The Nation: Replacing History With Fiction in Arizona

[marmar]

.......(snip).......

It is a peculiar fact of modern Western rhetoric, as prevalent among liberals as conservatives, that nationality is understood as a liberating identity, whereas ethnicity, race and other markers are regarded as confining. There are far more black and Asian people in the world than there are Americans. Racial identity is no less diverse than national identity. But somehow to describe Woods as black or Asian traps him in a pigeonhole, while to define him by his nationality sets him free.

Such was the ostensible motivation of the Arizona officials who banned Mexican-American studies from the Tucson schools. Tom Horne, the state attorney general who surfed into office on a wave of anti-immigrant bigotry, wrote the legislation, which claims the curriculum “advocates ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.” By the end of January officials were going into schools and boxing up Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, one of the books banned for “promoting ethnic resentment.”

It should go without saying that any education worthy of the name teaches children as individuals. It is equally axiomatic that being an individual does not prevent you from also being part of of one, indeed, many groups. At one and the same time we are always several things and just one, ourselves.

Horne’s goal was not only to erase the teaching of Mexican-American studies but to collapse Latino identity into white American mythology—to rewrite history so fast it smudges because the ink is not dry on the first draft. He wasn’t really referring to nurturing Latino students as individuals (indeed, he targeted them as a group) but raising them as “patriots” for a country that exists only in his imagination. “American” and “individual” are not synonymous—indeed, they are no more, or less, antagonistic a pairing than “Latino” and “individual” or “American” and “Latino.” And while being American may carry more privileges, it is no more, or less,
worthy a category than being Latino. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/article/166140/replacing-history-fiction-arizona

[pinto]

1. "being an individual does not prevent you from also being part of of one, indeed, many groups"

I am an individual.
I am a male.
I am white.
I am gay.
I am Irish-American.
I am a brother.
I am a twin.
I am a PWA.
I am a Baby Boomer.
I am an American citizen.
I am a Democrat.

None of these "profiles" exclude my identity as any of the other "profiles".

[RKP5637]

2. K&R !!! n/t

[RKP5637]

3. K&R !!! n/t