Ebony Elizabeth Thomas speaks with CNN Politics about the need to give students access to accurate history instruction
Between January and September of 2021, reports CNN Politics, state legislatures across the U.S. introduced 54 separate bills which intend to restrict teaching and training in K-12 schools, higher education, state agencies, and institutions.
According to PEN America, these bills "target discussions of race, racism, gender and American history."
School of Education associate professor Ebony Elizabeth Thomas notes that such limitations deprive students of an accurate understanding of the country’s past—and its present.
"If we teach a generation of young people that, after the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation and all of the events of the 1860s, attempts to integrate free people failed and there were repressive laws enacted that weren't repealed for almost a century, then we're going to have different conversations," she said. "We're going to have historical context for why the country is the way it is, instead of thinking that the fact that Black people are at the bottom of every metric is indicative of our deficit or our inferiority."
Thomas adds that the current legislative assault is a matter of control of the narrative, and of the future.
"All of the effort to suppress the teaching of U.S. history is a matter of control," she said. "Whoever controls the narrative controls society, and whoever controls the narrative will control the future."
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