Tim Wise Talk

Tim Wise brought up an extremely interesting point in his talk on Wednesday, the internalization of racism in America. This is part of our curriculum, our television, our advertisements in everyday life. He even, in a separate interview, says that this causes him to be a white supremacist just because he was raised in this indoctrinated society which puts emphasis on white culture. As a history major one of his most interesting examples is our historical curriculum. He mentions how schools don't teach black history like they teach white history. After slavery and the Civil Rights Movements in the 1960's we go back to focusing on white culture. We don't discuss the King riots in LA in the 90's but even further back then that the white on black riots that occurred at the turn of the 20th century are ignored in favor of the labor riots at the same time. While you could make a case that after leaving reconstruction, in a high school history class, the rise of industry and the reaction to that in the form of the creation of unions and the labor riots taking place all apart the country are extremely important and that choices must be made because you can never discuss everything. But these are riots which could easily be placed into a conversation about the labor riots. They go hand and hand. Or these could be mentioned while giving the lead in to the Civil Rights Movement. Use the riots to bring you along how former slaves have progressed in this country since they were give their freedom besides just saying that Plesey v Ferguson happened in between. There are plenty of ways history can be racially neutral as it should be and is something that could be added to something such as the national common core movement which is taking place right now.