from the highest reaches of government, as well as the murders committed by police officers around the country, have the potential to poison relations between my neighbors, fellow subway riders, and other people with whom I passively associate here in my adopted city.
So, for Black History Month 2018, every post on Mark’s Text Terminal will be related to the history of citizens of the United States of African descent (which I say understanding that everyone on this planet, in the final analysis, is of African descent; Black History Month refers to more recent arrivals from the continent, mostly, if we are to be honest with ourselves about this, the descendants of people abducted in Africa subjugated into chattel slavery in the Americas). Let’s begin with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Black Power Movement. I’m old enough to remember it well, and feel encouraged that we may now be seeing its return, a development I welcome.
For the record, I do understand that my efforts here are mostly inconsequential. The White House has a 24-hour cable news propaganda machine (i.e. Fox News) with global reach, while I have my blog with fifteen views a day.
If you find typos in the Word document on Black Power above, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
Here, on the final day of January, 2018, is a short exercise on the Greek word roots hepta and hept. They mean seven. This is a document to use at the beginning of a class period to settle students–and build numerical literacy.
If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
“The year 2696 used to be considered the start date for Chinese civilization, for the winter solstice of that year was held to be the beginning of the reign of the Yellow Emperor. Most historians had accepted that that the period of the Three Sovereigns and the Five Emperors is mythic time, though Huangdi was honored as the man who taught the Chinese to how to build shelters, tame wild animals, build boats and carts, and plant and reap the five cereals, while his wife taught weaving and silk-making, and their chief minister set out how to write, keep laws, and the annual calendar.
If we were all to agree to a new world calendar system, the Chinese Year One would not be such a bad start date, for it calibrates pretty closely with other great memory pegs of world history, such as the construction of the first pyramid (2630 BC), the first era of Stonehenge (3100-2400 BC), and the first recorded king (Enme-Barage-Si of the Sumerian city-state of Ur, c.2600 BC).”
Excerpted from: Rogerson, Barnaby. Rogerson’s Book of Numbers: The Culture of Numbers–from 1,001 Nights to the Seven Wonders of the World. New York: Picador, 2013.
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