Book controversy coverage is missing the mark 

Too much recent news coverage focuses narrowly on controversial passages, fails to address the historical context, and sidelines Black children’s experiences. 

By Amanda Calhoun

Recently, the novel Beloved by Toni Morrison has received increased media attention. The battle to have the novel removed from school curricula was a hot topic of debate in the Virginia governor race, prompting coverage by mainstream news outlets such as NBC and the Washington Post.

Stories defending the book’s inclusion in school curricula pushed back against minimizing the novel to its explicit content, arguing that the masterpiece discusses essential topics, and excluding it is akin to sanitizing racism. But, challenges to Morrison’s novels are not new, and the issue goes beyond Toni Morrison.

Books by Black authors are among the most frequently banned, arguably because of their honest accounts of the horrors of racism. In the midst of critical race theory debates, cries to ban Black-authored books are growing, which is racist in and of itself—just because a book is authored by a Black person does not mean it encompasses critical race theory, a field of knowledge coined in the law sector that requires expertise and scholarship.

But in the midst of reporting on these challenged or banned books, journalists miss the elephant in the room: the books that aren’t challenged.

Reporting needs to start focusing on the rampant white supremacy in American curriculum at large, and to center the perspectives of Black children (and other children of color) who have been forced for centuries to read books that show them in a dehumanizing, inaccurate light.

Reporting needs to start focusing on the rampant white supremacy in American curriculum at large, and to center the perspectives of Black children (and other children of color) who have been forced for centuries to read books that show them in a dehumanizing, inaccurate light. 

U.S. curricula are  white-centered to a fault.

Look at a typical elementary or high school syllabus, and you will find that, unless the teacher has taken special lengths to diversify the authors (and even then), the overwhelming majority of authors are white. And it shows. White people are always the winners.

History books are often whitewashed, glossing over the violence and hatred of white supremacy in order to present white people favorably. White people are portrayed as the settlers and the inventors, rather than the colonizers, the plunderers, and the murderers.

In English classes, students have long been forced to read American classics that largely center the white perspectives, and illustrate characters of color through a racist, inaccurate lens. 

Black people are only “seen” when they interact with white people, and even then, their roles are subservient and demeaning. This very concept also repeats itself in film, also known as the Duvernay test, a method to ascertain whether people of color are truly represented or are tokenized through a white lens.

The overwhelming whiteness of the typical U.S. curriculum goes unmentioned in most media coverage of controversial books by Black authors. A recent TIME article discusses the push by conservatives to ban certain books in schools. Another article in Washington Post mentions that nearly half of Republicans surveyed do not want children to learn about the history of racism in school.

Although these articles cover important issues, neither mentions that, whether teachers (still mostly white females) teach about racism or not, and whether school systems ban certain books or not, most curricula are white-dominated and racist. The whiteness of American curriculum is not a partisan issue; it is a societal issue.

Although these articles cover important issues, neither mentions that, whether teachers (still mostly white females) teach about racism or not, and whether school systems ban certain books or not, most curricula are white-dominated and racist.

As a Black child growing up in the Midwest in the early 2000s, I remember cringing with discomfort while reading Huckleberry Finn and The Sound and the Fury. I fumed as I listened to my white English teachers shower Mark Twain and William Faulkner with praise.

I could not wrap my mind around how these authors could possibly be so highly acclaimed when the Black characters they created in their novels were so inaccurate and offensive. And these two books were just the tip of the iceberg — there were many, many more.

In fact, every white-authored book we read portrayed Black people inaccurately and often as frank, racist stereotypes. Over and over, teachers subjected me to books with Black characters that made my blood boil. Black women were often portrayed as subservient “Mammy” characters—from the family maid Calpurnia in To Kill a Mockingbird, to Dilsey, the prized cook in The Sound and the Fury. I was keenly aware, at a very young age, that Black women were only considered worthwhile, in the eyes of white authors, if they were there as hired help.

The Black male characters were not any better. From Sambo in Uncle Tom’s Cabin to Jim in Huckleberry Finn, Black males were portrayed over and over as weak, foolish sources of entertainment for white characters or ridiculous sidekicks. My white teachers could have taught these books with acknowledgement of the racist portrayals that stained their pages—but they never did.

I began to hope there would be no Black characters when we started a new white-authored text. Yet each traumatic read of Black characters described as foolish, dumb, or deviant was coupled with an exuberant smile from my English teachers.

Many of my white teachers supported this underlying narrative that whiteness was superior and blackness was inferior—or at the very least, they did not challenge it. But even as a child, I sure did.

In my 8th grade English class, we read Ballad of Birmingham, a poem authored by Dudley Randall, a Black man, and written in response to the 1963 bombing of 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. The poem spoke of white gloves on the black skin of the little girls who would soon be murdered

My white teacher told us that the whiteness of the gloves symbolized innocence and invited us to discuss this concept. I disagreed, stating that, for me, the white gloves symbolized the violence and hatred of white people, who would soon decimate the innocent Black girls. My teacher insisted that I was incorrect, and that whiteness must symbolize purity. That teacher also remained visibly angry at me for the remainder of the year.

In that moment, I realized I was doomed to endure English classes that would center not only white authors but also the white teachers’ perspective.

In that moment, I realized I was doomed to endure English classes that would center not only white authors but also the white teachers’ perspective.

Ignoring the overwhelming whiteness of school booklists is not the only problem I’ve seen with recent coverage.

News stories about school curriculum, whether it be critical race theory or controversial books, also largely focus on the feelings of white children and parents. A white mother is given media attention, including a video, discussing how her son was traumatized by reading Beloved.

Reporters continue to cover stories centering on whether teaching about racism will make white children feel bad about being white.

A recent CBS tweet about their critical race theory documentary even asked, “how young is too young to talk about race with children?” This question is code for: How young is too young to talk about race with white children in schools? Black children, forced to endure racism from a young age, are painfully aware of their race.

Few articles cover the feelings of Black children and parents about the legacy of white supremacy in school curricula, but they should.

Few articles cover the feelings of Black children and parents about the legacy of white supremacy in school curricula, but they should. 

To be sure, journalists are mostly white, so it may prove difficult for Black interviewees to trust them enough to open up about their experiences, which society often minimizes or silences.

However, this should not stop reporters from prioritizing building trust, and besides, Black reporters could cover these stories, too.

There is a need for news stories that center the anger and sadness that Black children and parents endure while reading most schoolbooks that were never banned or challenged—and are, in fact, praised.

Where are the news stories highlighting the pressure Black children receive from white teachers to agree that the white perspective is correct?

Where is the widely publicized video of the Black parent discussing how their Black child is traumatized by repeatedly seeing themselves portrayed through a dehumanizing white lens?

I have not seen them, and I want to.

 

Previously from The Grade

Better ways to cover Black homeschooling
How do we get Black kids’ literacy to matter? Have more journalists cover it.
A white parent’s perspective on media coverage of Black schools like the one her daughter attends
The problem with the New York Times’ “impoverished rural schools” narrative