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Abstract
Our study examined the experiences of three middle school teachers who created their own Black History Month curriculum. Although, the relevance of Black History Month is under scrutiny by opponents who feel it marginalized the history of Black Americans, proponents of this position have failed: to account for teachers who view and use this Month to challenge passive approaches to teaching Black history and to provide for the overreliance on traditional historical sources. Our goal was to uncover various ways in which teachers navigate or interrupt "official curriculum" that marginalizes the history of Black Americans. Findings suggest that Black History Month teaching operates in both transgressive and regressive ways that require more scholarly attention and consideration to tease out appropriate pedagogies.
Introduction
The philosophical underpinnings that prompted Negro History Week (now Black History Month) served as an attempt at reconfiguring the long and troubling discourse concerning the representation of Black people in K-12 curriculum (Bair, 2013; Dagbovie, 2007; Sesay, 1996; Woodson, 1926). As early as the 19th century, Black history in K-12 schools presented Black people as non-existent or egregious caricatures in the master script (Swartz, 2007) to infer a state of natural inferiority to Whites. School curriculum, represented through textbooks, contributed to self-hatred for Black children and helped propagate racial bigotry and the doctrine of White supremacy (Elson,1964; Dubois, 1935; Woodson, 1933). The father of Black history, Carter G. Woodson (1994/1933), proclaimed that the curriculum taught Black children that their "Black skin was a curse" (p. 3) and that they should hold an inferior place to other races in society. Additionally, he surmised that schoolchildren and adults internalized the curriculum that contributed to both symbolic and physical violence against Black American children, "because there would be no lynching if it did not start in the schoolroom" (Woodson, 1933, p. 3).
Statements from historian Arnold Toynbee stating that Black people "made no productive contribution to civilization" (cited in Winston, 1975, p. 462) or philosopher Georg Hegel's (2004) comments that Africans had an "unhistorical spirit" (p. 171) were indicative of the attitudes and dispositions about Black peoples' heritage displayed in early textbooks (Epstein & King, 2012). Several late 19th century and early 20th century school textbooks (Elson, 1964; Foster, 1999; Dubois, 1935; King, Davis,...