The Roundup Top Ten for October 1, 2021
Don't Forget that "School Choice" Originated in Massive Resistance to Desegregationby Nancy MacLean"Rather than giving families more school options, school choice became a tool intended to give most families far fewer in the end." |
The Legal Standard Encouraging Religious Exemptions to Vaccination is Bafflingby Charles McCraryAmerican courts have established sincerity of individual belief as the standard for recognizing a religious accommodation or exemption. Even though no major religions ban vaccination, this standard could still sustain widespread refusal of coronavirus vaccines. |
Violence Over Schools is Nothing Newby Sherman Dorn"The history of education teaches us that violence surrounding democratic schooling is part of a recurring pattern and that we have a choice to passively accept or assertively confront violent impulses." |
When Black History Gets Unearthed, Who Speaks for the Dead?by Jill LeporeLocating and unearthing African American burial grounds is only the beginning of a process involving difficult questions of justice and inheritance. Should federal legislation make up for the legacy of dispossession that leaves cemeteries in legal limbo and without means for upkeep? |
The Lost Promise of Black Studyby Andrew J. Douglas and Jared LogginsAtlanta's Institute of the Black World struggled to negotiate its mission to theorize and document Black oppression and resistance without being captured or controlled by outside institutions, including the established historically Black colleges in Atlanta. Its history raises difficult and important questions about the relationship of universities and freedom today. |
Traumatic Monologues: The Therapeutic Turn in Indigenous Politicsby Melanie K. YazzieAmerican and Canadian politicians are happy to promote initiatives based in psychological understandings that "trauma" is the principal source of Native disadvantage, while ignoring the ongoing colonial exploitation of indigenous lands by the oil and gas industries. |
The Golden Age of "Traditional Marriage" Never Wasby Lauren GuttermanDespite conservative mythologizing, married Americans in the postwar era frequently explored same-sex attractions and relationships. These histories show that regardless of who controls the Supreme Court, conservatives will be unable to force a narrow model of family life on the public. |
Why I Hope My Kids Never Read Roald Dahlby David M. Perry"The Dahl family has apologized for Roald Dahl's anti-Semitism, but the question remains, for readers and viewers, for TV producers and writers: what might it mean to eat the fruit from this poisoned tree?" |
Observe "Banned Book Week" by Standing Up for Academic Freedomby David Wippman and Glenn Altschuler"When school boards or legislators with little or no subject matter or pedagogical expertise ban books or direct how certain subjects should be taught, education is impoverished, and everyone loses." |
Extinctby Barbara Penner and Adrian Forty"The history of objects becomes far richer when we also consider the underside of progress: the conflicts, obsolescence, accidents, destruction, and failures that have been such an integral part of modernization and its modes of operation." |