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Ethnic Studies
31 Plays6 months ago
In Episode 2 of Season 2, we're talking about ethnic studies!
In this episode we hear from...
- Manny Martinez, who emphasizes the significance of trusting relationships
- Lorenzo, who shares about his experiences learning his indigenous language and the healing that came for him and his family
- Teacher extraordinaire Artnelson Concordia who sits down for our Mic Check..1,2,3! round table segment alongside educators Kenjus T. Watson and Jewell Bachelor to talk about the history of ethnic studies, the challenges of getting it implemented by the State of California and the new direction for it if we are to take it seriously in schools.
Drawing From The Well is hosted by Tiffani Marie.
The podcast is co-produced by Tiffani Marie and Jon Reyes with music by Jansen V.
DFTW is supported by Community Responsive Education. Continue the conversation at youthwellness.com
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Transcript
Introduction to Youth Wellness and Education Reform
00:00:02
Speaker
Drawing from the Well is a podcast series from the youth wellness movement. We are educators, researchers, healers, parents, and community members striving to repurpose schools to address the critical wellness gaps in our youth's development.
00:00:19
Speaker
Founded by Community Responsive Education.
Building Trust in Education
00:00:27
Speaker
Hi, this is Manny Martinez. A specific learning experience that I've been reflecting on a lot since last year, especially during distance learning, for me as an educator, and especially implementing ethnic studies in my practice, has to do with relationships.
00:00:47
Speaker
I've always been good at establishing pretty solid trusting relationships with young folk. And I mean like toddlers, like kinder kids, teenagers, even young adults. right And my life experience has proven this to be a fact, not simply my personal opinion. right People who've known me all my life, my siblings, my nieces and nephews and their kids,
00:01:11
Speaker
parents who shared how good I am with their kids or how much their teenagers really like me or respect me or whatever. Some actual adults whom I've known since they were a lot younger.
00:01:22
Speaker
And plus, I'm also banking on testimonials from like countless recorded teacher observation feedback forms I've accumulated through the years. And I know this particular knack has something to do with my disarming skill of being able to make them laugh, you know, either by not taking myself too seriously or simply by being relatable and funny, which I can do, which I tend to do.
00:01:48
Speaker
But I also know it's because they can sense that I genuinely care about them. That knack, that ability to establish those kinds of relationships with young people has forever served foundational in what I used to call classroom management.
00:02:06
Speaker
You know, making sure everybody's doing what is expected of them and that nothing too wild and crazy and disrespectful is happening in the space, you know? But this knack also helped me create space for my growth as a teacher by listening to students and their families getting to know about their lives outside of school, et cetera.
Reflecting on Expectations and Wellness Impact
00:02:30
Speaker
But those expectations that I just mentioned, the systems expectations of what our students should and shouldn't be doing or saying, what is deemed appropriate academic or classroom behavior and the like,
00:02:43
Speaker
Those were my expectations too. And because of it, if those expectations were not being met in my eyes, I didn't always react to students in the healthiest ways.
00:02:59
Speaker
Meaning in ways that took their sense of wellness into account. I mean, if student wellness is to be cultivated and sustained through healthy relationships that are truly responsive to the lived experiences and the historical and material conditions that shape our students, then i was getting some of that right.
00:03:24
Speaker
But I was getting some of it quite wrong. See, in the way I sometimes reacted to what I deemed inappropriate or defiant or non-compliant behavior, going to be completely honest, whether it be using a judgmental or aggressive tone in my voice or threatening to call home or school security or student dean or what have you, or asking them to leave my classroom.
00:03:49
Speaker
I know that in doing those things, I realize now that I wasn't always being responsive to my students' lived experiences. And i don't know if this is irony or whatever, but as an English teacher using an ethnic studies framework,
00:04:08
Speaker
I was conscious of the historical and material conditions that shaped my students and their families. I was conscious of this. I just wasn't being fully responsive to said conditions, if that makes sense.
Understanding Systemic Issues in Education
00:04:24
Speaker
So preparing for distance learning and building my ethnic studies curriculum around texts like STAMPED and WE WANT TO DO MORE THAN SURVIVE and concepts of conscientization and anti-racism and historical trauma last year, I found myself really, really thinking about issues and systems that are still preventing marginalized peeps from moving forward and more importantly,
00:04:48
Speaker
my role in that prevention, in that perpetuation of unjust and inequitable practices. So yeah, I came into this profession thinking that because of my life experience, you know, because I'm an OG for, you know, POC from NYC, I've studied Freire and Hooks and Dewey and Emerson and Fanon and Baldwin. And because of all those things, I thought I could never really be part of the problem, right? That I was actually part of the solution, which is why I got into this profession to begin with.
00:05:22
Speaker
But I was blinded by my own self-righteousness to see how I'd been an accomplice in helping this educational system do exactly what it was built to do in preventing marginalized peeps from thriving. I was complicit.
00:05:39
Speaker
And truth be told, in a way, I still am simply by association, simply by being in a classroom. within this educational system, within this country.
00:05:54
Speaker
So it hit me hard during a conversation with another ethnic studies teacher who shared how disappointed she was with a student who chose to go by a more anglicized pronunciation of their name rather than the Spanish pronunciation.
Critique of Shame and Importance of Love in Education
00:06:08
Speaker
I'm not even going to get into like what exactly that was, but I know that this teacher expressed how she let that student know of her disappointment, citing colonization and what have you.
00:06:21
Speaker
So I left feeling how shaming our students in any way, shape or form in order to have them understand our personal opinions or even in order to convey how important or critical we think something is, is exactly ah colonized way of doing things.
00:06:41
Speaker
Making our students feel bad or ashamed is a colonizer's tool, period. I mean, I'm still struggling with the grading system, but I'm feeling that we are conveyors of pertinent information and facilitators of dialogue and discussion that can be transformational for our students, not banking educators or judges of character.
00:07:06
Speaker
My personal opinion. I've reflected on my role in my students' wellness as an agent within an oppressive system. I have not compromised my expectations for my students, but now I am constantly checking my tone checking my words, checking my body language.
00:07:27
Speaker
And I do my absolute best in letting my students know that I love them every day, that my love is nonjudgmental and unconditional in a world where they are constantly being judged, shamed, ridiculed, and underestimated, all while conveying the information I believe they need to thrive for a happy, healthy life.
00:07:52
Speaker
That's what's up.
Ethnic Studies: Importance and Focus
00:07:54
Speaker
Peace.
00:07:59
Speaker
Welcome to Drawing from the Well. I'm your host, Tiffany Marie. Today's episode centers ethnic studies. You just heard from educator Manny Martinez, who emphasizes the significance of trusting relationships. Next up, you hear from youth expert Lorenzo, who shares about his experiences learning his indigenous language and the healing that came with that for him and his family. And for our Mic Check 1-2-3 segment, we have the one and only teacher extraordinaire, Art Nelson Concordia who's gonna talk to us about the history of ethnic studies, some of the challenges in getting it implemented in the state of California, and the new direction for it if we are to take it seriously in schools.
Cultural Connection Through Language
00:08:50
Speaker
My name is Lorenzo Jones, and up until high school, I never learned anything about my culture. Whether would be about where my grandmother came from or even my pre-colonized ancestors, I was never told or educated in these parts of my history.
00:09:04
Speaker
When I first took a look on the classes about learning Nahua, the language of my ancestors, it felt surreal, like I was taking something back that was denied from me for so long. I survived centuries of colonization, genocide, and the rape of a culture and its people, but it never stopped managing to move forward.
00:09:22
Speaker
It was really especially inspiring to experience this with my classmates as well, who were also my close friends. And it really felt like it was community building, like we were bringing back the community and culture that was destroyed long ago and was being denied to us.
00:09:39
Speaker
It was pretty challenging at first, but i did not want to stop. I was extremely determined to keep going. I did not want to let this die out. I felt like this was something I wanted to carry on, and it was something that I did not want to let disappoint my ancestors.
00:09:54
Speaker
I really wanted to honor my ancestors in the strongest way I could, and I felt like this was one of the strongest ways to be able to take back the language that was trying to be destroyed and strengthen it by teaching it to others like my brothers and my mom and my grandma who didn't even know this was a language to begin with.
00:10:11
Speaker
I even used Nawa at my high school graduation and my acceptance speech. After my speech, I sing a song in Nawa. It went,
00:10:24
Speaker
that's just a part of the chorus, but the song is about how community and family was a really big aspect of the culture that we come from. And this is something that I will never take for granted. This is something I extremely encourage anybody who can and has the ability to to learn about their own language.
00:10:42
Speaker
It doesn't have to be Nahuatl, but wherever you come from, I please like really encourage you to learn about your own language because this is something that helped me get closer to who I am, helped me build more better relationships with my family, and overall just feel like more connected to myself.
00:10:59
Speaker
I feel like everybody deserves a right to have the ability to carry um their own legacy and be proud of who you are and where you come from.
Journey from Organizing to Teaching
00:11:25
Speaker
All right, we're here, mic check, one, two, three, Kenjus Jewell and Tiffany Marie. We got with us the one and only Art Nelson Concordia, y'all.
00:11:36
Speaker
Greetings. Great to be here. Thanks for supporting us and being willing to talk with us today. But tell us a little bit more about you and where you come from. I was just sharing with Jewell and Kenjus. I was born and raised in Los Angeles, in Cheongva land.
00:11:51
Speaker
But my folks and my ancestors come from the so-called Philippines, very far away, ocean away, specifically from the Tagailog people or the Tagalogs, the people of the shore.
00:12:03
Speaker
And my family's been in California since the 60s. Grew up in Echo Park, working class immigrant. And my childhood like lies squarely in the 80s, 80s LA.
00:12:16
Speaker
which is a different thing than what it is now. And I was very much formative, very much responsible for how I see and be in the world. But ah I'm a father, i got four kids. That is in the present very much what this is very focused on, in addition to being a husband and a teacher, educator, all community grounded.
00:12:40
Speaker
i can keep going, but i don't know, maybe that's a little bit of a snapshot in the now of me. I appreciate you sharing that. You share little bit about being a father, partner, educator.
00:12:53
Speaker
does your week look like? What do you spend a majority of your time doing? We got Tagalog classes. We got flag football. We got soccer on top of the eight to six job, parenting, cleaning, cooking, laundry, and connecting all of that, right?
00:13:10
Speaker
I got twins. The eight years old and a nine year old, they might as well be triplets. The twins are very large people. not that the nine year old small, but they're large. So they look like they're all the same age.
00:13:22
Speaker
And as they get older, there's this real, real clear release of responsibility on my end. So that's the part we're trying to figure. It's not always the smoothness, but there's progress.
00:13:34
Speaker
And co-parenting them with Paloma, my wife, is a big deal. We're really, really fortunate to be able to do that multi-generationally. I live with my in-laws, my wife's folks. It's a trip because I live in Oxnard.
00:13:47
Speaker
And I never thought of this place as a place that I would see myself in and raising a family and And it's only about an hour away from my folks in LA. We're near, but we're also kind of doing this thing in a place where we're having to rebuild or create community and connect with folks.
00:14:05
Speaker
That in and of itself has been great because the place is amazing and so much opportunity to connect. I learned about Oxnard from Anderson. Pack. That's what I was saying. It's a thing. People from Oxnard love their town and I get it. There's so much to love about it.
00:14:24
Speaker
That's what I said. know about you from the Bay Area. Matter of fact, I thought you were still in the Bay Area. That's how much I connect you to the Bay Area and to what Balboa and experiences out here. but Like a lot of folks, you know I've shared before, you're kind of ah a household name. That's why I called you Art.
00:14:44
Speaker
They say they say Art. That's the name that come up. But how did you even start working with young people? like What were some of the experiences that influenced you getting into this work with young people? you know Before teaching 23 ago, going into teaching 23 years ago,
00:15:01
Speaker
ah going into teaching twenty three years ago I was an organizer down here in LA in the Filipino community, Echo Park community. And it was very much focused on bringing youth together, like raising awareness, getting them organized and moving them to some kind of action.
00:15:18
Speaker
Like that was a big part of my late teens and 20s, which led to like some incredible I think growth for myself, but then a burnout, like feeling like I'm exerting all these calories, exerting all this energy and effort.
00:15:34
Speaker
And though there's clear victories in the relationships you develop and you see people, you know, participating, but I don't feel like, wow, it's, gotta be a better use of my effort.
00:15:45
Speaker
And so then I had a buddy and went to undergrad with who's from the Bay and he went back to the Bay. He became a teacher among many other things. Victor Diaz, he runs Renegade Running out of Oakland now. Victor, Victor was one of my teachers at Upward Bound. So this is the thing, cause he said, I teach at school called Leadership and there's this opportunity at USF, you and our buddy Mike and Jason, former roommates, right?
00:16:11
Speaker
He was like, come up. And i was like, not feeling what I was doing, even though it was really meaningful. But I was like, all right. Decided within a week, applied, got accepted and moved that summer.
00:16:24
Speaker
And I was like, OK, I'm going to teach. Like very much connected to youth development. Maybe this is like a direct way that I could be more impactful. And it was a total opposite.
00:16:37
Speaker
Like that world, not being prepared to do it. Justice just led to a lot more strife and struggle and burnout. So I ended up actually leaving teaching after three years.
00:16:48
Speaker
The first three years i was burnt out, went back into nonprofit. My second stint with teaching really was ah did it for the money. i was doing nonprofit work with the organization called Soul, also based out there in Oakland, School of Unity and Liberation.
00:17:04
Speaker
And my partner at the time, we got pregnant and i was like, dang, We don't have health insurance. How are we going afford this? And so i was like, all right, I'll go back into teaching.
00:17:16
Speaker
That's kind of what led me back. And from there, I think that's where really things took off. I think having the time away and then really linking with people like practitioners. trying to figure it out in that late 90s, early 2000s context is the starting point of the work I'm doing now, I think. But Tiffany, you I feel like I'm sure we've shared space with hundreds of other people.
00:17:43
Speaker
don't think I've ever met you in person. And this is the smallest context we've associated, but I feel like I know you and your name gets brought up in space. It's like, oh yeah, Tiffany, and from Lott to Cam to Allison.
00:17:57
Speaker
like, man, I got to meet this person. And then you reach out with invitation. I'm like, oh, I'm nervous. but but one hundred You know what though? You know what's deep?
00:18:08
Speaker
I just feel like we got to get this out. I used to have beef with you. ah used to have beef with you back in the day before I even knew you. Yeah, you didn't even know had beef with you. Look, this is what happened. me tell you. We can cut this out if it's too controversial, but I like juicy stuff. Okay, look.
00:18:22
Speaker
So you talk about Victor, right? So I'm an upper bound. I was a student upper bound at USF. And Vic's class, it was dope because I haven't had a teacher like that. And he was weird.
00:18:33
Speaker
He had us just writing about like our experiences, our lived experiences. Man, that essay... was, I'm scared to even share that. I can't believe somebody had me at 15 writing like that. He was a great teacher. was a really, really good teacher.
00:18:48
Speaker
And so I actually went back to work for that program. And in the program, I'm not even going to say no names, but i this this is about why I had beef with you. I don't beef with you now, I'm going tell you what. So I had a student who was one of your students at time.
00:19:02
Speaker
And so they were coming back and forth between my classroom and the summertime. And then in the fall, they was in your class and they were a senior in your class. And so I'm working with them at late at night and they didn't pass your class.
00:19:17
Speaker
They didn't pass your class. And they actually didn't end up graduating from high school. I was hot and was deep because i kept hearing your name, i kept hearing your name. And I'm like, from this student, I'm like, who is this dude? Like that dude?
00:19:32
Speaker
Nah, no. What's even deeper is that they really liked you. They really, really liked you. And so it hit them. It hit them. And so I'm like, man, whatever. you know i mean? They didn't graduate from high school.
00:19:44
Speaker
They're in a doc program right now, which is actually really interesting. but you know Years pass and folks are like, yo, you got to meet this dude. You got to meet this dude. And I'm like, that's what's up. Because i at that time, was studying Area's finest. you know And your name kept being in the conversation.
00:20:02
Speaker
And it was amongst mentors. So I couldn't say nothing but deep in my heart. I was like, man, if that's the same dude. But what's so deep to me is that I thought I was doing a thing in the Bay Area I was killing the game.
00:20:15
Speaker
And I met a student on a bar train recently in the past three years. I was feeling myself. i was like, is going to be great when I saw them. And they were like, what's up, Tim? And I was like, hey, what's up?
00:20:26
Speaker
And we was talking and I just knew I was about to get celebrated. They were like, I'll never forget. You gave me a C. And that's really when my beef with you really dissolved, like real talk. Oh, oh. Because I thought about you and I thought about how I felt about you, about that student. And and it was deep how energy is exchanged.
00:20:49
Speaker
where I'm experiencing a very similar reality where they're like, you talking all this talk, you're teaching these things, and then you put a grade attached to my experiences, my energy in that space.
00:21:01
Speaker
And I really was like, I got to leave doing it alone. I really thought about you, for real. And it's so interesting that when people talk about ethnic studies particularly, that's where your name comes up.
Systemic Challenges and Personal Growth in Education
00:21:12
Speaker
And that's where my name comes up. And I'm like, Wow. We both have these really interesting histories and I'm always interested in where people are because I think sometimes we like, you might still be in that space. I don't know. But when that student was talking to me and I saw their energy around how I was using grades and associating it with the work,
00:21:33
Speaker
actually the spiritual activity that I was asking them to engage in, I was attaching grades to that. That's something that I'm not proud of necessarily, but I'm interested to hear from you. like yeah yeah Just hearing that, like how does that land with you? Oh, yeah. I always think about those earlier years of teaching.
00:21:49
Speaker
If that first three years was terrible, that first three years back, which I think is locating that 2006, 2007 period where I didn't know how to do the thing.
00:22:00
Speaker
I had no mentors outside of Vic in terms of developing a different way to connect with our young people and to teach them within the system. I think that 2006, 2007 class still precedes the ethnic studies work that we've started developing.
00:22:16
Speaker
And so that art right there, I think, if that young person appreciated me, it was because of the relationships and connections. And they were hurt by me in terms of my place of where I was developing or how I was maldeveloped as an educator and then exacting that on them. And so I'm really uncomfortable with this attention or this, like I've heard that before. Oh, R. Nelson, ethnic studies, you're the one I need to talk to. and I'm like,
00:22:44
Speaker
Am I? i mean, she yeah, I am And i don't want to be ever kind of projected as this person that is doing the thing in perfection, like the whole path to this point.
00:22:57
Speaker
And I also don't want to like tear myself down. I think we we're doing things that are significant. that's not where i started I've come a long way. And then that's never been an individual process.
00:23:10
Speaker
Like to get to this place is one a community and collective. I really appreciate you bringing that back and presenting that in this space. I want to know who the student is. I do. And I don't know if is they're a doc student.
00:23:24
Speaker
Oh God, like that journey. yeah You can check in with them if you can't share now. They're going to get this interview. You know what though? They wouldn't have no problem telling it because they were a pretty prominent, nationally acclaimed a poet laureate now. The student is Sojari Bradley. Sojari.
00:23:44
Speaker
I love so Jari. Wow. Yep. Yep. Yep. And it's deep because we all have these experiences, right? We have all these experiences. Jari was on the the last season. Jari wouldn't no problem with me sharing it.
00:23:55
Speaker
i just think it's a deep story. It is. It connects us. And the other student who I gave a seat to, Sidney Cain, they're these prolific, profound, nationally known artists.
00:24:08
Speaker
that I think in our infancy as educators, yeah we didn't know what to do with the fullness of their beings. yeah yeah and And school is way too small to assess, let alone make sense of way who we had in front of us. But I think it's important I feel like people who are elevated, they don't get these spaces of deep reflection.
00:24:30
Speaker
And I was like, man, i talked to Art Nelson. We very just don't do it. And I'm not even going to come at I'm going to come at us about how we started this work. I think I appreciate the, like you said, the full circle.
00:24:43
Speaker
Also, those grades and grading was not the end of their story either. It definitely impacted their stories. It impacted their notions of self. Yeah. yeah But it's also like there were external organizations and communities that were holding and supporting them as we were growing in our work with young people.
00:25:03
Speaker
you know, it's deep because you are known. in the realm and culture of ethnic studies, you are well known. And that speaks also to your transformation, your trajectory as a practitioner.
00:25:17
Speaker
And I'm interested in um just hearing a little bit from you and like, how did you come into this work around ethnic studies and like, what is it to you and why
Dedication to Community and Collective Learning
00:25:29
Speaker
is it important? Like, how did you get here and why has it held you this long?
00:25:34
Speaker
In terms of ethnic studies, my background with the organizing work, like I think I was coming into learning about ethnic studies from its really radical root.
00:25:44
Speaker
When you talk about third world liberation, and I'm still very much in support of work around the national liberation movement in the Philippines. And I was led to that movement because of my introduction of the Black Panther Party.
00:26:01
Speaker
and their real sense of connection outside of the borders of the United States. And that Black liberation was tied to all people's liberation and that there's a world of struggle happening.
00:26:13
Speaker
So the Panthers along with Malcolm really captured me in the freshman year of community college. And i was like, what's the equivalent for my own community? And then that's actually what led me to getting involved with the work within the Filipino community.
00:26:28
Speaker
come to learn that there's this movement, right? Third World Liberation movement is a multinational, right? Not multiracial, but it was an expression of a multinational movement of internal colonies to the people kind of representing the internal oppressed nations inside the borders of the United States.
00:26:46
Speaker
ye And that what we're experiencing is Yeah, racism, yes, but it's actually ah oppressed nations. Of course, I'm like into revolutionary nationalist politics or intercommunalist politics as Huey developed.
00:27:03
Speaker
And that was my angle, like as an organizer, like wanting to go into schools, i was like, this is how we're going to move young people into action, right? Really kind of share the history, share the longstanding solidarity across communities.
00:27:19
Speaker
And then that'll kind of motivate them to engage first with self and then outward. That didn't work. There's no pedagogy. there is you know it just Fast forwarding to ethnic studies, I was doing my individual thing trying to teach a radical history.
00:27:35
Speaker
I have history, social studies background. But lacking just the pedagogy, my kids are just... totally asleep and it became like really developing relationships with them, which I brought in from my organizing background that would keep some kind of attention, right? But eventually it would wane.
00:27:52
Speaker
And then within the confines of my own training and the system, was just failing kids left and right, left and right, just failing kids. And it was ethnic studies because Allison was part of this initiative at Tinchanco Cubales out of San Francisco State, was working off of this board resolution to establish it in San Francisco.
00:28:13
Speaker
She needed practitioners, she needed teachers, classroom teachers to pilot it. And she asked me, she was like, okay, we're starting ethnic studies. I told her no. The first answer was no, I'm doing my own thing.
00:28:27
Speaker
And she gives me a couple of weeks. She comes back to that. Hell no, you're doing ethnic studies. I'm like, I'm doing ethnic studies. And so then got to be part of this cohort. And it was in that collective development of the class, kind of really studying theory.
00:28:42
Speaker
and then implementing it is where my the practice, like, boom, oh shit, like you've been doing it wrong. you know And even I think collectively, like what we created was whacked.
00:28:53
Speaker
It was like a survey history course. First we're gonna do Native Americans, then African Americans. And before the intro, like kids are like, and we're like, whoa, this is ethnic studies. Why not feeling it? Cause I started with them.
00:29:08
Speaker
And that was like the biggest, most significant like pedagogical development in SHIFT. And then from there, it was like, oh. Now you bring in the content, the history, the different movements and stuff, because you're kind of breaking down all the barriers and making connection, like people to people connection.
00:29:27
Speaker
It sounds so simple, but coming in 1998 was when I came into teaching and USF was not USF as it is now, at least not UESJ. Now, where there was this clear, like longstanding practice of some master teachers and scholars.
00:29:45
Speaker
So Not having that, we figured that out together, collectively. And it was the ancestors and elders and scholars in the books and then our own reflective kind of practice.
00:29:57
Speaker
That's when ethnic studies in San Francisco kind of just took off. That gets referenced a lot. Because I know for a fact there are a lot of people doing incredible work. We just got linked with Stanford.
00:30:09
Speaker
That name just elevates everything. So then our crew really gets attention, like more so than anybody else. Like Tucson really was, I think, what I was looking back at the day.
00:30:20
Speaker
What are they doing? And so we had the benefit of them, whatever relationships we still have with Berkeley and Logan, we've been doing it for decades before. So we weren't started from scratch. And I think there was just a really great crew of really reflective teachers bringing in experience.
00:30:37
Speaker
But I think for me, ethnic studies was like I was coming into it. This is a radical project. And when done right, we'll reach and move young people. I don't know if i answer your question in terms of what it is, but I think it elevates an understanding of racism to a broader system of imperialism, capitalism, white supremacy, and the relationships between all of that. And like how we get out is through, right through.
00:31:03
Speaker
Brother Art, I appreciate all the grounding. historically and it's making me reflect as an educator the simple turn back to the self the identity of the students the connection to ourselves to the historical and other sort of political content when you talk about like i guess the implications of ethnic studies what it produces what's the aim of the work as you see it now knowing that there's Due to your work and work out and others, right? Like now we're in this place of the state in an official sense, not just the city, but the state, not just the university, but so I'm guessing federal, right?
00:31:41
Speaker
State will say, okay, you do ethnic studies in quotations, go, right? What does that produce? And how is that project happening on the same ground, same rail as the actual project of ethnic studies? How do you see those differentiated or where do they meet?
00:31:59
Speaker
Yeah, there's a lot of tension there. And I think 2016, 2017, there was this ah assembly bill, AB 2016, that was passed for practitioners and scholars to develop a model curriculum.
00:32:17
Speaker
It was at that moment that it became really clear that to do ethnic studies the way we saw it was going to like really butt heads with the way that the state needs it done.
00:32:29
Speaker
And who they're interacting with and how that's informing their stance. And we're in the middle of that now. I think the power of ethnic studies comes from communities, right? Comes from local neighborhoods, cities and towns throughout California.
00:32:45
Speaker
And people are demanding this. demanding this, demanding this. So the state had to respond. And then when we wrote the document, we caught hell. Oh my God.
00:32:56
Speaker
And really what it was is like developing lesson plans that were critical of the state of Israel. There's two lesson plans, two Arab American lesson plans that centered Palestinian experience, aspirations for liberation and to be able to go back to their homeland and were critical of the state.
00:33:18
Speaker
We got labeled as anti-Semites. Of course, the other lesson plans that folks are calling out were lesson plans that were critical of police brutality and the root and the state and challenging anti-Blackness.
00:33:32
Speaker
And so it being really clear, they don't want ethnic studies. not in its true origin, purpose, and practice. But i think the momentum of it isn't allowing them to stop it.
00:33:45
Speaker
Because shortly after, AB, I don't know what it was, but AB 101 passes, which makes it a graduation requirement. So that one bill they had develop to write the model curriculum as a resource for districts to use.
00:33:59
Speaker
And then the other one was to mandate it and make it a requirement. But that was vetoed before it was passed because the governor was like, hold up, this model curriculum needs to be acceptable to ah acceptable tos certain elements of the community. And they basically gutted the whole thing that we created and then completely went after us in the media.
00:34:24
Speaker
But what came out of it was this, na like we recently launched this national ethnic studies formation, Liberated Ethnic Studies Coalition, couple of weeks ago. Kind of ironic, but we didn't go into writing this curriculum to do organizing, but because of the reaction and how we were treated, like the advisory committee was disbanded, the writers were dismissed.
00:34:48
Speaker
It actually propelled us into organizing mode. And we're actually much closer statewide than before we wrote this model curriculum.
00:34:58
Speaker
And so we're in the middle of this, I'd say struggle to keep, you know, authentic critical ethnic studies as what is getting rolled out. And it seems like at every turn there is opposition. It's interesting.
00:35:13
Speaker
Like there's the MAGA right, who's attacking CRT and 1619 Project, Zined, any DEI work, including ethnic studies.
00:35:25
Speaker
And then there's this kind of right wing of the Jewish community. There's Zionists that are attacking the pro-Palestinian stance that we take. Of course, i personally affirm, and there's a diverse set of ah practitioner scholars involved with this, but I individually affirm that.
00:35:42
Speaker
the right of the Palestinian to self-determine and that they should have right of return and absolutely that the analysis of settler colonialism is at the heart of their struggles. Right. But at the root of ethnic studies is an anti-colonial stance.
00:35:57
Speaker
Engaging and using that frame to look at a situation for me leads you to solidarity with Palestinians or solidarity with Filipinos or solidarity with First Nations here in the United States. Maybe some people would take a different conclusion I think what I'm trying to say is that it's not automatically like a pro-Palestinian position that ethnic studies takes, but because it's anti-colonial.
00:36:27
Speaker
I mean, I'm open to the conversation, discussion and dialogue, but I think what I'm trying to say, and apologies if it's confusing, but that's where the attacks against ethnic studies is coming from.
00:36:37
Speaker
Weird alliance of Zionists and MAGA, hard-right Christian fundamentalists. It's really interesting and a part of our process of those of us who like went into ethnic studies. I think most of us who went into ethnic studies or any similar discipline and went in with the idea that we are going to be like the educators we didn't have. We're going to give our young people the access and resources we didn't have.
00:37:02
Speaker
And it took me many years since me graduating with my degree in ethnic studies to really recognize that it's not necessarily about teaching young people the content of what I learned in ethnic studies, because even there were big limitations, like not learning about Palestinians in the Department of Ethnic Studies, right?
00:37:24
Speaker
Or engaging in that conversation. Also, I learned that a huge part of me living this liberatory life, for the lack of a better term, is actually engaging in the praxis, not just thinking that literacy, you know, reading, not just thinking that these things are going to free me,
00:37:40
Speaker
but actually learning the land, learning the plants, engaging in different languages, getting uncomfortable. And so I'm really curious because we see what was happening with, you know it's ah it's a ban against ethnic studies.
00:37:55
Speaker
It's a ban against what ethnic studies could teach, has the potential. What I'm more curious about is for those of us who continue to run against those limitations,
00:38:06
Speaker
how are we teaching our children like within our homes or you know the children that we work with, how are we still engaging with them without centering literacy as the framework of learning?
Practical Skills Beyond Traditional Literacy
00:38:18
Speaker
you know And I think that's one of the biggest things that I've been up against with myself in education. i spent so much time trying to push this, you know learn this story, read this book. you know You're going to learn so Until I have you know recognized with people who don't have great literacy but can grow fruit. And I'm like, I can't grow no fruit.
00:38:42
Speaker
And like who is going to outlive you know one on this type of land especially with the differences in the exchanges we're experiencing with the pandemic, the price of food going up, the price of gas.
00:38:56
Speaker
So what real world tangible practices do you see yourself engaging with, you know, your children as a father, your wife, and even yourself? Because I feel like that is a form and a language of freedom, even when we see how the state responds to y'all trying to submit, you know, this application ethnic studies, this curriculum. Yeah.
00:39:17
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I just got back from Santa Barbara and there's planning led by Chumash elders, like directly addressing what you're talking about, Jewel, in terms of there's so much disconnection, disconnection, disconnection, disconnection from ourselves to ourselves, ourselves to the land, ourselves to our communities, family.
00:39:41
Speaker
And that is at the heart of the struggle Ultimately, like you can learn how to read and write in that context. like We were at a community garden planning for this healing event at an ancient fishing ground, Chumash Fishing Ground, that's now buried beneath this public park.
00:39:59
Speaker
I'm learning so much about how the struggles within the Chumash community, and I learned that the term Chumash is an externally imposed identity like that hasn't even been around for the last more than 100 years.
00:40:13
Speaker
There's like five different nations that just kind of like put underneath this. And that's an example of disconnect and the need to heal or to reconnect as a means of healing.
00:40:27
Speaker
And so that I think approaching how I raised my children, like they went out with me and I try to keep them as close as possible to the work and the messiness of it all. And I think the community really is so welcoming of the collective figuring.
00:40:44
Speaker
I don't know the answer. I just know where we're going to find the answer. And I see little bits, little bits, little bits. And I think, like I said, if we have any significant practice that's worth anything now, that came from a long road of work that started many, many years ago, but it's that constant reflecting on how to do this thing. And what gets reaffirmed is doing it with community that's connected and collective, that is reflecting on the plans we set out to do and the action we take and then making it better.
00:41:20
Speaker
And I think really what what it is is faith.
00:41:26
Speaker
I went through this weird thing about religion and faith. i I grew up in two churches, two Christian churches. Seventh-day Adventists, they go to church on Saturday. i don't know if you know. My mom's Seventh-day Adventist. My dad's Catholic.
00:41:39
Speaker
And that thing's on Sunday. and I'd be in the church Saturday and Sunday. He said that thing. I go to church on Saturday. and I'm like, cool. with my mom and my aunt says, okay, get ready. I'm picking you up. We're going to church. i was already went to church.
00:41:54
Speaker
Like, that's not the real church. want burn in hell? You got come to the real church. So I go to church on Sunday. And um they come on Saturday. ah tell my mom, no, I'm not going to your church. I'm going to real church tomorrow. I was kitchen You go to church some church. And so I have this weird thing with, um'm I'm over it now. I'm good with my Christian upbringing.
00:42:15
Speaker
I'm not Christian, but I have determined for myself I'm a spiritual being. You know, i believe that we're part of this larger community. larger whole. And I share all of that. Why?
00:42:28
Speaker
Part of the answer is faith in something that we cannot yet see based on what we're observing in the present. Like this right here, I've never shared physical space. I've met, this is the first time meeting you, Kentius. First time, I think I'm meeting you, Jewel. And then Tiffany, this is really the first time we're really talking and I feel a deep connection.
00:42:48
Speaker
And I think that is part of how we're going to figure this shit out. and that my children, i do a lot of yelling. I still from my own childhood, I'm carrying a lot of trauma and and do a lot less yelling now.
00:43:04
Speaker
And that's why I don't want to promote myself as this perfect parent. But I say sorry to my children. Like when I can get myself recomposed that I'm practicing this self-reflection and acknowledging when I'm doing harm.
00:43:21
Speaker
Like that's one simple, not simple, it's not simple, one small thing. And that that crosses over into how I am interacting with my fellow educators who are involved in this work and how I'm connecting and relating with community out there.
00:43:38
Speaker
It takes ah humility. It takes just acknowledging like, I don't know what I'm doing a lot, but I know, and that's that's where it comes, is the faith thing, that if we're figuring this stuff out together, we're going to figure it out.
00:43:53
Speaker
And going to advance this movement. We have a lot to build off of while also acknowledging we have a lot of work to do.
00:44:03
Speaker
But the whole thing with Sojari is a humbling reminder, like you mess up, You make a mistake and then you commit to doing better. and you have faith that people are going to be a part of figuring, refiguring, checking you, giving you feedback.
00:44:24
Speaker
And then you just keep coming back to the table to try to figure it out again, and cycle repeat. I think that's the best answer I can give, Jewel, because that's happening with my spouse.
00:44:34
Speaker
Like how we talk to each other, how we model the love and mistakes or success and failure, how I am engaging my parents, my wife's parents, like that organizing work, I think a lot of times it gets compartmentalized.
00:44:50
Speaker
Like the principles that we say, this is what it is in the world in the classroom. I say that because ah was guilty of it. Like there's a disconnect between how I'm behaving out in the world and then in the home.
00:45:01
Speaker
And that needs to be addressed. Yeah. Doing, reflecting, not alone. and I think an example of that is this, how we started. Yeah.
00:45:14
Speaker
yeah I was going to ask that, like it seemed to me, Tiff, that the initial engagement between y'all for me was, i was going ask, how is that an example of the praxis, to your point, Jewel, of ethnic studies, right? Beyond the literature or the rendering of history.
00:45:33
Speaker
And I'm also ah someone who survived Christian socialization and is disorienting. your definition of faith, I heard it, it's like in the back of my head, beat into me, sometimes literally, right? Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
00:45:50
Speaker
yeah It's a powerful message that I hear us carrying today towards the future of this struggle, right? That is not clearly defined. End point should not probably be end point. Faith is powerful.
00:46:03
Speaker
But to get that message from a place where we know there is trauma and violence, I think is so disorienting. And I kind of align that with the practice or the work of how we come to ethnic studies in general in these places that are literally premised on and our undoing.
00:46:20
Speaker
But there are practices or our education preceded, and I think will probably <unk> extend past these institutions. But it is disorienting to be in a place of our undoing, where we get access to information that is supposedly aligned with our survival, with our autonomy.
00:46:40
Speaker
I don't know if you have anything that jumps to your mind or heart around that contradiction or what you kind of see as the work going forward, given that reality.
00:46:52
Speaker
Or maybe you don't see it that way, right? Maybe it's not how you would think things through. That's what's coming up for me. I now take the position of take the best and leave the rest.
00:47:03
Speaker
There are some lessons from the Christian faith I will take. right Do one to others, loving thyself and thy neighbor.
00:47:13
Speaker
And I'm going to always put that in the context of colonial conquest and dispossession and eu erasure and committing to trying to remember when so much is lost.
00:47:29
Speaker
And then recreating that. This is the real, I think, test of faith. and don't know, it's instinct? Is it whispers of the ancestors? Is it dreams that you're having that, don't know, is that data?
00:47:43
Speaker
It is data. I mean, it's information, it's energy. You should actually be open to having that guide you, right? This real Western way of being, which wants you to squash all of that, i think,
00:47:58
Speaker
an ethnic studies frame, right? An anti-colonial frame, liberatory frame, like, okay, well, what does that mean? Well, the first half of my life, I'm trying to squash all of this that's happening inside as superstitiousness is whatever. But like at some point, I think was able to reclaim that, like this real sense of a connection beyond the immediate physical realm.
00:48:27
Speaker
that with my grandparents, like that's just fact, like that you have relationships. with It's very arrogant to think that you're the only ones here. a Human beings or life in general, we live in a very old, and don't know, what what's the word, place, realm.
00:48:47
Speaker
And this is just a snapshot of something that's been around a very long time. And back to that arrogance, that very now-centered, that's not Tagalog. That's not indigenous. Indigenous ways teach us to listen inward.
00:49:03
Speaker
right And so I think that's where I see faith now. And when I listen inward, i see the young people that I teach. I see my own children. I see my parents as they, I see aging.
00:49:16
Speaker
This is a crazy thing. Like I'm pushing 50. I'll be 50 this year. Yeah, once upon a time, I was, think, less in touch with it. And as I get older and I see my parents age, and I'm so blessed to have them alive, but in the not too distant future, they'll enter the ancestor realm and I'll become a real elder.
00:49:36
Speaker
That doesn't end there. There's a longer, bigger, and that's where the, I guess, the sense of spirituality and faith comes from in terms of how does that ground me? How does that sustain me?
00:49:47
Speaker
This work is not easy. There's so much like brutality and suffering and pain, and then it's being amplified by technology. And then you're starting to feel like,
00:50:00
Speaker
way overstimulated and that leads often into really bad places, ah for me anyway, anxiety and kind of living in the state of heightened fear.
00:50:11
Speaker
And so then it goes, for me, the need to slow down, to filter and to go back to this practice, I'll call it now a practice of faith and spirituality that is anchored to something that I'm just observing within myself that is very old, that my grandparents talked about, that my family, you know, in a real syncretistic sense that though they were Catholic or Seventh-day Adventist, they were also talking about something beyond that.
00:50:45
Speaker
If that makes any sense. so Makes perfect sense to some people and none at all to others. yeah I going to say, you got excuse Ken just because Ken just lives ethnic studies.
00:50:59
Speaker
his people be excited about Maya Angelou on the quarter. And then, was she on the quarter or was she on the nickel? She's on the, the what is that called? the the half cent, actually, I think. Oh, dang. Okay, well, she was on a coin.
00:51:14
Speaker
And Kimmy's people, going to say, they'd be like, yay. And then Kimmy's will enact ethnic studies. And they'll be like, yay, we did it. and he'll say, Did we? You got to ah be careful with him.
00:51:25
Speaker
was thinking about ethnic studies, also like thinking about the Super Bowl, because I don't say much, but I think a lot. you know So people are like, I think ethnic studies is like cap, kneeling. know You are countering, and then you get... Look, work with me real quick. yeah I'm going to slow down like you said. huh So then you get, if I use this example,
00:51:47
Speaker
I was thinking about like there's the fight, the fight, the fight to be seen, the fight for it to be recognized, the fight for it to be accepted. So I'm like, is ethnic studies also us on the stage, crip walking with nice boots and being accepted on a national platform?
00:52:06
Speaker
like Is that also the desire is to shift from being the caps of the world to then becoming... A performance, like what is that? So there's that one, and I have the questions about that. It's like the next direction of ethnic studies. Oh, man.
00:52:20
Speaker
Certain angles that we move in is kind of like we just, what happens when you are accepted by the very vehicle that has been running over you? And then the other part, like is the goal for you to drive it to be able to and Well, there's also self-driving cars. But my question is, as we are talking about the next direction of this work, because then you move to this other realm.
00:52:45
Speaker
I think for so many years, we've been doing ethnic studies from this perspective of maybe the curriculum and the performance of it, if we're going to stay around this idea of performance. But then I think a lot of what Kendris and I are particularly finding in our work There's something very different around the embodiment of ethnic studies that I believe connects with Art Nelson. Part of what you were sharing just in the latter, like what you were just talking about, around the slowing down, around the awareness
00:53:17
Speaker
that we are not in this alone, around the awareness that you don't necessarily go to church on Saturday and Sunday anymore, but the church is inside of you, or the spirit is inside of you, or the God is inside of you, or the you know and you have this intimate, profound connection to all living things, and your intuition is your guide, and your ancestors, dare I say, are your guide.
00:53:43
Speaker
like all of these areas where ethnic studies is and there's all these questions about where it's going or what it looks like and what I'm asking.
00:53:54
Speaker
For you, particularly, to share with, there's a lot of folks in teacher ed programs, and they have, I think, very critical decisions that they need to make um around their practice. Some folks are leaving the field altogether.
00:54:09
Speaker
And that's very specific and strategic. And there are others who are struggling in a lot of ways. And I always believe that as folks become elders, as folks are moving into that,
00:54:19
Speaker
that we have a responsibility to share certain wisdom so that people don't have to re-experience the same type of pain and struggle that we had with the Jaris, with the Sydney's.
00:54:31
Speaker
Given what you have learned in your experiences along this pathway, like what wisdom do you believe you would share with prospective educators or those who are in teacher ed programs who this year particularly have a really important decision to make about the next few years of their lives. And I think this particular decision that they make will impact the next few years of their lives. What wisdom and advice do you have for these folks around, particularly, this realm of ethnic studies?
Advice for Future Educators
00:55:03
Speaker
So I think the grand vision of ethnic studies is that we ethnic studies-ify everything. but the goal isn't to become an ethnic studies teacher. though we need them. We need our scholars and our practitioners to develop that way of thinking with as many people as possible.
00:55:19
Speaker
And in that, really encouraging our students to go and figure out what their path is as they define it, whether they become CEO of some corporation, and I'm not pro-corporation or pro-capitalism at all, but I understand that that's what we exist in.
00:55:40
Speaker
Or they become an attorney or doctor or cashier behind a register. That they're informed with how they treat other people. That the decisions that they make are informed with a criticality, like rooted in love and respect of life, human life and plant and animal life.
00:55:59
Speaker
That's a huge shift. And I think that's a huge part of the resistance. Like I was in the classroom yesterday where there was this TA in the ninth grade class. So this kid, maybe 16 years old, gender non-conforming, so moved by what they were just observing in the ethnic studies class, they were TAing.
00:56:23
Speaker
read the book that they were reading, American-born Chinese, and told the teacher, hey, can I make a slide deck and teach the class? And that's what I sat in on yesterday. And I was like, who is this young person?
00:56:35
Speaker
Weaving history, xenophobia, the root of it, its impact, its relationship to anti-Blackness, anti-Asian sentiments, dispossession of First Nations.
00:56:47
Speaker
And they're synthesizing all of this stuff. with incredible like energy and enthusiasm. I'm like, whatever this kid becomes or decides to become is gonna be informed by this way of understanding the world.
00:57:03
Speaker
And that we can like, as teachers impact thousands, millions of young people across racial spectrum or whatever.
00:57:17
Speaker
And when they become whatever they become, are making decisions that are shaped by this framework, like that's significant. And so for our young teachers, I'm like, one, this shit is hard. You already know, you're already thinking of leaving.
00:57:31
Speaker
I left after three years, I left. And to me, it is, it's like, if you wanted to go into teaching, you remind yourself of why it is you went into teaching in the first place, go back to that and then find somebody else to develop your practice with.
00:57:47
Speaker
Because it's doing that in community and not even just a person to do that with, but then to find the communities that your young people are from and find meaningful connection. Because that's what's going to sustain you. That's what sustained me.
00:58:00
Speaker
I was going to leave with the profession a second time and then being brought into that collective to build ethnic studies. That's really what kind of unlocked it. And so I think if there's wisdom, it's you can't do this alone.
00:58:14
Speaker
You've tried. How's that working? Exactly. There's going to be other people at your school, if not your school, at the adjacent school, and for sure in the communities of the young people that you serve, that you can plug into.
00:58:29
Speaker
You got to have this faith, this sense of larger purpose otherwise, no matter where you go. Like, there's a lot of folks going into HR or going into corporate or into tech, leaving education, and I'm like,
00:58:43
Speaker
For what? And I think that's at the root of effective practice. Like if we can't answer for our students, you know, when they ask, why are you making us do this? Why math?
00:58:54
Speaker
Math for what? Ethnic think studies for what? History for what? we can't answer that question, then we have a lot of work to do. But think once we answer that question a meaningful way for them, I mean, starting with yourself,
00:59:11
Speaker
That's where you'll find the answers. I don't have the answer for you. I have a lot of non-answers which might lead you to the answer.
00:59:19
Speaker
It's a very ethnic studies thing to have no answer.
00:59:25
Speaker
More questions. But then you add, when it's done right, you ask any student in an ethnic studies class, like, why'd you like that class? It's the relationships. It's the connection with other people that they thought they never would have anything in common with.
00:59:39
Speaker
Oh, that teacher. They helped me. It's like very clear in terms of what is effective and what's not. And I think it's easy because of our conditioning, our lack of the ways that our teachers are prepared to teach, that really set you up to fail.
00:59:58
Speaker
you know And so the lift needs to be done with as many other people as possible. And so to me, that's the role of the artists. That's the role of the cultural workers.
01:00:10
Speaker
And yeah, eventually, like, not eventually, like if you can be up on the Super Bowl halftime show stage, great. And your responsibility to the places that you come from.
01:00:23
Speaker
To me, I'm less and less about, no, not that way, this way, and more about, okay, that way and this way, and being in conversation still with a real sense of awareness, critical awareness of your impact.
01:00:39
Speaker
You can measure it, you know, like what you're putting out in the world. You can measure the impact of failing a child. you could observe the impact of, you know, yeah, assigning grades to your students as an example, or the impact of the lyrics that you put out and the music you put out in the world.
01:01:01
Speaker
And the art, the action, it's all energy. I think I've had some positive impact, not perfect, but if it gets better, it's because I'm reflecting on it. And I think sometimes to the degree where because of that whatever colonial conditioning, like or maybe it's Catholic condition, you really go at yourself.
01:01:21
Speaker
And so trying get to a place where you're self-critical without being so invested in, i don't know, self-crucifixion, you know?
01:01:32
Speaker
Again, I don't know if I'm answering your questions. i do appreciate just being able to talk with you three. And I've never been asked these types of questions in relation to ethnic studies and practice or allowed to just go.
01:01:46
Speaker
So if this is at all valuable to anybody, great, great. Because it's definitely valuable to me right now. I'm a big practitioner proponent of therapy and beneficiary of therapy.
01:02:01
Speaker
Definitely. That's the way it should be. I feel very healed, Art Nelson, from this conversation. I feel connected to you in a way that I have not ever.
01:02:14
Speaker
I'm grateful for age. I'm so glad i'm got to live and be older and yeah have an opinion and be able to do things differently. And, you know, as we get out of here, I think what's most important, that you know, you said something that was really powerful and and you said quickly, which was that you apologized to your children.
The Role of Apologies in Education
01:02:38
Speaker
When I talk to a number of educators, one of the most groundbreaking questions I ask educators in my teacher ed courses, in your experiences in K through 20, just say hold it up on your hands, the number of teachers who have ever apologized to you.
01:02:53
Speaker
And people rarely have to use more than two fingers. And asked them to think about that in relationship to their practice as well. And when I was on that bar train with Sydney, and said, I'm sorry.
01:03:07
Speaker
said, I'm sorry that the framework that I was using to educate at the time could not capture, could not even recognize or see the wholeness of who you are.
01:03:21
Speaker
apologize that I believed in that project at one point. Yeah, yeah. I have a lot of grief around that. I think in closing, I want to ask if there's anything you want to say to Jari or the Jaris of world as yeah as you are you know in such an elevated place in your life. Yeah.
01:03:39
Speaker
So Jari, I'm not perfect. And where and when I failed you as a teacher, and I sincerely deeply apologize.
01:03:49
Speaker
But I'm also very excited about hearing where you are and look forward to being a partner in this work, in this life at this time.
01:04:02
Speaker
Antoine another student and there are many students that I recognize. Yeah, exactly what you were saying, Tiffany, within the ways that I was developed and the place that I was at, very ah much not able right not able, not equipped to be the teacher that you all needed.
01:04:27
Speaker
But from that, think with every failure, every fall are hard lessons. I'm sorry, you all had to be the ones to experience that and I in a different way.
01:04:40
Speaker
But and I'm committed. I'm committed to keep on growing the practice. Like you said, and I'm in an elevated place. in a position that is significantly impacting current and future teachers.
01:04:52
Speaker
And so these lessons are benefiting and will benefit teachers and young people alike for years to come. That is a commitment, a promise and something you can objectively measure, right?
01:05:07
Speaker
Yeah, that's a tough thing. Apologizing is something we got to practice and be committed to. And then that's the other thing about faith, about living a spiritual existence.
01:05:19
Speaker
There is, there is so much unknown and yet there's enough that is known for me that I understand deeply and know deeply that compels me to keep going in the direction that we're going.
01:05:34
Speaker
So, hey, and I would like to cook for you. Who, me? All of That is an expression of, or one of my love languages, to cook for my folks. And to you, Jewel and Tiffany and Candice.
01:05:49
Speaker
Yeah, I was going to say that before that You dropped that question. was like, I'm a cum laude, Tiffany, right? Yeah, don't know. That's really like the coming together of so much life and energy and connection to the past and to people in a very, very focused, immediate way.
01:06:10
Speaker
so And I can go any direction. could go plant-based. I could go crazy carnivorous, pescatarian.
01:06:22
Speaker
Look at you, flexitarian. I this. You said flexitarian? I said pescatarian, but for yeah I'm interested in what a flexitarian is. Flexit, it means you're flexible.
01:06:36
Speaker
Flexible. You are amendable. I like it. I am flat and satarian. And that is what an educator should be.
01:06:47
Speaker
Yes. An ethnic studies educator should be adaptable to the conditions in front of them and the young people and the different experiences and sensibilities and cultures that they bring.
01:07:01
Speaker
it seems so simple. Yeah. It seems so like, I don't want to say easy, once you have that focus, maybe that's the wisdom too.
01:07:11
Speaker
Like really get to know yourself. So you can really get to know the students in front of you, be committed to that. Like, yeah how can you even teach others if you don't even really know who the hell you are?
01:07:25
Speaker
That's another ethnic studies foundational thing that ironically gets lost, right? In myself. always starting with myself, but I've observed with other teachers and parents and elders and folks that you want and need to be wise enough to do the right thing.
01:07:46
Speaker
so I'm all for redemption, I'll say that. And so these young teachers that are struggling, who are probably beating themselves up too a lot in terms of like, I can't do this, doing damage. I'd rather not do this and do damage and just leave.
01:08:01
Speaker
But we need you all. So if that's wisdom, then that's what I'll leave with.
Closing Reflections and Gratitude
01:08:08
Speaker
To those things we say, Ashe, we appreciate you. Art Nelson Concordia came and dropped.
01:08:15
Speaker
a bunch of dimes, some Maya Angelou quarters on us today. and brought We appreciate you so much. We're so grateful for the time that you spent with us.
01:08:27
Speaker
Give it up one more time, y'all, for Art Nelson Concordia. Appreciate you, brother. Thank you, Tiffany. Thank you, Jewel. Thank you, Kenji.
01:08:46
Speaker
We learned so much today with such amazing guests. I'm thinking back how sacred the work was that Lorenzo spoke of and what it enlivened for him and the histories that were awakened when he was able to pronounce, to declare so much in his indigenous or native tongue.
01:09:11
Speaker
Thinking back to Manny and this idea of trusting relationships and how that showed up in our conversation with Art Nelson, for us as educators to be able to go back think about the moments in our practice that we're not the most proud of, where we weren't the most experienced educators, where we caused harm.
01:09:35
Speaker
And that even through an ethnic studies lens, when we think about self-determined people, what it means to restore, what it means to be accountable to those we may have harmed, to the harm that's been imposed upon us by our participation in schools, and all the accountability work that is necessary for cultural perpetuity and the restoration of our communities. i feel so blessed.
01:10:01
Speaker
I'm grateful to everyone and excited to do this again. See y'all next time.
01:10:25
Speaker
Thank you for listening to this episode of Drawing From the Well, brought to you by the Youth Wellness Movement. I'm your host, Tiffany Marie. This podcast is co-produced by yours truly and John Reyes, with music by my boy Jansen V. Drawing From the Well is supported by Community Response of Education.
01:10:46
Speaker
Continue the conversation at youthwellness.org.