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NEW LITERATURE                          WEAVER

child, is largely response to the black nationalism sweeping the nation. While some white racists continue to say that all black people know is to burn, loot, snipe, and kill and be a "tool of the communists," some other whites are turning to compensatory educational programs "designed to eliminate the causes of deprivation" before "the ravages of poverty become irreversible."
Hence, the "new" literature postpones to another generation any real solution of ghetto problems. It also places the burden for change upon the shoulders of the black child. For it is the black ghetto child who must be changed, not the centuries-old conditions which have perpetuated disadvantage. Many black people find these programs much lass than thrilling, as having not too much potential, and as a delaying tactic.
The "new" literature has been written too hastily. The problem of educating black ghetto children is being brought to the attention of our people at this time partially as a cover for the poor quality of education which has long been the fate of low income and minority group children. The deprivation theory places the burden on the black children and the effort to denigrate the black family, and especially the black mother, is a systematic effort to free the school systems from accepting responsibility for the mis-education of black children. The present and prior history of neglect of the children and youth of the poor and to provide superior education, facilities, and opportunities for white middle- and upper-class children and youth still continues.  This means a widening gap between the black ghetto child and middle- and upper-class white children, and results in a life-long handicap to the black child by freezing him into low class status. Cultural deprivation of the black people has been a conscious policy of the white racists and their dupes and stooges on the boards of education for more than a century. Cultural deprivation is still the major factor in the education of the black child.
Compensatory education programs are too little and too late. Many of these programs are based in (1) a power field which does not yet involve parity for black people; (2) a content field which does not identify the kinds of changes in behavior to be induced in blacks other than as a condescending approach to the culture of the black people with no effort to structure dignity for the life-style, linguistic habits and behaviors of black people, but rather designed to produce white middle-class conventional behaviors; (3) a reward system oriented towards a racist society, rather than integration of black and white people, providing for development of individual self-respect
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