在美国政治学课程中教授关于种族的残酷事实
Professor Ron Watson teaches in both the political science and health and society programs at 贝洛伊特. He contends that teaching about race in introductory political science courses may be “students’ only opportunity to thoughtfully encounter how race shapes, 渗透, 困扰着美国的政治和社会生活.”
问:当你开始教授政治学时，种族是如何被包括在内的? 强调了什么，又忽略了什么?
我决定以《真人国际菠菜》作为补充?:美国政治中的种族和少数民族, a book that laid out the policies that helped to define the American state and particularly focused on this tradition of exclusion or inegalitarianism—this idea of not fighting for the equality of everyone. As you can imagine, many if not all of those policies have to do with race in some form or fashion. I now use American Government in Black and White, a textbook that covers it all, and institutions. Nothing about American politics or American society makes sense if you don’t talk about deep-seated, 反黑人种族歧视.
Q: Why are uncomfortable discussions of race especially important in introductory political science courses?
A: This class may be the only opportunity students have to engage with the real history of how their political system developed and the implications of it. 这些对话绝对是至关重要的, 因为在以白人为主的学校里，学生们得不到这些, they leave with what I would consider to be a very skewed view of the world.
问:学生们给了你什么反馈?
A: When I asked students what they learned in the class—and this is what actually prompted me to write the paper—the responses were extraordinary. 一个学生谈到了如何, 当他发现这门课是关于种族的, 他差点把它掉在地上, 但一旦他接受了，他就很感激. That was a similar sentiment expressed by any number of white students and a few other non-white students. 我意识到这不仅仅是必要的信息，也是人们所希望的.
Q: What can institutions like 贝洛伊特 do to better support professors in their efforts to make race central to their teaching?
A: I think 贝洛伊特 is on the right track in trying to push forward with an agenda around anti-racism that has us not just talking about our aspirations, 但谈到实现这一目标的具体步骤. Any institution that is serious about helping to make transformational social change has to be willing to recognize all of the risk—that this isn’t just a fraught conversation in terms of the fragility of white egos and historical imagination, 它也对教授它的人产生了现实生活中的影响. 我还认为，当重要(当前)问题出现时, 我们需要想办法把它们纳入课程, 即使只是为了帮助人们应对创伤和情感问题, 或者说, “We’re going to spend the first 10 minutes of every class checking in with people, 询问他们的想法和他们读过的新闻.”
Q: Do you sense that 更多的 professors and departments are building inclusive curriculums and reading material?
A:当然是在伯洛伊特学院. Especially for those departments who didn’t do those things in such a committed way before, 在过去的几年里发生了这样的变化. More and 更多的 professors I talk to are bringing up issues of positionality and race and racism and incorporating the interrogation of these points into the curriculum. 我为自己选择来这里而感到无比自豪.
分想
Q: With everything we’ve seen in the last six months related to the pandemic and racism, 你认为我们已经到了美国历史的转折点吗?
A:我认为有可能，是的. If you just step back objectively, this has been such an extraordinary moment for so many reasons. 也许说这一刻是时候了并不过分, 至少在某种程度上, 给收敛的隔离和精神上的一种现实的冲击, 旧式校风大流行, 它造成了如此多的情感和经济创伤. 乔治·弗洛伊德的谋杀案有些不同. 它是如此明目张胆, 如此可怕的, 很多人会说, “如果这就是黑人一直在谈论的事情, 然后是的, 我也绝对不能接受.“这就是为什么你会看到撤资警察的运动. All those points converged, and that has forced a shift in the consciousness of many people. For some, of course, that shift has actually been in the opposite direction. It does feel a bit like a line’s been drawn, especially once the riots began.
但我担心的是, 尤其是即将到来的大选, is that we may end up with a situation that I think happens a lot in the United States. I like to think of the United States as a pressure cooker in that things build up and then we say, “好吧, 我们会让黑人投票,” and the pressure recedes; then 更多的 things build up and we say, “好吧, 我们会让女性投票,，然后它又退去了. 我担心, 例如, 如果拜登和哈里斯赢得大选, that many of those folks of all different races and ethnicities will be like, “唷, 我们终于回到了正轨,” and neglect to realize things aren’t on track until some actual change occurs. Black Lives Matter began under Barack Obama—this is what a lot of folks miss. The government, especially at the federal level, has not been terribly responsive. No matter who wins that election, the momentum for change has to move forward.
