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Hen81
Veteran Poster
Username: Hen81
Post Number: 124
Registered: 09-2007
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 01:18 am: | 
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I remember being called a blue jeans wearing egghead along with many other that were recruited to the School of Business and Industry at Florida A&M University. Even in college where learning is supposed to be the task, there was this tag if you didn't play the popularity and fashion game. Luckily there were enough of us to form our own circle and take care of business and get what we came for, an education.
Now I see the peer pressure in Junior High that makes academic excellence almost like wearing a scarlet letter, so many under perform on purpose to fit in. The penalty for that brief social popularity is often a lifelong lower standard of living.
How do we make learning cool? If Obama becomes President will we be able and willing to say, 'See what being smart, studying and articulate can lead to.' Will young black people take it to heart or see it as an annomolly.
http://DTPollard.com |
Ferociouskitty
Veteran Poster
Username: Ferociouskitty
Post Number: 369
Registered: 02-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 09:01 am: |
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Ah, Hen81, you remind me of when I was at the crossroads for college. I had a choice of a free ride at FAMU (I was a Florida resident and also interested in the School of Business), or Yale (uh, not a free ride). For a variety of reasons--none of which included a preference for white people, lol--I chose Yale. Well, the FAMU recruitment rep couldn't have been nastier or more unprofessional about it when he called me to follow up.
I had to chuckle a little a few years later when a friend at FAM told me that this rep got caught up in multiple scandals at the school. Way to represent, bro!
One thing black folks need to do is to respect each other as independent thinkers. I don't think Obama as President will make a dent in that problem. Look at how the Old Guard black folks have acted towards him during the election. How dare he think out of the narrow box in which they would seek to confine him. ;-)
As far as making learning cool, I think it's the usual suspects: parents leading the way *and by example* and by being consistent and active in their children's lives and education. But parents can't teach/model what they don't know.
But you know what? I typed that last sentence and was reminded of how a few generations back it was not unheard of for illiterate/barely-literate parents in the lowest of service jobs to be raising future doctors and lawyers.
It comes down to what we value. If I know the value of education--even if I don't have one--I can impart that value to my kids. I can try at least...
Looking forward to Dr. Perry weighing in on this. ;-) |
Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3087
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 11:17 am: |
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Looking forward to Dr. Perry weighing in on this. ;-)
Ooooo, and I have plenty of thoughts. Unfortunately, my library internet time is about to expire! Oh well, back to work. LOL |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 12570
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 12:20 pm: |
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There's rumor going around that "Nerds" are "in" now among the 20-something crowd. Girls, at least, are starting to realize the earning potential of these low-profile guys. |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 7222
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 12:27 pm: |
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I remember being called a blue jeans wearing egghead along with many other that were recruited to the School of Business and Industry at Florida A&M University
(When I started college in 1968, if you DIDN'T wear blue jeans you were out of it.
But the Bourgeois Negroes struck back, and soon in the 70's started making dressing up the thing to do. This was as they were flunking out.
College students ain't supposed to have no money. Bourgeois Negroes think they have made it when they get in.
Look at the white and asian kids. They got plenty of money and don't dress like crap--one place that Negroes ought to imitate what they do. |
Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3090
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 02:18 pm: |
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F'kitty, regarding your FAMU story: I recall visiting Howard as a college freshman, looking around at all the immaculately-dressed students and saying to my friend from HS who attended there, "Oh, is it a job fair today or something?" He said, "What do you mean?" I pointed out how everyone seemed to be dressed to the nines. He said, "No, people dress like this pretty much every day." I was SO relieved I decided to attend another institution: I would not have had the wardrobe to go there! LOL |
Ferociouskitty
Veteran Poster
Username: Ferociouskitty
Post Number: 374
Registered: 02-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 - 02:40 pm: |
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Yvette: Yeah, given my penchant for sweats and baseball caps in college, I chose the right institution for me! |
Troy
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Troy
Post Number: 1453
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, July 26, 2008 - 12:53 pm: |
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Hen81 I grew up the same was being called a "Brainiac" and the like. The name calling was not such a big deal we all "snapped" on each other all day.
What had the biggest impact were the unspoken rules of being "down". To be really down you had to drink, gamble, hang out late, be willing to fight over nothing, have a lof of sex partners, have flashy jewelry, clothes, have a contempt for police (a arrest or two helped), a lot of money (illicitly obtained is better), etc. These were like the unspoken rules of being down.
In college no one really made fun of you for trying to do well, but by then the damage was already done. Most of the "boyz from the hood" did not graduate, as they carried their ghetto mentality into the university -- where those skills simply do not work on campus (or in life for that matter). Really very sad -- I almost did not make it myself. The only thing that saved me was an unwillingness to fail.
Yeah, I was a teenager in the 70's and people dressed with style. Jeans and slacks were pressed. I hated to iron, so I got the creases in my jeans stitched in.
The school I went to was majority white; the dress style was definite more casual that I was accustomed to -- and I fit right in. It would be nothing for me to sleep in my sweats wake up, then go to class wearing what I slept in.... And I rarely got a hair cut.
I know if I did that at Howard I would have been the object of ridicule, even scorn.
I remember visiting Howard in those days and thinking that every single sister had a very high maintenance hair style. Actually it seemed like all the sisters in DC spent an inordinate amount of time and money at the beauty parlor.
Actually it seems pretty much the same now... except, increasingly brothers are getting in the fray with arched eye brows, twists, fancy braids and the like...
Ferociouskitty, you know something interesting; I did not even apply to an Ivy League school -- my thinking that is was just a place for rich white people. I'd opted out on my own: it sounds crazy when I think about it now.
Hen81, the ghetto mentality is pretty strong even reaching into the middle and upper middle class. This needs to be destroyed before "learning" is considered cool.
I prevented my kids from developing this adversion to learning by keeping them in environments where education valued. Today, in many major cities, unfortunately, that means keeping them out of public school... |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 12590
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, July 26, 2008 - 01:54 pm: |
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There is definitely something significant about the emphasis on stylish wardrobes at black schools. Superficiality is the bane of the black community, not only in the ghetto but among the bourgeoise. But there is no correlation between being well-dressed and well-informed. And being well-informed is what gets you over in the real world. |
Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3098
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, July 26, 2008 - 09:53 pm: |
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I think there may be a point that is being missed here. ANd I think I may have inadvertently contributed to it. It is not correct to say that Black college kids focus on style whereas White (and other) college kids do not. Style is just as prevalent on majority White campuses as on majority Black ones. But it is a different "style." The kind of "hip downdressing" that many White college kids do seems to me to be just as self-conscious, just as signifying, just a superficial as the dressing to the nines I have observed with some Black kids. College is a time to play with your developing identity and virtually no one is immune.
I guess part of the difference, like with so many things, is how different groups may be impacted differently by the choices they make in this area. On my former campus, a White kid could walk around in long dusty dreds, a t-shirt with a marijuana leaf, and dirty jeans hanging down his behind and very few folks would think that he is part of the criminal element. A Black kid dressed the same way--even if he were also outfitted with a backpack full of textbooks--probably would get a very different reaction.
So, to a great extent I do understand the desire to dress up that many Black college kids have. To some extent it is very much in keeping with our history and demonstrates a desire to be respected. (Just look at all those archival photos of Civil Rights protesters dressed in their Sunday best in order to get sprayed by water hoses and bit by police dogs.)
Please, then, attendees of Howard circa 1982: take this as an apology for making light of your choices in wardrobe! |
Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3099
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, July 26, 2008 - 10:06 pm: |
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Re: making learning cool (or making it cool "again"):
Not to keep belaboring this about my bio, but a lot of what I feel about this topic is informed by my formerly teaching preschoolers. I have never met a 3 year old who was not inherently curious and excited about learning. If they are different 10 years later, it is not the fault of the kids.
I think part of the problem is this very idea that learning has to be "made" something that it may not be. Real learning is a very deep, long-term commitment. It may be exciting at times, but often only after a long time of wading through confusion and not-knowing to finally master something difficult. I think educators went down the wrong path when they began to try to simplify things and make knowledge flashy for kids. Learning is not so much "fun" or "cool" but satisfying and fulfilling.
Maybe we should have been spending moer time figuring out how to nurture little kids' natural curiosity and penchant for learning instead of breaking education down into bite-sized "units" that would be flashy and fun. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 12592
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 - 11:47 am: |
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When it comes to a preoccupation with high maintenace wardrobes, I didn't mean to restrict my indictment to black kids. White kids are not exempt from having an inordinate amount of pre-occupation with designer threads, either. Materialism is materialsm no matter who succumbs to it. It is pervasive and when style takes precedence over substance, then a shallow person is the result. Of course, it's not a sin for a person to be shallow. It's just hard to take a shallow person seriously. IMO. |
Ferociouskitty
Veteran Poster
Username: Ferociouskitty
Post Number: 378
Registered: 02-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 - 03:11 pm: |
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Ferociouskitty, you know something interesting; I did not even apply to an Ivy League school -- my thinking that is was just a place for rich white people. I'd opted out on my own: it sounds crazy when I think about it now.
Troy, it doesn't sound crazy to me at all. I threw a letter from Harvard away, unopened. Same with Yale, initially. Why? Because I didn't think black folks went to places like that. This was 1989. Fortunately, I also got a personal letter from a black guy who was about to graduate from Yale. He was from Columbus, GA, and he encouraged me to apply, as part of Yale's Minority Recruitment Program. He gave me his home phone number (this was pre-email, at least in my world). So, I picked the hayseed out of my teeth, and called. I was shocked SHOCKED to learn that black folks (from the South no less!) did indeed attend Yale, and they weren't asocial Oreos! I shudder to think of what I said to this guy--but I know it revealed me as the big Bama I was at the time. But he was great, answered all of my questions, and convinced me to apply. I did, and the rest is history...
I guess part of the difference, like with so many things, is how different groups may be impacted differently by the choices they make in this area. On my former campus, a White kid could walk around in long dusty dreds, a t-shirt with a marijuana leaf, and dirty jeans hanging down his behind and very few folks would think that he is part of the criminal element. A Black kid dressed the same way--even if he were also outfitted with a backpack full of textbooks--probably would get a very different reaction.
Yvette, another difference is how much time, energy, and money (which you may or may not have at your disposal) one's chosen style demands. If you feel compelled to be dressed to the nines at all times, you're either a) going to avoid 8 AM classes (which may have academic and/or professional consequences), or b) risk often being late to said classes, lol. Later in life, when it's time to create a budget and learn to live within your means, does an expensive hairstyle and maintenance every two weeks count as a want, or a need? Will you (the general you) know the difference?
I jest in part, but I think black folks and style issues run a bit deeper than they do for white folks. Our hair, for example, is absolutely political. The history of segregated pools aside, it is the reason some of us (and our progeny for generations to come) cannot swim/fear water. Then, as you mention, there is the history of wearing our Sunday best and the need to garner respect. I can't disagree, but I think any time style/fashion poses limits on you or causes you to miss out on opportunities, that's a problem.
If we are consistently spending money we don't have on clothes and hair, instead of books and things which feed what's inside our heads, that's a problem. I don't know if that's as large a concern for white folks--and I realize that rampant consumerism, not reading, and misplaced priorities are an American problem, not a black one--but I feel we have more to lose. Collectively, speaking--individual mileages may vary of course. ;-)
Of course, it's not a sin for a person to be shallow. It's just hard to take a shallow person seriously. IMO.
Cynique, once again you display your knack for boiling the essentials down and cutting right to the heart of the matter. I am going to use this line the next time someone wants to question me about why I don't care for a particular person, or book, or genre! |
Ferociouskitty
Veteran Poster
Username: Ferociouskitty
Post Number: 379
Registered: 02-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 - 03:14 pm: |
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I think part of the problem is this very idea that learning has to be "made" something that it may not be. Real learning is a very deep, long-term commitment. It may be exciting at times, but often only after a long time of wading through confusion and not-knowing to finally master something difficult. I think educators went down the wrong path when they began to try to simplify things and make knowledge flashy for kids. Learning is not so much "fun" or "cool" but satisfying and fulfilling.
No worries. Fewer are "teaching" this way now because they are forced to teach to the all-mighty tests. Thanks, NCLB!
That said, we wag fingers at school for being turned off from learning. But truly, they aren't turned off from learning--they are turned off from school (sometimes for good reason), and we've taught them to equate school with learning, so... |
Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3105
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 - 06:40 pm: |
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^^Spot-on analysis, FK. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 12604
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 - 11:20 pm: |
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True dat. |
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