[NLA] [Fwd: [NIFL-ESL:7324] COABE plantation tour]

[Chris Francisco]

Dear Colleagues,

I just registered for the conference.  I did not consider the plantation 
tour and felt equally knocked from center when I read the 
description.  It's ironic to note that last year, COABE 2001,  I did 
sign-up of the National Civil Rights Museum tour, but it was 
cancelled.  The COABE conference is very important to me.  Having worked on 
many conferences I know how many details must be attended.  Elsa your 
compassionate and pro-active approach is constructive in its criticism.  To 
ignore this would be collusion.

peace and love,

Chris Francisco


>Dear colleagues,
>
>This is a long post, but I think it is extremely important to consider
>as a field.  Although some may disagree, I think the issue raised here
>is entirely relevant to policy.  If we, who are advocates for the field,
>do not have political clarity ourselves on such a central question, how
>can we represent adult education?  Thank you Janet for your vigilance
>and leadership in addressing this issue.  Elsa Auerbach
>Return-path: nifl-esl at literacy.nifl.gov
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>Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2002 11:50:42 -0500 (EST)
>From: Janet Isserlis <Janet_Isserlis at Brown.edu>
>Subject: [NIFL-ESL:7324] COABE plantation tour
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>Colleagues,
>
>I'm sending you copies of a message I sent to COABE and the response that 
>I received from them about a tour they've included amongst their offerings 
>(f tours/trips) during their upcoming conference.  My intention here is 
>not to malign COABE necessarily, but to bring to our collective attention 
>the fact that an important learning opportunity risks being neglected.  I 
>have never organized a national conference, and can't imagine the level of 
>detail that such an event necessitates.  Nonetheless, it feels important 
>to be mindful of learning opportunities -- found and neglected --  and it 
>is in this spirit that I offer the following, with apologies to those to 
>whom this will be cross posted.
>
>Janet Isserlis
>
>[my letter to COABE]  To whom it may concern:
>
>  I received your brochure yesterday and was startled, angered and 
> saddened at the description of the Boone Hall Plantation tour you provide 
> therein.  Your text:
>
>  Boone Hall Plantation Tour
>
>  Go back in time to the antebellum days when plantation life in the South 
> was self-sustaining and held a charm all its own. Arrive at Boone Hall 
> Plantation through the famour three-quarter mile "Avenue of Oaks." Boone 
> Hall was granted to one of South Carolina's first Settles, Major John 
> Boone, in 1676. Originally a cotton plantation, Boone Hall spread over 
> 17,000 acres. Hand-made brick and tile were also manufactured on the 
> plantation. These same brick [sic] have been identified in the mansion, 
> garden walls, slave cabins and many of Charleston's oldest and most 
> historic buildings. This plantation has been used in the filming of "Gone 
> with the Wind," and more recently, "North and South." Enjoy a guided tour 
> of the grounds followed by a guided tour of the mansion.
>
>
>  Your narrative completely obliterates any possibility of 
> problematizing  issues of race and racism inherent in slavery as it was 
> practiced on the plantation, thereby  reducing what could be viewed as a 
> powerful opportunity to witness a terrible force in history to an 
> attractive side trip, part of the local color.  I am deeply saddened that 
> a group of educators would not be more attentive to the implicitly racist 
> point of view given in your text.  Where we have an opportunity to 
> educate ourselves, and by extension, those with whom we learn and teach, 
> you have done nothing to promote a critical stance, or even the asking of 
> important questions. Instead, your text promotes a romanticized, 
> sanitized glimpse of the backdrop to "Gone with the Wind," itself a film 
> that is open to discussion. I fervently hope that you consider writing a 
> more appropriate description as an insert to the brochure and create 
> links on your web site that facilitate a more educational exploration of 
> our history.
>
>  The following two excerpts provide examples of ways in which a more 
> critical stance might be developed so that a trip to the plantation might 
> result in more than the acquisition of local color and could, instead, 
> provide an impetus for those present to reflect upon and/or reconsider 
> not only their own understanding of slavery and racism in this country, 
> but also the ways in which those things are taken up in the educational 
> contexts in which they work.
>
>  Another account, written by a student
>  http://www.scriptllc.com/oudc/thetrip.html
>
>  During our visit to Charleston, we went to the Boone Hall Plantation.
>  I was overcome with emotion and found myself crying uncontrollably.
>  It was as  if all the slaves who lived there came to me at once to
>  tell me their horrible   tales. The experience was overwhelming. The
>  entire tour of the plantation was conducted without a single mention
>  of slaves. The tour guide  discussed the architecture and the
>  furnishings in the house extensively   including the floors, tables,
>  china and silver. The trees were mentioned   many times. But the
>  people who built the plantation, the people who lived  there, some of
>  whom died there, the people who worked from sunrise to   sunrise,
>  these people were never mentioned.
>
>  As an African-American, it was not surprising   that the plantation
>  evoked profound feelings and  emotions in me. My Jewish peers,
>  however, were  also moved and were as outraged as we African-
>  Americans. They questioned the tour guide about  what they understood
>  to be a humiliating  oversight. We all learned a great deal from the
>  experience. Even though we may not have  entirely understood one
>  another, we learned that it is important to be sensitive to other people 
> and  to respect one
>  another's feelings. This trip taught us how to be tolerant. I have
>  learned one very  important lesson: we African-American people  must
>  learn to love ourselves. We must learn about ourselves in order to
>  stand strong with others. And we must all know about each other in
>  order to understand. After the summer trip, my commitment to
>  enlighten others and to learn are considerably stronger. I had a
>  chance to get to know the other students better; I also learned a
>  great deal about myself.
>
>  And this, an account of a tour taken despite the NCAAP boycott in 2000
>  http://www.inform.umd.edu/News/Diamondback/00-02-29/news1.html
>
>  At about 3 p.m. the bus stopped at the Boone Hall Plantation, a
>  17,000-acre farm when it was established in 1681, according to
>  brochures. Three hundred years later,   the farm has shrunk to 738 acres.
>  The tour bus drove down the half-mile dirt drive shrouded by Spanish
>  moss-covered oak trees. Jason Wiles, a  senior entertainment
>  management major, said he could feel the reminders of slavery.
>  "As soon as I got off that bus, I knew where I was," he said.
>  Lined a few yards from the street were nine slave houses, three
>  unrepaired after damage done during Hurricane   Hugo in 1989. The
>  buildings were cloaked in the original brick, made at the plantation,
>  with shells still stuck in    the cement between the bricks.
>
>  The group headed to the main house for the tour and was greeted by a
>  blonde young woman in an     old-fashioned blue dress, complete with
>  hoops to flare out the skirt. They met the tour guide, who then
>  focused     the tour on the antique furniture and mentioned little
>  about slavery.
>
>    Belcher said he was upset because the slaves were referred to as
>  "craftsmen" and "they" instead of overtly   recognizing the enslavement.
>  "It was a wonderful demonstration of erasing history," Belcher said.
>  Many others said they were upset with the production.    "It was like
>  they knew what happened but they were hiding it," said Taiwo Oladapo,
>  a junior chemical  engineering major.
>
>  After the tour Belcher sat on a bench outside the plantation while
>  the others either did handstands in the   backyard or lounged around
>  the ancient oak trees, many taller than the main house. Belcher said
>  he found racism in the reconstruction after the hurricane.
>
>  "The slaves' quarters were destroyed but the gardens were maintained," 
> he said.
>
>  The plantation does offer another tour, led by a historian who takes
>  the group through the slave quarters, said  Julie Rose, Boone Hall
>  office manager. "[The tour] is all about how the slaves would have 
> lived," she said.
>
>  I thank you for your attention to this matter and look forward to
>  your response.
>
>  Janet Isserlis,  joined by Heide Spruck Wrigley, Elsa Auerbach, Andy 
> Nash and Mary Ann
>  Florez, Maria Elena Gonzalez  and Judy Titzel
>
>
>COABE's response:
>
>COABE 2002 offers the tours described in the registration brochure for the
>pleasure of conference participants.  The tour description is the one offered
>by the tour company and the Charleston Visitors Bureau.
>
>[me again, to this list] Again, finally, my intent here is not to 
>embarrass or malign anyone, but to make us all aware of a learning 
>opportunity -- not only in terms of the way in which the tour is 
>described, but in the fact that such a tour could provide either a strong 
>learning experience or render us, again, complicit in disappearing this 
>country's history of slavery and in perpetuating an insidious form of 
>racism in so doing.