Just Research/ers: Resisting Censorship and Mis-Education/Advancing Human Freedom Collectively

Session Type: Virtual Symposium

Abstract

It may be of no importance to the race to be able to boast today of many times
as many “educated” members as it had in 1865. If they are of the wrong kind
the increase in numbers will be a disadvantage rather than an advantage. The
only question which concerns us here is whether these “educated” persons are actually equipped to face the ordeal before them or unconsciously contribute to their own undoing by perpetuating the regime of the oppressor.
– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, Mis-education of the Negro, 1933/2023, p. 4
Every scheme to prohibit public schools from teaching about the history of
bigotry, discrimination, and hate in this society is a 21st century attempt to turn, transform public schools into the Woodrow Wilson White House where D.W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” was shown to validate bigotry, ignorance, and
distrust against marginalized people.
–Wendell Griffen (Former Judge, Arkansas), 20231
The Eurocentric concept and “practices” of democracy and public schooling
(en mass) do not nurture nor enhance “nationalistic organizational formations that connect culture, Pan-African consciousness and the building of Diasporic linkages.”
--Mosi Deterville-Makori, Sankofa Cultural Institute, 2023
When we do not take control of our children’s education it means that we are not there to meet the intent of their biological and cultural programming with our own cultural content and our own intent as a people. Therefore, there will be a mismatch between how they are taught, what they are taught and their own intellectual growth and development. In a sense, the largest percentage will fail even when they “succeed”.
- Dr. Amos N. Wilson

Sub Unit

• AERA Presidential Session

Chair

• Linda Darling-Hammond, Learning Policy Institute

Papers

• "All Necks Are on the Line" - Joyce E. King, Georgia State University; Mosi Deterville-Makori, Sankofa Cultural Institute, New Orleans

• Closing the Marketplace: Restriction, Repression, and Retrenchment in U.S. Higher Education - Gloria J. Ladson-Billings, University of Wisconsin - Madison

• Poster Child for Diversity and Critical Race Theory: Collective Strategizing - Gloria S. Boutte, University of South Carolina

• If We Want Censorship, We Can Have It ... but We Don't Want It - Max Altman, Southern Education Foundation; Natasha K. McClendon, United Negro College Fund

• Voices From the Field: Insights on the Impact of "Divisive Concepts" Legislation on Public Education - Brian A. Williams, Florida International University

Discussant

• Brian A. Williams, Florida International University