Occupy the Curriculum: Critical Approaches for Teaching About the Occupy Movements

Jason R. HarshmanThe Ohio State

UniversityNAME Conference—

Philadelphia, PANovember 29, 2012

OverviewA. Objectives and Theoretical

Framework

B. Mississippi Freedom School Curriculum (1964)

C.A history of “occupying”

D.Occupy the Hood: A Critical Sense of Place/Space

E. OTH, social media, and citizenship education

F. Curriculum ideas for OTH

G.Questions

Objectives: Build upon examples found in the curriculum used by the

Freedom Schools in 1964 to examine current issues regarding political and economic power, civil rights, and citizenship education;

Examine the Occupy the Hood and Occupy Wall Street movements through a critical lens in order to complicate the way in which the narrative of OWS was presented through domestic media outlets;

Review curriculum that brings together the ideals of the Freedom Schools and the OTH movement to learn about and critically examine historical and contemporary issues pertinent to students who are part of a larger decolonization movement for social justice;

Extend the conversation beyond the presentation by using an on-line blog forum for attendees to share ideas, reflections, and engage in discussion about these and other related topics.

Theoretical Framework

History of resistance regarding students of color in the United States (Anderson, 1988; DuBois, 1903/1994; Scarborough, 1903; Woodson, 1933). Radical Teacher (1990): Mississippi Freedom School

Curriculum—1964 Postcolonial challenges in education (Sinos Coloma, 2009;

Subedi & Daza, 2008; Wynter, 2003). Connecting critical perspectives of space to education and citizenship

(Gruenewald, 2003; Gulson & Symes, 2007; Harvey, 2012; Kinloch, 2009; Lefebvre, 1974/1991; Schmidt, 2011; Soja, 2010).

Critical approaches to curriculum and pedagogy in an era of neoliberalism (Apple, 2001; Cornbleth, 1990; Ellsworth, 1992; Freire, 1970; Giroux, 2011, 2012).

Mississippi Freedom Schools (1964)

WANTED:• Willing to teach in

a non-academic sort of setting;

• Willing to participate in voter registration activity after school;

• Willing to work with students scarred by the system.

THE BASIC SET OF QUESTIONS: (1) Why are we (teachers and students) in Freedom Schools? (2) What is the Freedom Movement? (3) What alternatives does the Freedom Movement offer us? 

Freedom School Curriculum

Secondary Questions:(1) What does the majority culture have that

we want?(2) What does the majority culture have that

we don’t want?(3) What do we have that we want to keep?(4) What do we have that we don’t want to

keep?

Questions asked throughout the curriculum:-- Where do white children live?-- What is the relationship between housing, schools, and location?--What kind of jobs do white people do in your town or city? Are there black people in similar positions?-- What does Freedom of Assembly mean? Does it mean you have a right to come together? If so, why do demonstrators go to jail?-- What is a power structure?

A History of “Occupying”

The Mission of OWS:“#ows is fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process, and the role of Wall Street in creating an economic collapse that has caused the greatest recession in generations. The movement is inspired by popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, and aims to fight back against the richest 1% of people that are writing the rules of an unfair global economy that is foreclosing on our future” (taken from OWS homepage: http://occupywallst.org/).

Brookfield confirms: No more sleeping bags or 'lying down on the ground' in Zuccotti (October 13, 2011)

The Mission of OTH:Occupy The Hood is an autonomous national grassroots movement comprised of activists, organizers and community members working with like-minded individuals and organizations across the US. Occupy The Hood stands in solidarity with any progressive organization or movement who desires and works towards the liberation, benefit and improvement of the quality of life of disenfranchised People of Color.

From Occupation to Liberation, De-Colonize, Empower The Hood.

People of Color, and in particular Black, Brown and Native/Indigenous People, have been disproportionately affected by the issues that the Occupy Movement has recently raised. Unemployment rates double nationwide, disproportionate incarceration rates, wealth gap, subprime mortgages/foreclosures.

Ife Johari Uhuru and Malik Rhasaan (#occupythehood)

“There was a problem with the model of the G.A. [General Assembly]… it became almost dismissive … If you didn't know the protocol and the hand signals already, you didn't fit in. The G.A. didn't work. For a lot of people, it was a tourist attraction.” ~Rhasaan

OTH, Social Media, and Citizenship Education

OTH on Progressive Radio Network

Occupy The Hood Radio airs Thursdays at 7pm Eastern / 4pm Pacific

The Convergence of Social Networking and Civic Education

Civic NetworkingThe use of social media to:Access civic information

and resources.Create a civic commons

whereby citizens can share, deliberate, and advocate on important civic issues.

Civic Networking Education

• Providing citizens with the opportunity and training to meaningfully, constructively, and safely use social networking for civic purposes.

OTH and Youth Citizenship/Action

“What are our obligations to each other and to the world? How inclusive are our institutions, and if they are not, why not? …These are questions that were not on the agenda for most people until the Occupy movement began.” ~ Grace Lee Boggs, 96, Civil and Workers’ Rights Advocate in Detroit.

Voice and place of youths in citizenship education

“Youthscapes” (Maira & Soep, 2005)

Judging a website by it’s 21st century cover

Whose voices are represented in your classroom?

OTH, Critical Curriculum Studies & Pedagogy

Lesson #1: Freedom Schooling in the U.S (Two days)

Rationale: The creation of Freedom Schools in the Southern United States in 1964 was not the start of resistance against discriminatory public policies aimed at disenfranchising and under-educating students of color. Since the bringing of slaves from Africa to the Caribbean and North America, the powerful have denied a quality education to students of color. This lesson provides a historical overview of resistance efforts taken by African Americans prior to and including the establishment of the Freedom Schools to provide students with a better sense of efforts over time in order to complicate the myth propagated in classrooms that the Civil Rights movement began after WWII.

Essential Question: How have students of color resisted inequities in education and society over time?

Objectives: (1) Students will understand the long history of resistance to unequal schooling from the

perspective of African Americans in the United States. (2) Students will work with primary and secondary sources to analyze perspectives using a change

over time lens. (3) Students will draw parallels between historical and contemporary events while also taking a

critical position as to why these similarities remain.

Applying the Freedom Schools Curriculum in Ohio

The Ohio Department of Education School Board members in 2012: 10 White men (2 were teachers), 1 African American man (a teacher), 7 White women (2 were teachers), 1 multi-racial woman (Real Estate).

Educational and employment backgrounds are: business, law, postal worker, airline employee, education, and lobbyist (against labor contracts). Two members worked in the George W. Bush Administration.

Questions to ask: How did these people secure these

positions? Is the process by which they came to

these positions transparent and fair? What are their values related to

education? What is a power structure?

Diagram provided in Citizenship Curriculum, Freedom Schools (1964)

Lesson #2: OWS and OTH (One to two days)

Rationale: The goals of the Freedom Schools include critical citizenship education and informed action to challenge and change power structures in the United States. Societal inequalities that affect schools and vice versa became public protests in 2011 and despite the attention given to these national protests, the voices of African Americans were not well represented in the Occupy Wall Street movement. This lesson looks at the evolvement of the OWS movement and the Occupy The Hood (OTH) movement that developed to raise awareness around issues important to people of color in the United States who were marginalized within the larger OWS movement.

Essential Question: Have the Occupy movements been successful in achieving their goals?

Objectives:

(1) Students will understand why the Occupy Movement began, why the Occupy the Hood Movement began, and the goals of each movement.

(2) Students will analyze issues of power related to modern institutions and organizations using the tools provided in the Freedom Schools curriculum.

(3) Students will compare the goals of OWS and OTH to evaluate the success of both movements.

Rationale: Building upon the previous lesson during which students learned about the long history of the Occupy Wall Street movement and the relationship between the OTH movement and the Civil Rights Movement, students will now take a global perspective of these and other events.

Essential Question: To what extent are protests globally interconnected?

Objectives:

(1) Students will understand historical roots of contemporary movements against corruption and neoliberalism around the world. This is meant to place the Occupy Movements within a larger context of global anti-colonialism.

(2) Students will use the curriculum developed by the Freedom Schools to interrogate current leaders of transnational banks and corporations, along with national governing institutions to develop a better understanding of what is meant by power and how people attain and maintain it.

(3) Students will be able to articulate their understanding of how their project at the local level connects to what they have learned about national and global movements for change.

Lesson #3: OTH/OWS and Global Decolonization (Two days)

Rationale: The culminating lesson of this unit will be used for students to discuss the relationship between the projects they created to the themes, goals, and issues of the Occupy Movements. Students will discuss what they have learned about the role of technology in the movements and then discuss the connection of their projects to the principles and goals of the national and global movements they studied.

Essential Question: What is your place in the global movement(s) for change?

Objectives:

(1) Students will evaluate the role of technology and social media in relation to the organization of the Occupy Movements.

(2) Students will share the projects they created and articulate how the extent to which their projects have been effective in raising awareness and effecting change.

(3) Students will reflect on their role and responsibility related to social justice, power, and critical citizenship.

Lesson #4: Students as Agents for Change (One to two days)

The students marched outside Frederick Douglass Academy in Detroit, Michigan and chanted,

"We want... education! When do we want it? Now!”

“Eshelman Hall Barricaded in Defense of Multicultural

Student Spaces” (Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012—

UC Berkeley campus).

THANK YOU.

Blog address: http://occupythecurriculum.wordpress.com/