If teachers from various public schools in New York City gathered together and started discussing the numerous difficulties they encounter in the classroom, the talk would inevitably turn to the significant, often demoralizing problem of student apathy and defiance. The significance of this problem lies in the origins of unequal relations between teacher and student and the responsibility of the teacher to understand these origins and recognize the powerful tools students use to defend against powerlessness.
If a child’s experience in school consists of direct or indirect rejection of all that is important, meaningful, and relevant to this child, specifically in regard to language, literacy, and culture; if this child’s parents have acquired power outside of an academic environment, or if the parents of this child have superficially requested students’ compliance to school norms, without making higher education a realistic and attainable necessity; and finally, if this child and the family of which she is a part prioritize survival (as any rational being does)—paying rent, providing and preparing food, taking care of siblings, participating in local cultural/religious activity—why is it surprising that this child does not imagine school as useful, as meaningful, as worthy of discipline? Why is it surprising that this child disregards the teacher’s stalwart effort to empower her? Does this child know her own voice, or has it been silenced for so long that she must recreate it? Would the teacher, one whose primary discourse is radically different from the majority of her students, (as is common to teachers in urban public schools) recognize this child’s voice—even if and when it is articulated? Or has the cry of apathy and defiance become the secondary discourse of this child? As teachers of children who often rally against our sincere attempts to make possible what Freire (1993) calls a “language of possibility,” how can we reposition ourselves as teachers who seek to expand our limited knowledge of and experience within cultures different from our own? (as cited in Schultz, 2001, p. 81)
It is wrenching to work as an agent of change in a classroom of students who actively refuse change. When violent outbursts and other more creative forms of intimidation threaten the climate of our classrooms, it is destabilizing, even crazy-making; it requires a prompt suppression of our own anger and fear, and a response to the origin of and need for this kind of student power. Giroux (1988) discusses Freire’s explanation as to why students often refuse to learn ways of knowing, to write and read the self into freedom. He states, “Ironically, emancipatory forms of knowledge may be refused by those who could most benefit from such knowledge. In this case, accommodation to the logic domination by the oppressed may take the form of actively resisting forms of knowledge…an active refusal to listen, to hear, or to affirm one’s own possibilities” (as cited in Schultz, 2001, p.83). When our students are at their worst, is it possible that this is their revolt against ‘domination?’ And if students view themselves as ‘oppressed,’ what options do they have but to fight against this oppression? Not only must we change our position in the classroom, but students must change the way in which they view themselves. What language will replace ‘the oppressed,’ and what is implied by the phrase ‘the emancipated’? Abraham Lincoln, in all his glory, comes to mind; and the concept of freedom as granted—not demanded, taken, or recreated. A teacher does not grant freedom, empower, or ‘liberate’ students—she should first liberate herself from such responsibility and then work to become a student of her students. In knowing our students, we can create what Greene (1993) calls a “community of persons,” a space in which multiple voices can be remembered, recreated, and repositioned (as cited in Schultz, 2001, p352).
In responding to the problem of student apathy and defiance, Greene’s analysis of The Bluest Eye, specifically the character of Claudia, is relevant. Claudia states, “There is really nothing more to say—except why. But since why is difficult to handle, one must take refuge in how” (1972, p. 9). With an initial understanding of why students’ oppression manifests itself in these forms, and a continual commitment to understand its causes, it is essential to focus on how we as educators might go about bridging the gap between students’ primary discourses and the secondary discourses found in school. Adolescent literature is an excellent resource for teachers to study the daily triumphs and struggles of their students, to hear their voices and learn to recognize them. Its place in a ‘community of persons’ is essential, for it acknowledges adolescents as individuals first, with a host of concerns particular to age, location, and culture. The themes and characters of the genre are relatable to students and a class investigation of character action in the face of despair provides students with a viable space in which to explore similar feelings and experiences (Stallworth, 2006). The theme of oppression and emancipation could be studied within these texts, allowing teachers to facilitate discussion of how people work to read, write, and shapetheir identities.
It is easy to spur this kind of dialogue on a superficial level, but much more difficult to create a learning environment that allows for true personal and public reflection. Beach & Meyers (2001) suggest that students and teachers can construct social worlds by reading literature, and in doing so, they construct possibilities for their own social worlds (p. 12). This process can begin with Probst’s (1994) “Reader Response Theory,” in which “meaning is created by readers as they bring the text to bear upon their own experience, and their own histories to bear upon the text” (p. 38). The classroom in and of itself must become a newly constructed social world in which students’ experiences and histories are tools for recollection and revision. Adolescent literature allows students an entry point of commonality. Even if class sets of adolescent literature are not found in schools and therefore unable to be included as a substantial part of the curriculum, teachers will benefit from reading it on their own, gaining insight as to why students often refuse to reclaim emancipatory power.
Walter Dean Myers, a popular author of adolescent literature, reveals the weight of liberation in his novel, Autobiography of My Dead Brother. Jesse, the main character, combats the inevitability of gang life, which his best friend/blood brother, Rise, has become a part. He does so though art, through the life that arises from his drawings. He envisions a future for himself and actively works toward it—no one, not even his parents or friends, give him the freedom to pursue his art. In first person narration, Jesse discloses, “I told myself again that I was just letting Rise go and moving on with my life. I took out the book I was doing and thumbed through it, looking at the photographs and the pictures I had drawn, thinking how hard it was going to be to say goodbye” (2005, p.197). This kind of active participation in one’s education suggests that a student-centered approach is critical to navigating multiple discourses and situating a more productive power in the hands of the student by creating an environment that necessitates such power, rather than attempting to free the student from domination—an act that seems absurd, impossible, and offensive. It is necessary that teachers explore art, literature, and all disciplines as in a constant state of change, believing that students have the power to effect this change by contributing to the conversation in these disciplines as well as producing their own creative work (Johnson et al. 2008).
What may we call ourselves as teachers? Are we or are they the oppressed? Who dominates whom? According to Frank McCourt (2005) a teacher is “a drill sergeant, a rabbi, a shoulder to cry on, a disciplinarian, a singer, a low-level scholar, a clerk, a referee, a clown, a counselor, a dress-code enforcer, a conductor, an apologist, a philosopher, a collaborator, a dap dancer, a politician, a therapist, a fool, a traffic cop, a priest, a mother-father-brother-sister-uncle-aunt, a bookkeeper, a critic, a psychologist, the last straw” (p. 19). Why not ask our students to rename themselves, to work toward a pluralist construction of the self, unbound by dominant illustrations?
References
Beach, R., Appleman, D., Hynds, S., & William, J. (2006). Goals for teaching literature: What
does it mean to teach literature? Teaching literature to adolescents, (1-21). Hahwah, N.J.:
Lawrence Evhaum Associates.
Gibbons, L., Dail, J., Stallworth, J. (2006). Young adult literature in the English curriculum
today. The Alan Review, summer, 1-9.
Johnson, J. A., D. Musial, G. E. Hall, D. M. Gollnick, & V. L. Dupuis. (2008). Foundations of
American education: perspectives on education in a changing world. Boston: Pearson.
McCourt, F. (2005). Teacher man. New York: Scribner.
Probst, R. E. (1994). Reader-response theory and the English curriculum. English Journal,
March, 37-44.
Schultz, F. (Ed.). (2001). Sources: Notable selections in education (5th ed.). Guilford, Connecticut:
McGraw-Hill/Duskin.
Stallworth, J. (2006). The relevance of young adult literature. Educational Leadership, April,
59-63.
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