When we're done. When those two pages are in the past. When George and Slim have walked off, arms around each other with Slim saying, "You hadda, George...I swear you hadda." My students and I have shared something. We have witnessed, in 100 short pages what it feels like to fall in love with a character, then to have seen awful things befall them just to see what they are made of.
And yet in the midst of those hundred pages, we shared so much.
One of those shared moments was our collective horror at Steinbeck's use of racial slurs.
This year I tried a new approach to discussing slurs in class.
At the inspiration of my friend Ben, I looked at some of the different words for snow in the Inuktitut language. I wrote eleven of them on different slides and shared them with my students.
"What do the number of words for snow in Inuktitut tell us?"
My students were brilliant. They waxed poetically about the way the peoples of northern Canada and the Arctic must revere snow, understand snow, and they noted that both "there must be a need for all these names because they use all the words in their daily life," and "snow must just be so important to them."
Now it was my turn again,
"What do we have lots of words for?"
My students turned to their neighbor and discussed the things we have many names for:
money and phones were the two unanimous choices.
But then I asked them another question,
"I want you to take sixty seconds to silently think of as many put downs and insults as you can."
There was a weighty pause as the air drained out of the classroom.
"You may not say any of these words, I will just ask you for the number."
My point here was clearly about the variety of ways we use words to harm other people. The students' lists ranged from 21 to 57 words.
And, truly, by the time we got back to Steinbeck's use of terrible, hurtful, despicable language which was heartbreakingly appropriate for the era in which it was written, my students were acknowledging things about the ways we destroy each other, the ways we break each other down.
I am always proud of my students, but on this day I was particularly moved. I saw them as future lawmakers, future parents, future world leaders, and future teachers. It must be noted, however, that they do not always agree, but that fact makes me even more encouraged. I saw them look at language as a way of moving the needle of humanity toward positivity or negativity. Our language, they realized, is not neutral.
Later that day I watched my cross country team run a race. It was beautiful and so were they. My favorite part of running, though, is the cheering. Everyone cheers at running races. It doesn't matter what the person running believes in, who they vote for, or what football jersey they wear on Sunday afternoons. We should all be more like the crowds at running races, handing out water and screaming out "put ups," like "You look great!" "Keep going!" and "C'mon, you got this!!"
"What do the number of words for snow in Inuktitut tell us?"
My students were brilliant. They waxed poetically about the way the peoples of northern Canada and the Arctic must revere snow, understand snow, and they noted that both "there must be a need for all these names because they use all the words in their daily life," and "snow must just be so important to them."
Now it was my turn again,
"What do we have lots of words for?"
My students turned to their neighbor and discussed the things we have many names for:
money and phones were the two unanimous choices.
But then I asked them another question,
"I want you to take sixty seconds to silently think of as many put downs and insults as you can."
There was a weighty pause as the air drained out of the classroom.
"You may not say any of these words, I will just ask you for the number."
My point here was clearly about the variety of ways we use words to harm other people. The students' lists ranged from 21 to 57 words.
And, truly, by the time we got back to Steinbeck's use of terrible, hurtful, despicable language which was heartbreakingly appropriate for the era in which it was written, my students were acknowledging things about the ways we destroy each other, the ways we break each other down.
I am always proud of my students, but on this day I was particularly moved. I saw them as future lawmakers, future parents, future world leaders, and future teachers. It must be noted, however, that they do not always agree, but that fact makes me even more encouraged. I saw them look at language as a way of moving the needle of humanity toward positivity or negativity. Our language, they realized, is not neutral.
Later that day I watched my cross country team run a race. It was beautiful and so were they. My favorite part of running, though, is the cheering. Everyone cheers at running races. It doesn't matter what the person running believes in, who they vote for, or what football jersey they wear on Sunday afternoons. We should all be more like the crowds at running races, handing out water and screaming out "put ups," like "You look great!" "Keep going!" and "C'mon, you got this!!"
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