Teaching Prejudice and Resistance

I’m excited about a project I just started, building the theme of “prejudice and resistance” into 6^th grade world history curricula.  I’m collaborating with a teacher on curricula that we’ll test during the spring semester.  I’ll be doing the bulk of the research, part of which will involve examining how various forms of prejudices existed in ancient India, China, and Greece.  I mention it here because I’m curious to discover how ancient Buddhism functioned both to support hierarchical structures and prejudices supported by them, and to subvert prejudices.  I’ll let you all know what I come up with :)  And it may be an interesting way to introduce the Upanishads (those works that gave philosophical depth to notions of samsara, karma, and reincarnation beginning in the 9^th century BCE) as a spiritual, philosophical and reflective movement serving to de-hierarchize spiritual practice.

 I’m excited to discover ways to introduce such material to twelve year olds!  And I’m excited to see what they do with it.  One of the points behind teaching thematically is that historical themes can always be compared to the present – it will be interesting to look at diverse modes of prejudice and resistance, and see if students see those functioning in their world.  The idea is not so much that this subject is historically interesting, but that students will learn how to perceive prejudice where they might not have seen it before, analyze how it functions, and conceive of methods of resistance.  (I’m still not sure about the word “resistance”, it feels a bit ideologically loaded, bringing to mind the boorish image of the raised fist.  Resistance also feels more militant that many modes of fostering change tend to be.)   

So, my working thesis question as it stands is “does teaching the theme of prejudice and resistance in world civilizations help students better understand prejudice and resistance in their own world?”

And, yes, I’m probably also excited because ever since wanting to be a ninja as a little boy, I have also wanted to investigate historical guerrilla mechanisms of avoiding the state or strategically assimilating into it.  (An excuse to read authors I’ve long been interested in, such as James C. Scott.)  An academic extension of boyhood fantasies?  It makes me happy to consider how childhood imaginations continue to blossom in invisible ways all throughout life :)

Aside from that… I’ve been considering the precepts.  The main feeling that has arisen is that taking them feels natural and affirming of myself and the life I want to live.  Not taking them would feel like turning my back on my most lovely desires.  I feel like my back has been turned the wrong  way for a few years – not completely the wrong way, but let’s say not exactly angled in the direction that will make me happy! – and that its time to embrace all those things I truly love and respect about myself.  The precepts, to me, symbolize that embrace.  I’ll be sitting docusan with Jordan Thorn on Tuesday morning to begin the process of reflecting on this matter.