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April 12, 2006
Scholastic Broke Back
Seems that school really is about more than reading, writing and 'rithmatic. The California Senate is poised to require students' textbooks to inform kids about which famous people throughout history have been homosexuals, because what they did is less important than who they did when the history-making was done.
The bill, which was passed by a Senate committee Tuesday, would require schools to buy textbooks "accurately" portraying "the sexual diversity of our society." More controversially, it could require that students hear history lessons on "the contributions of people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender to the economic, political, and social development of California and the United States of America."
Though it's a California bill, it could have far-reaching implications, not only by setting a precedent but also because California is the nation's largest textbook buyer and as such often sets the standards for publishers who sell nationwide.
[...]
The bill's author, Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Los Angeles, rejects the criticism. "We've been working since 1995 to try to improve the climate in schools for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender kids, as well as those kids who are just thought to be gay, because there is an enormous amount of harassment and discrimination at stake," she said.
As for the need to teach gay history, Kuehl points to research she says concludes that gay students might do better in school and be less at risk for suicide, truancy or drug and alcohol abuse if they saw their own lives more accurately reflected in school textbooks and if the issue were more openly discussed in classrooms.
"Teaching materials mostly contain negative or adverse views of us, and that's when they mention us at all," said Kuehl, one of the Legislature's six openly gay lawmakers. A Senate analysis of her bill noted that one of the few times homosexuality is routinely discussed in classrooms is in relationship to pathology. "In textbooks, it's as if there's no gay people in California at all, so forget about it," she said.
The bill expands on the existing state education code that already requires inclusion in the curriculum of the historical role and contributions of members of ethnic and cultural groups.
But central to the coming legislative floor debates will no doubt be questions about how gay issues might be woven into American history. The answer is still up for debate -- as is which historical figures might be outed in the process, and how textbook authors would decide their relevance.
"We're not suddenly going to say, 'So and so was gay' when they never said that," Kuehl cautioned. "But if you're teaching Langston Hughes poetry, you get a twofer because he was admittedly gay and he was black. So you could say he was a gay, black poet and talk about that."
[...]
[Critic Karen] England says she doesn't really care, because a person's contribution to history doesn't hinge on sexual orientation.
"I don't care if, or who, whatever historical figure they want to say is gay," England said. "If we're discussing history, who someone had sex with is inappropriate. I don't think most Californians want history and social sciences taught through the lens of who in history slept with whom."
Who cares? Gawd a'mighty, I don't recall my history teachers telling us about 'tang-crazed persons of great historical import, and if they did lecture about where Tallyrand dipped his tallywhacker, it left a much less lasting impression on my young mind then did Peter Graves asking his young charge, "Billy, do you like Roman gladiator movies?"
Perhaps it's time to drop the "L" from Public Education; it would be a more honest statement of what K-12 is really all about: creating little Democrats.
Posted by Mike Lief at April 12, 2006 12:14 AM
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