Florida's Brainless Ban on AP African-American Studies
By Iris Qi
AP African-American Studies is a pilot course currently being taught by 60 teachers across the country, with the AP test not officially launching until 2025. The general objective of this class, according to the Official AP African American Studies Course Framework, is to understand the black experience in America and its modern connections through African-American history, connections with the present, key figures, movements, art, literature, and more. Wilfred Chan for The Guardian says that “structural racism, racial capitalism, mass incarceration, reparations, intersectionality and Black Lives Matter” are required topics. African American studies is typically offered by most colleges and universities in some form, yet this specific AP finds itself becoming one of the most divisive and hotly contested classes put out thus far. Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, has recently banned the teaching of this class in the state, saying that it “lacks educational value” and “inexplicably contrary to Florida law,” which would reference his 2022 Stop Woke Act that effectively bans the discussion of race in schools. This echoes his March 2022 “don’t say gay” bill, which prohibits teaching on sexual orientation and gender identity until after third grade.
The objections: the discussion surrounding reparations, queer studies, feminist thought, and intersectionality. They’ve opposed the teachings of many black writers including the Communist and Marxist ideas of Angela Davis, the phrase “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” by bell hooks, and Kimberlé Crenshaw’s term of intersectionality. DeSantis can be found saying, “I'm so sick of people not doing what's right because they're worried that people are going to call them names. We're doing what's right here.” Manny Diaz Jr, Florida's Education Commissioner, called the course “woke indoctrination masquerading as education.”
The result: the College Board published a newly revised framework for the course, changing Black Lives Matter from a required topic to an optional one and adding “black conservatism” as a “potential search topic.” Many have slammed the decision, calling it a decision which “[cowered] to politics.” Ta-Nehisi Coates, an intellectual removed from the AP curriculum, perhaps puts it best, saying the College Board shouldn’t cower for politicians who “just want a curriculum that makes people feel comfortable and feel good about themselves.”
The ban is ignorant and narrow-minded, and evidence of Florida lawmakers’ unwillingness for Americans to reconcile with our country’s ugly past and current problems. DeSantis’ block on the study of African America is a clear effort to stop the youth of this country from learning anything that would make America from looking as perfect as it should be. America’s history as a country built off of the enslavement of Africans is a hard and difficult one to learn about, but that doesn’t mean that it should be covered up. Ignoring facts doesn’t change anything: America is, and will always be, a country built off of the murder of Native American tribes and the exploitation and abuse of Africans. The least America could do in terms of reparations is allowing minority groups to discuss their community’s role in history and current society. I can’t speak for everyone or make generalizations, but as an Asian-American, understanding the history of my community and its current place changed so much of my worldview. Conversely, the only thing we are taught in class is white America’s history: the glory of George Washington, the country’s growth, the pride in its standard for the rest of the world while ignoring that Washington owned slaves, US land was forcefully taken from Native Americans, and anti-immigration legislation was passed to stop certain racial groups from entering the United States. The point is that America is the one who created the racial inequality that is present today, so it needs to reckon with its racial issues. The idea that we shouldn't learn about something because it’s not easy to digest is ridiculous. The world is not an easy place, so there should be no need to romanticize America through a rose-colored lens. The critics of this course call it “woke indoctrination,” ignoring the fact that it is a class being taught by a teacher in high school. They’re not trying to force their students to be anything, they’re just teaching how the world worked and still works. History classes teach documents from white world leaders of all different ideologies, from Hitler to Stalin. Why don’t they ban these teachings in class? They’re afraid of Americans thinking about things like intersectionality or condemnations of white supremacy as their entire rationale rests on the idea that exposure leads to conversion. So following this logic, we shouldn’t learn about anything, because we shouldn’t be indoctrinating students with the founding fathers’ racist views or Hitler’s extreme anti-Semitism. Not only that, but similar classes are taught in colleges, so it is unclear why high schoolers cannot learn the same. DeSantis is afraid of Americans understanding the real world and real world repercussions. He believes that teaching us turns us against America. He wants America to only think one way, which is that of a non-critical lens. America values democracy and freedom, so why keep us ignorant, unaware, unable to think critically about topics that matter in our modern society? Answer: he’s afraid and he doesn’t.
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