December 16, 2016 - 09:52
I started out the semester really excited for this 360. I knew it wouldn’t be easy, but it was important to me in so many ways. I already knew that I would be declaring an English major and Education minor, with the goal of someday becoming an English teacher, so having the two subjects in one 360 was perfect, and I knew that the topic of race would be relevant to my future work as a teacher. It was also the first time I would be taking an Education class, which was exciting and scary. As for Museum Studies, I knew it would be interesting, but I was nervous, since I normally would never have even considered taking a class in such a subject.
With regard to the theme of the 360—race—I feel like my understanding had been shifting constantly since I came to college. I was somewhat aware of the struggles faced by my Black classmates in high school, and by Black people in the nation as a whole, but before starting college, I was not really aware of my complicity in that oppression. Thus, the year between the beginning of my college career and the start of the 360 included a lot of reflection on my thoughts and behaviors with regard to race. I had learned a lot, and I knew I had a lot left to learn. Over the course of the semester, I learned to pay more attention to verbal and visual representations of race, and I saw how race can affect classroom dynamics, though I don’t feel like I understand this yet, so that is something I will need to learn more about before I am in charge of a classroom.
One thing that made a big impact on me early in the semester was when we discussed the canon in Anne’s class. I found it interesting—and important—to think/talk about why certain books are taught, and what books should be taught—whether we should read the classic texts or focus on those that are more recent and (perhaps) more relevant to us today. My conclusion (though it is not really conclusive) is that we should read both, and that in choosing books, one should think more about the books themselves than about how old they are, though it can be nice to draw from a variety of time periods. I do not feel like there are any books that we absolutely must read in schools, because there are too many to read all of them; therefore it doesn’t matter whether we read the classics. I’m still distressed when I think about my high school and how it seemed to divide books among the different level English classes by the race of the author. I am going to try to talk to one of my former teachers about this over break.
Also, this is what inspired my banner image, which is a picture I found on the internet of books that are often taught in middle or high school English. I read some of them in my classes. The caption reads: “Looking again at character and curriculum.” This is, of course, a reference to the “Look Again” exhibit at the PMA; it also refers to my own reflections on myself and the world around me throughout the semester. “Curriculum” refers to the thoughts I’ve been having about English curricula. I included “character” because I noticed that all my essays for English this semester focused pretty heavily on character development, and because I myself have undergone a good deal of character development.
Monique’s class, our museum trips, and the process of developing our own exhibit have made me consider museums in a way that I had never thought to. Before, I always just looked at the things in a museum without thinking about why the exhibit was set up as it was. From now on, I will be a much more critical (in a positive, thoughtful way) visitor in museums.
Developing the exhibit was challenging but rewarding. I learned so much interesting information about minkisi from my group’s research; I wish we could have used more in the exhibit, though I am happy with the amount we have. Too much more, I think, would overwhelm visitors, and we conveyed what we were trying to, which was the significance of minkisi and what the particular nkisi nkondi we were working with reveals about colonialism and collecting. I think my group did a good job of respectfully listening to each other and combining our ideas to do the best work that we could. We carefully chose the wording for the text and the layout for the display, and I am looking forward to seeing how it turns out!