Literate Black Women Peer Counselors

The essay, “Transformation College Literacy of Literate Black Women Peer Counselors,” started off with Robin Wisniewski’s definition of a literate black woman. “[Being a literate Black woman means] that I can speak and what I have to say will be hear because I know what I am talking about (69). She then goes on to tell readers of the importance of knowledge and education. Wisniewski planned to successfully create a peer counseling program for students with disabilities, from low-income families, and who were the first from their families to attend college. Her methods were not of the traditional note-taking method.

Robin realized she wanted to do this transformation when she herself began feeling change. “My transformative journey began with the awareness of my own expectation for change in myself” (71). She tells readers that her college literacy arose from knowledge and learning new things. She thought of it as freedom, as “liberation” (71).

She starts her story with two young Black women, Lauryn who came from an all black school, and Vania who came from an all white school. Both Lauryn and Vania thought of the program as less of a program, more of a family environment. As the students were being taught, they were also doing the teaching. In this program everyone learned from everyone. Robin tells us that those two women taught her the best method of liberating black women, and that is knowledge through family orientation. These women made the program more family-like and each student was based off of their personality, not their major or grade point average. Each student was tutored without being judged. Robin Wisniewski just wanted to educate young people. “Knowledge is power, so if you’re literate you can make your own way. It is freedom.”

Going Against the Grain 3

The last ten pages of this reading feature how opportunities for African Americans to gain literacy were available to both pre-Civil War era and post-Civil War era. African Americans helped themselves to literacy in provocative and creative ways, but after the Civil War they were energized to take supreme advantage of what had previously had been denied them. This energy was cycled in three ways: the Sabbath school movement; the missionary school movement; and the common or public school movement (153).

The Sabbath school movement was church-sponsored and community-run schools that provided basic literary instruction. It was run predominately by African Americans themselves and operated in the evenings and on weekends. The african American community itself was largely responsible for laying the fertile foundation for universal literacy in African American communities. The second effort toward literacy was the missionary school movement. During the Civil War, various northern community and church organizations intensified their "home" mission activities...These efforts became a primary mechanism for the advocacy of freedom, justice, and empowerment (153). The third effort, the common/public school movement, emerged in the early 1870s. Southern leaders rose to regain their authority by supporting the education of African Americans through the establishing of public schools. These southern leaders were aided by many industrial philanthropists, who sought to maintain the status qui and push industrial models of education and to discourage liberal arts education (155).

This section of the reading went on to tell how African Americans began starting schools of their own such as Spelman College and Morehouse College. Schools such as these came to because African American parents with the resources to take advantage of other options typically did not favor public schools. They did not want to subject their children to the abuse of white southerners or to a southern-designed system of "Black" education, which they knew to be inferior. They preferred private schools that were still being run by philanthropic support, with a significant percentage of that support coming from the freed men and women themselves (155). Such efforts were repeated across as a network of private schools was established that would ultimately form the core of what today is the collective of historically African American private colleges and universities. This network of public and private institutions continues today, at the beginning of the 21st century, having forged a remarkable historical record for education of African American people (156).

"You Ain't Black If You Ain't Seen It!"

This particular reading highlights the importance of black films and literacy. It demonstrates how black feature films portray black women and the role literacy plays in such. It uses "Passion Fish", "Eve's Bayou", "The Josephine Baker", "Losing Isaiah", "The Color Purple", and a few others to demostrate how the black woman is portrayed as either a struggle or a rise from struggle, and in these instances the films seldomly show the black female as a literate being.

 The women who played these roles were provided with lucrative jobs, however, they were subjected to the demeaning message of the producers. It is important to notice these sort of things because just like in other forms of media, movies are factors in influencing youth and how they portray black experiences. These black films imply that black women struggle in day to day life, and the women that play these roles get paid to diminish the view of the black community. I have never noticed the simplicity in slandering the black literacy in these movies until this particular essay. It has raised awareness as to how often and how easily it is for our own people to bring down a collective community. Music, the way black people act on televison, magazines, and movies can all either benefit or be detrimental to the image of black society and our literacies.

Going Against the Grain 2

This portion of Going Against the Grain emphasized the efforts of people all over in the education of black peoples. The author highlights the philanthropic efforts of Reverend Samuel Thomas, Elias Neau, Dr. Thomas Bray, Thaddeus Kosciuszco, Catherine Williams Ferguson, Ann Marie Becroft, and many more. The writer also traces efforts such as Port Royal Commission and different exerpts from the Emancipation Proclamation and President Abraham Lincoln which helped the black community gain literacy. Even when the slaves were under the bondage of  being "contraband", there were still notable efforts of the black slaves succesfully beginning to learn to read and write.

 

 I think it is important to highlight the amount of work that was put into the acquisition of black education, and to note the pride the black community had in seeking and attaining (what we see as) simple knowledge such as reading and writing. When we go back into the historical context of how we as a people struggled to gain the legal right to learn, it shows how ungrateful today's generations can be about free education. As i was reading my exerpt and noticing all of the trials and tribulations people of all different backgrounds and beliefs went through for the education of African-Americans it kind of irritated me to know that I know people who do not go to school because of laziness and lack of concern. It emphasizes the difference in how my generation thinks differently from past generations. It ultimately reminded me of the lack of "work ethic" my father always talks about. Seeing how past leaders literally fought and struggled for many years to even be able to look at a book and then seeing how my generation gets annoyed when we have to touch a book demonstrates the shift in morals between old and new.

Going Against the Grain

The relationship between African American women and the black community is embraced throughout the first few pages of “Going against the Grain.” Women were the backboned in their families and households. Black women became a crucial part of the community despite the struggle of being recognized they have faced. As African Americans were fighting for equal rights for all races, African American women were fighting for equal rights for all genders. Exploitation for America arose when Thomas Jefferson contradicts his “all men are equal” statement by saying blacks should have rights, but not any that are equal to whites. But the real issue was that "all men are equal" left out women, despite everything women have done for their community.  

Women were used as producers, only being treated with respect if they were needed. These women found a way to prevail against all odds. “Each movement toward literacy was a signal that these women were going very much against the grain of prevailing cultural beliefs, practices, and expectations” (114).  

Reading how women were treated inspired me to be everything that they expected me not to be. I think here at Spelman, or at any all female college, we learn how to be respectable and dignified intellects with a mind of our own while maintaining our “pretty girl rock.” J 

Black Women/Black Literature

Reading "Black Women/Black Literature" was very uplifting as a black literate woman, but it also had its low points throughout the conversation. It felt good to find out that there are other ethnicities in the world that place value in the black language and culture. This reading was a interview between Christina McVay, a white teacher of Pan-African Literature among many other black literacy classes, and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy. The interview mainly centered around how McVay became interested in black literature, how her classes have an effect on her students as well as herself, and how black women and black literature have influence her life both personally and academically. 

After being asked how she came to be involved with black women and literacy in the Pan-African Department, McVay answered by stating "...one of the communities that has the greatest oral dexterity is the Black community. I believe that comes from that long oral tradition from Africa right through slavery and Jim Crow in this country" (89). Reading this statement the first, I regarded it as a complement to black people, but when I reread it, I only saw it as a one-sided comment only complementing the African Americans that endured slavery and the racism of Jim Crow laws. It seemed as though McVay thought that the dexterity of the black community was only passed down from the older generation, and the younger generation only used the language that they learned from their parents or someone from earlier generations. But the reality is that black language is not only comprised of the oral traditions of the older generation, and would not get the attention for its diversity if it were not for contributions made by both the old and new generations. 

When asked how black women and black culture have influenced her life, McVay explained that she appreciates black literature because of the knowledge and morals and values that black women are able to provide throughout their stories. She went on to talk about how black literature helped to shape her belief system, and that it helped her more than going to Sunday school or church. Although I do believe that black literature includes knowledge and morals and values, I had trouble understanding how McVay believed that reading a book written by a black woman could or would equip her with the knowledge and values needed to make it through life. My take on black literature it that most black writers get their philosophies from the Bible or some type of spiritual teaching or experience anyways, so to put black literature above the Bible or any type of spiritual teaching does not make sense. 

The Black Woman's Strength

 Literacy and education go hand in hand. What is important is that these two concepts are often deprived from black women, leaving them to struggle in society. Black women are generalized and categorized as the stereotypical inferior counterparts of society. Even in the historical perspective women of color faced difficulties in education, besides the long period where they were not taught how to read or write, when they had the legal right to society shut them off. Education was seen as a privalege and not needed for a woman because her ultimate goal was to give birth and raise children, those women who persued education were abnormalities for society. This mentality of inferiority in education has silently progressed into today's society. In this century, "25% of the world's population is illiterate. Women comprise 60% of this group, and Black women comprise 44% of all illiterate women," meaning that the majority of the illiterate population is comprised of black women (19). This fact emphasizes the severity of needing to educate our black women. All in all it is crucial that we uplift the stereotypical black women and not only educate her, but provide her with the resources to recieve a quality education. "Perhaps the black womanis tired, perhaps sha has given up, or perhaps neither is true. Hundreds of years after being brought to the United States, the Black women seems to be worse off than ever. There are glimmers of hope that she will overcome, but they are simply glimmers." The hope comes from the fact that "she continues to survive, and she survives the best she can given her circumstance. She continues to struggle because she believes in the promises for social equity" (23).

-How do you think it is that after all of this time it is still a struggle for the Black woman to educate herself?


-Do you believe that it is a societal hinderance or a mental one?


-Do you see illiteracy as a problem now like the essay emphasizes it to be?