DEI and the Teaching of American Literature

For the record, as a lit/comp teacher, I integrate writing from all racial/cultural lines possible within a given unit. For example, for the founding documents section, we not only look at the Declaration, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, we also read selections from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl so students can see how the US failed to actually implement life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness promises to those who weren't white, male, or land owners. 

In our unit on the Individual and Society, we examine writing from Booker T. Washington, Emily Dickenson, T.S. Eliot, and Walt Whitman, along with an extended study of American Born Chinese (the graphic novel). 

In our unit on Power, Protest, and Change, we look at the literature that confronted inequity and led to changing status and rights for women, workers, and African-Americans. This includes works by Frederick Douglas, Sojourner Truth, Abraham Lincoln, Langston Hughes, Upton Sinclair, and an extended study of Kate Chopin's The Awakening.

In our unit on the importance of setting, I give my students a choice of Gatsby, Their Eyes Were Watching God, or Huck Finn (with parental approval), along with a few short selections including Judith Ortiz Cofer. 

In our unit on what America fears, in addition to The Crucible (and studying the Red Scare and McCarthyism alongside it), we also cover "The Masque of the Red Death" and how even in Poe's day, the rich set themselves aside in a place of safety, leaving the rest of society to suffer. 

In our final unit, we study and write short stories, including those from Alice Walker, Hemingway, Poe, Louise Erdich, Bierce, and Raymond Carver. 

Finally, the students are allowed to read a book of their choice, as long as it is written by an American author, and relate how the ideals and characteristics of American society and history are reflected in it (fights for freedom, equality, liberty, etc.)

Even with all this integration, I still feel it's important to set aside time as a nation to celebrate those who have been historically forgotten, abused, or even are currently being maligned. 

American literature and American history is the story of a baby country being born and still growing. Hopefully, we can realize that we aren't an adult country yet, but still a growing adolescent and learn that we are still trying to become a land of the free, where all people are created equal and have equal access (not just equal freedom) to the unalienable rights promised on our birth certificate.

And this is why I believe I've finally found myself as a Literature teacher and as a citizen.