Blog Post #6

“The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house” –Audre Lorde

            This is a quote that I heard first semester my freshman year of college. I heard it in the class “What is ethnic literature?” At the time, we were discussing it in the context of English curriculums. In this class, people of color wrote all the books that we read. The majority of the pieces somehow focused upon the author’s own life experiences as people of color living in a white supremacist world. We talked about how the majority of literature books that are read in school are about old, white men. The fact that we even had to have a class titled “What is ethnic literature?” should say something about what American society values and considers being normal.

            Last year, I heard this quote in my Foundations of Education course. We talked about it in relation to assessment. We talked about standardized testing and how expecting every child to succeed at every subject is absurd. Standardized testing also does not take into consideration that all students do not learn or reproduce information in the same way. Therefore, why would students only get tested on information in one way?

            This semester I heard this quote in my Race/Class/Gender/Sexuality course. We talked about how students are time and time again hindered because of their race, socioeconomic status, etc. We talked about the implications of electing Donald Trump as president and contemplating where to go from there. We wondered how to approach giving people new tools to initiate the change that would bring down the system that has hurt so many.

            Now I hear this quote and think about how messed up the world is. I think about how so many people talk about making a change, but hardly anyone ever does it. This quote calls us to act. It calls us to not just be a part of a change, but to initiate it. It calls us to recognize disparities, recognize our privilege, and recognize that there are people who spend every day living in a country who elected a man to lead it who has said that they are not good enough because of the color of their skin. Change and liberation do not come from the actions of one person, but it only takes one person to get the ball rolling. It is up to everyone else to see the ball and help push it along. Once we can begin to recognize and initiate change, that’s when something will start to happen.