Tempest ban in Arizona racial pot

Ray

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Tempest ban in Arizona racial pot

London, Jan. 22: Alas, poor Shakespeare. The education authorities in Tucson, Arizona, have decided to ban discussion of The Tempest in class and remove the play from school libraries.

The ban, the latest in a line of politically motivated American assaults on the Bard, is part of a battle over Arizona's treatment of its fast-growing Mexican-immigrant population, and the extent to which cultural and racial differences should be examined in class.

Long hailed as one of Shakespeare's most subtle and provocative plays, The Tempest is studied in many US schools for its insights into racism and colonialism. One of its protagonists is Caliban, a black slave on an island ruled by Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan.

Yet, the play has fallen foul of conservative Arizonans disgusted that state schools offer classes in what they regard as increasingly radicalised Mexican-American studies. Critics complained that so-called ethnic studies courses were encouraging racial conflict and promoting extreme causes, notably a redrawing of America's southern border to return disputed land to Mexico.

Threatened with financial penalties if it failed to adopt a state ban on ethnic studies, the Tucson school district caved in to a two-year-old law prohibiting courses that "promote the overthrow of the US government, promote resentment towards a race or class of people, are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group, or advocate ethnic solidarity"........

This may also describe the debate over Arizona's ethnic studies programme, which first erupted in 2007. Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers union, which represents many migrant labourers, told a high school audience that Republicans hated Latinos.

<I>Tempest </I>ban in Arizona racial pot
Is it merely a reaction to the overflooding of US with Hispanic immigrants, illegal and legal?

Or is it a genuine concern of the US that such books promote racial conflicts and are therefore not to be encouraged?

Or is it merely politics?
 

W.G.Ewald

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Is it merely a reaction to the overflooding of US with Hispanic immigrants, illegal and legal?

Or is it a genuine concern of the US that such books promote racial conflicts and are therefore not to be encouraged?

Or is it merely politics?
"The education authorities in Tucson, Arizona, have decided to ban discussion of The Tempest in class and remove the play from school libraries."

You can count on school boards in the US to make a bad decision every time. Members of school boards are illiterate to begin with, I am convinced.

You can read no better book about America than Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Many schools have banned it because it contains the word "******." Lost is the concept that in the book, the most noble character, named as such by the protagonist, is the one called ****** Jim.
 

pmaitra

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"The education authorities in Tucson, Arizona, have decided to ban discussion of The Tempest in class and remove the play from school libraries."

You can count on school boards in the US to make a bad decision every time. Members of school boards are illiterate to begin with, I am convinced.

You can read no better book about America than Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Many schools have banned it because it contains the word "******." Lost is the concept that in the book, the most noble character, named as such by the protagonist, is the one called ****** Jim.
One black guy once explained to me that if a black guy calls another black guy a "N-word," it is not offensive, rather, a symbol of endearment.
 

parijataka

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AFAIK both Republicans and Democrats love the Mexican immigrants! Repubs because they provide cheap labour in farms and factories and are staunch Christians and Dems consider them a vote bank whose cause liberals like to espouse.
 

W.G.Ewald

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Is it merely a reaction to the overflooding of US with Hispanic immigrants, illegal and legal?

Or is it a genuine concern of the US that such books promote racial conflicts and are therefore not to be encouraged?

Or is it merely politics?
School board members do not read the books they ban, so we can't answer the question.

In college our Dean of Women said freshmen English classes could read Chaucer, but not The Miller's Tale. After the instructor cautioned us, what part of Canterbury Tales was read first, do you think?
 

Ray

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School board members do not read the books they ban, so we can't answer the question.

In college our Dean of Women said freshmen English classes could read Chaucer, but not The Miller's Tale. After the instructor cautioned us, what part of Canterbury Tales was read first, do you think?

So, it is like the Satanic Verses Salman Rushdie crisis?
 

Twinblade

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One black guy once explained to me that if a black guy calls another black guy a "N-word," it is not offensive, rather, a symbol of endearment.
you need to watch this :)

 
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niharjhatn

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One black guy once explained to me that if a black guy calls another black guy a "N-word," it is not offensive, rather, a symbol of endearment.
Its not so simple.

Blacks only call other blacks "******s" if they are Indigenous i.e. of slavery descent. African migrants are generally not "allowed" to use it. I have a cousin in America (in Illionois) and he told me in high school heated arguments, even fights would break out between African-Americans and African-Africans :)lol:) like the Sudanese.

Shakespeare's works are crazy though. The whole world revolves in them.
 

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