Thursday, 3/5
EQ: How do romantic and realistic approaches to DESCRIPTION contrast in Twain's essay?
Read and discuss Twain's "Two Ways of Seeing a River"
Work on HUCK FINN Study Guide--DUE tomorrow, Fri. 3/6
Friday, 3/6
AGENDA:
ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS FOR THIS UNIT:
What is satire? What are the techniques satirists use? What is the difference between Horatian and Juvenalian satire
What are the characteristics of the realist period in American literature? How does it contrast with romanticism?
How does Mark Twain employ both kinds of satire in his essays and in his fiction--i.e. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn? What is the novel relevant for us today and why has it stirred so much controversy over the years?
Read and discuss Jocelyn Chadwick's essay.
View excerpts from Ken Burns' Mark Twain video for PBS
Why Huck
Finn Belongs in the Classroom
Twain's work sparks the kind of frank
discussions about race and race relations that we need - and fear - to have
by Jocelyn
Chadwick, from the Harvard Education
Letter, Nov./Dec. 2000
In
the American Library Association's
recently published list
of the 100 most frequently challenged books of the 1990s, Adventures of
Huckleberry Finn ranked fifth. In fact, Samuel Clemens (a.k.a. Mark Twain)
had the dubious distinction of having written two of the only three
pre-twentieth-century books on the list. (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
was #83, and Helen Bannerman's blatantly racist The Story of Little Black
Sambo was #90.) Clearly, much controversy remains about whether Mark Twain
had racist attitudes and whether he displayed those attitudes in his works,
especially Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Stereotypes
in his portrayal of the character Jim, excessive use of the racial slur
"nigger," and a paternalistic attitude toward African Americans are
among the charges made against Twain by his would-be banners. Are these charges
valid, and if so, do they implicate Mark Twain as a racist? Twain scholar Lou
Budd has asserted that Twain had "conflicting, conflicted attitudes"
about the racial issues of his time. And while I acknowledge the likely truth
in Budd's assertion, I would also argue that, given the time in which Twain
wrote, this can be seen as a minor indictment of Clemens the man and an even
lesser one of Twain the writer.
As
an African American, I know that I would rather be in a room with a person who
is working through his position on race and inequality than with an
incorrigible racist. Certainly racist attitudes of any kind, even if they stem
from "conflicting, conflicted attitudes" and membership in a culture
steeped in racial oppression, are unacceptable. But what are essential and
substantial are the decisions we make and the concomitant actions we take as a
result of our attitudes. We cannot, therefore, overlook the works of Twain that
do address the issues of race and stereotype. Clearly, Twain used his writing
to work through issues of race for himself and his society, and when I read
Twain's satires, I feel that he "gets it." Despite the culture
surrounding him, Twain understood deeply that racism is wrong. For Twain to
have depicted in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a young hero who
questioned racial inequality and an African American who was caring,
compassionate, and strongly committed to his freedom was revolutionary indeed.
Moreover,
The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson more than nods at Twain's interest - or,
rather more appropriately, his concern - about race. In this novel Twain turns
on its proverbial ear the misconception of racial inferiority as evidenced
through language acquisition. Roxy, a slave woman who gives birth to a child
sired by the slave master, switches her baby with that of the slave master's
wife to avoid having her son sold down South. Both children grow up adapting
perfectly to their environments. Through the strength of Roxy's character and
the results of her actions, Twain makes clear that racial inferiority is not
inherent (as many in his time believed) and that voice and language can be
acquired by anyone who is put in the right environmental circumstances.
Consider
the Context
Twain's
views and depictions of African Americans must also be considered in the
context of African Americans' changing notions of themselves between 1835 and
1910. We know concretely through African American periodicals published during
the period and through slave narratives published both during the period and
during the early 1930s through the WPA project that African Americans viewed
themselves and their place in the North and South in varying ways. But one
constant that emerges over and over again - from the precise and articulate
periodicals such as The Elevator to
the narratives transcribed in heavy Southern dialect - is the desire to be
understood and appreciated as a thinking individual. This is a view of African
Americans that Twain, especially in Pudd'nhead Wilson, depicted
strongly. Paralleling this view, too, was an abiding and deep appreciation
among African Americans for any white person who displayed a scintilla of
concern, let alone a proclivity for voicing or displaying that concern. If the
African Americans of Twain's time could recognize the extraordinariness of
whites who dared question the prevailing social structures, can't we as
contemporary readers do the same?
By
now, I'm sure it's clear that I believe Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
must remain in classrooms throughout the country. It is educative not only for
African Americans, but for anyone sitting in an American literature survey
course. Does it stand in lieu of a good, substantive American history class
that addresses African Americans' experiences under slavery? Of course not, but
it certainly rounds out that experience. This is especially true in school
districts that for budgetary or other reasons do not have access to many novels
by African Americans who were Twain's contemporaries. But even if a district
does have a budget that allows it to purchase class sets of Frances Harper's Iola
Leroy, for example, it is still important to include a Twain novel,
especially Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, in the curriculum.
Through
the controversy surrounding this book alone, Twain brings into schools what all
of us in this country desperately need, yet fear, most: discussions - frank
discussions - about race, race relations, interracial relations, race language,
racial stereotypes and profiling, and, ultimately, true and unadulterated
racial equality. Does he ask all the pertinent questions and provide effective
and lasting solutions? No. How could he? How could African American writers
such as William Wells Brown, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Ralph Ellison,
George Schuyler, or even the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. do the same?
In
no way am I asserting that this novel is the ultimate answer to discussing race
relations in this country or even in the English/language arts classroom. What
I am asserting is that change begins, must begin, with one individual. And
while that one individual who connects with someone else will not cauterize the
racial chasm, the connection does create a ripple in the great racial ocean
that continues concentrically. By questioning racism in his own time and
provoking discussion in ours, Twain provides just such a connection for many
students.
No comments:
Post a Comment