Critical Theories in Education
From Newstarget.com:
American News Industry a Far Cry from Genuine Journalism. By: Mike Adams
Where has the honest press gone in this country? I don’t see it out there except in a few small independent publications and some gutsy newspapers that manage to uncover real news from time to time. Most newspapers are just running corporate press releases and making just enough modifications to call it news.
If you’re interested in how the press covers education issues, check out:
In her latest column for BlackCommentator.com, Margaret Kimberley illustrates how fear, stupidity and lessons in capitalism all converged to make idiots out of adults who are supposed to educate or protect kids.
Last month school officials called police who then handcuffed and arrested a 5-year-old Florida kindergartener who was throwing a tantrum; last week in Clovis, NM a call about a possible weapon at a middle school prompted police to put armed officers on rooftops, close nearby streets and lock down the school. All over a giant burrito.
Kimberly makes the case that the system is running out of adults to punish and now must begin the criminalization process at younger and younger ages.
The Texas House approved a bill last week that would ban “sexually suggestive” routines by school cheerleaders.
Democratic Rep. Al Edwards of Houston, who filed the legislation, argued that lascivious exhibitions are a distraction for high school students that result in pregnancies, high school dropouts, contraction of AIDS and herpes and “cutting off their youthful life at an early age.”
Besides solving key health, social, and education problems, the legislation banning bump-and-grind cheerleading also gives the state education commissioner the right to reduce funding to school districts that do not comply, yet another nifty way to reduce funding for public education…brought to you by Democrats!
Mike Davis reports that the vigilantes are back. The so-called “Minutemen” project headquartered at the Miracle Valley Bible College, is part of an anti-Latino backlash that has the backing of California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is following in the footsteps of former governor Pete Wilson and the anti-immigrant Proposition 187.
The Minutemen are “the latest incarnation of the anti-immigrant patrols that have plagued the borderlands for more than a decade. Vowing to defend national sovereignty against the Brown Peril, a series of shadowy paramilitary groups, ordinarily led by racist ranchers and self-declared “Aryan warriors” — and egged on by rightwing radio jocks — have harassed, illegally detained, beaten, and possibly murdered immigrants crossing through the desert cauldrons of Arizona and California.”
Unfortunately, Woody Guthrie’s song “Vigilante Man” still has relevance today.
Starbucks won’t brew Devils & Dust
Starbucks Corp., a growing force in the music scene (responsible for selling a third of the 3 million copies of Ray Charles last album), says it chose to keep Bruce Springsteen’s new album, “Devils & Dust,” off the menu at its coffee shops, partly because of concerns about its explicit lyrics.
Neither an FBI investigation nor Dave Marsh’s exhaustive account inLouie Louie:The History and Mythology of the World’s Most Famous Rock ‘n Roll Song; Including the Full Details of Its Torture and Persecution at the Hands of the Kingsmen, J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI, and a Cast of Millions; and Introducing for the First Time Anywhere, the Actual Dirty Lyrics can stop the controversy from roiling on. The following was posted on the Rock and Rap Confidential listserv yesterday.
School board bans band from performing ‘Louie Louie’
May 5, 2005, 7:21 AM BENTON HARBOR, Mich. (AP) — A pop culture controversy that has simmered for decades came to a head when a middle school marching band was told not to perform “Louie Louie.” Benton Harbor Superintendent Paula Dawning cited the song’s allegedly raunchy lyrics in ordering the McCord Middle School band not to perform it in Saturday’s Grand Floral Parade, held as part of the Blossomtime Festival. In a letter sent home with McCord students, Dawning said “Louie Louie” was not appropriate for Benton Harbor students to play while representing the district — even though the marching band wasn’t going to sing it. Band members and parents complained to the Board of Education at its Tuesday meeting that it was too late to learn another song, The Herald-Palladium of St. Joseph reported. “It’s very stressful for us to try to come up with new songs for the band,” eighth-grader Laurice Martin told the board. “We’re trying to learn the songs from last year, but some of us weren’t in the band last year.” Dawning said that if a majority of parents supports their children playing the song, she will reconsider her decision. “It was not that I knew at the beginning and said nothing,” Dawning said. “I normally count on the staff to make reliable decisions. I found out because a parent called, concerned about the song being played.” “Louie Louie,” written by Richard Berry in 1956, is one of the most recorded songs in history. The best-known, most notorious version was a hit in 1963 for the Kingsmen; the FBI spent two years investigating the lyrics before declaring they not only were not obscene but also were “unintelligible at any speed.”
In her new book, In Defense of Our Children: When Politics, Profits and Education Collide, Elaine Garan describes how high-stakes testing and government ditaks on curriculum materals (specifically for teaching reading) are severely damaging public education.
Garan argues that the No Child Left Behind Act is a tool for the coporate takeover of public schools that has also created serious conflicts of interests for certain educational researchers.
Garan lays bare problems with the National Reading Panel (NRP) report, with a critique that complements excellent research on the same topic by Gerald Coles. She also illustrates how the NCLB requirement that any “instructional materials” purchased with program funds must be “based on scientifically based reading research” (NCLB Sect. 1202(b)(7)(iii)) damages reading instruction.
In his review of the book in Teachers College Record, Gary Ranter concludes:
Garan has performed a valuable service by challenging the purported “scientific basis” for the commercial reading programs that the government requires states and localities to adopt to receive funding under NCLB’s Reading First initiative. And she is right to urge parents and teachers to learn more about the new NCLB “reforms,” to organize, and to advocate at the state and local levels against “corporate takeovers” of public education and “deskilling of teachers” (p. 150).
Allison Krause
Jeffrey Miller
Sandra Scheuer
William Schroeder
National Guardsmen at Kent State
Ten days later police killed Phillip Lafayette Gibbs and James Earl Green and wounded 12 others on the campus of Jackson State University during demonstrations against the war in Vietnam and the Kent State shootings.
The April issue of the Canadian Association of University Teachers Bulletin offers up the following tidbits on the university workplace:
Police violence & suppression of free speech
A CAUT committee is investing the allegations of threats to freedom of expression, academic freedom, and inappropriate government practices at York U. Concerns about freedom of expression at York peaked after Toronto police violently ended a peaceful student demonstration, arresting five students. Click here for video of the January 20, 2005 police attack on York U students.
Attack on academic freedom
CAUT has called on McMaster U to reverse a policy that prohibits academic staff from expressing an opinion to the media that is unrelated to their area of “academic or professional expertise.” McMaster officials say that the policy is not meant to restrict academic freedom or freedom of speech. The CAUT report points out the obvious by saying that the effect of the limitation could be precisely that.
Institutional racism
In his commentary “Institutional Racism is Alive & Kicking” Les Back, a sociology professor at the University of London, discusses how white supremacy functions in higher education.
Back makes particular mention of the new book Institutional Racism in Higher Education. Back points out that making universities more democratic and inclusive is not just about developing a more multicultural curriculum or ensuring fair, respectful treatment of minorities. It also involves confronting the “whiteness” of the university and raising issues of ethics and responsibility in intellectual life.
Well, GBV is still in heavy rotation (particularly the Hardcore UFOs box), but Pollard et al. is in serious competition with:
Patty Griffin (courtesy of d.b.)
Johnny Cash’s Unearthed
John Hammond’s In Your Arms Again
Solomon Burke’s Make Do With What You Got
Thievery Corporation’s The Cosmic Game
Yo La Tengo’s Prisoners of Love
Beck’s Guero
Eliza Gilkyson’s Hard Times in Babylon (also courtesy of d.b.)
Marianne Faithful’s Before the Poison
Mix cd of acoustic covers (including Harry Manx, The Sadies, Townes Van Zandt, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings, Steve Earle, etc., courtesy p.o.)
“Perry’s Picks of 2004” (including John Fogerty, Lenny Kravitz, Patti Smith, Ray Charles, Christine McVie, Todd Rundgren, U2, Keb’ Mo’, Steve Earle & Reckless Kelly, Joss Stone, etc., courtesy p.m.m)
“Fuck Bush” (including Country Joe & The Fish, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, John Lennon, The Rolling Stones, John Mellencamp, Jeff Beck, etc, also courtesy p.m.m.)