inheritance

On Wednesday we had a rousing little session with a few people from the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation. With the prospect of running my own classroom looming in the next couple weeks, I'm absorbing very little of the teaching-related advice from this week, so listening to S.G. and my classmates talk about the civil rights history of Mississippi was a welcome change of pace. Besides being something different, though, the talk was also something inspiring--in the true, rejuvenating breath-of-air sense of the word. To be honest, I had never considered how teaching a messianic view of civil rights history, centered around MLK Jr. (and a few others), could paralyze kids who--quite understandably--didn't consider themselves superheroes. And here's the William Winter Institute telling us that they've just gotten a bill passed that will require public schools to teach comprehensive, interdisciplinary civil rights history! Teachers expanding Mississippi children's notions of how they can change their society!

It was flattering too, when S.G. told us that we were "the natural inheritors of the civil rights movement in Mississippi." I want to believe her; social justice is as big a reason for why I'm here as any other. But hearing such a strong affirmation of that purpose from someone else, I also find myself frightened, even resistant to it. After all, that's a tough act to follow. Is the civil rights movement in Mississippi really in good hands then? I'm clumsy; I drop things; what if I drop it? What does it mean for the cause of social justice if I'm spending my first 9 weeks just trying to stay afloat?

Ben was helpful in putting this into perspective: realistically, the social justice / civil rights side of teaching is something I'll come back to when I get my feet under me, mid-year-ish or whenever. I just hope that my flailing attempts at pedagogy until then won't create more obstacles to justice and my students' awareness of it.