@@Individual_Lives_Matter My hunch is that liberal / conservative weaponizing of woke politics insults the original leftist meanings of the term used by Marcus Garvey in the 1920s then by MLK in the 60s.
Buy Norm's book guys, it's great, and he deserves the praise. His point -- about the necessity of class-based understanding for serious politics -- is probably the most timely thing that is possibe for people in the US who want to try and make the world a better place.
So Norm is pretty much saying the entire curriculum has nothing about the material conditions the majority of black ppl live under. No shocker there loll.
"You're taking a lot of time to say this." The level of disrespect and unintelligent stink in that comment alone was unbelievable and immediately tainted everything he said from that point on. Norman is such a coherent and elegant speaker. This level of specifics is desperately needed in all discourse. Idk who the other guy is, but his disrespect of N.F. right in that first sentence was unbelievable - especially after Norman did so much to make sure he knew he was being civil.
@@adamazzalino5247 You are extremely emotional here and disrespectful as well. What you said has absolutely nothing to do with how he showed such a high level of disrespect to Norman. And further, you show disrespect as well. For what reason? Because of a disagreement? You are so juvenile. Did your parents not teach you basic social skills? You dont insult your own peer in a professional conversation, especially after they go so far to be kind and respectful to you. Also we all saw who won this conversation. It was Norman, without question. The other two weren't even coherent in addressing his argument. Just dismissive and disrespectful to Norman or Prisoners. Kelley can be a good historian, but he is a very disrespectful person and seems very disingenuous in this conversation. Norman is more respected than him for a reason: merit. It just goes to show the difference between people like Norman who are accomplished scholars first and teachers second, and people like the other two who are teachers first. The woman was especially elitist and gross in her words. Kelley was disrespectful and a jerk. Norman was a class act all the way.
@@adamazzalino5247 Lmao. He's an idpol quack. You only need to listen to him for 2 minutes to recognise that. The idea that MORE THAN HALF of "black" history should be about women is absurd. Women were historically infantilised and their role was marginal. It would be as ridiculous as saying over half of history should be about children. In addition to which, black men were the ones most persecuted, by far. Like all wokies, he's observably sexist and racist.
"Okay, can I jump in here because, because you're taking a lot of time..." They had 45 minutes before Norman and this is the first thing Robin says. Why so hostile?
@mattsimpson6493 Agreed, but that is the nature of debate. Let your "opponent" make his argument, and then you refute it. You don't interrupt to blow his point up. That bugged me.
Fwiw I thought the point he was trying to get to is that focussing on the personal concerns of the intellectual and then complaining about populist interference, isn't useful. Populists gain ground because established elites, of Left or Right, ignore the concerns of the masses.
Gerald Horne is a charlatan who's willing to falsify history to support his race war theory of history. He's exactly the same kind of opportunistic identity politics peddler that Norm blasts in this video, and there's a very good reason the New York Times boosts his shoddy work. Please don't insult Adolph Reed by naming him alongside with Horne.
Oh, yes! That Garbage curriculum, Gerald Horn would tear it up!! Those Black history or studies professors Do Not want to debate Gerald Horn. Norman Finkelstein is just being nice; his expertise is way beyond that of an "African American history curriculum". He s telling you , focus on the working class , but they don't get it; Some people are always on the defensive; can't reason ...
This illustrates the misguided racial attitudes in America: the bourgeoisie hyperfixates on cultural and symbolic interraciality (DEI/wokeness) in order to ignore the more tangible economic and social human rights of the black working class. By and large, Americans run screaming from any whiff of Marxist/economic analysis and think, 'if we just give the black poor some more visible cultural heroes, they'll be motivated to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, too!' Plenty of minority leaders have risen to the upper classes only to collaborate with former oppressors to enrich themselves at the expense of their minority brethren. And for all the talk of 'systemic racism,' the idea that the American economic system would also need reform is never on the table. There is a time and a place for cultural rights, and a time and a place for economic and social rights--not that either is more important, just everything has its place. I side with Finkelstein on this one.
There's an online documentary you might appreciate that makes similar points, called 'Represenation Matters, Right!?,' by Peter Coffin. Came out in late 2021.
It's as if this post was spoken by a charter member of the professional managerial class. Typical elitist tripe that phartzz in da face of everyone who is lower than them. You're so much better than us aren't you, love? Koont.
@@J3unG Care to retry this comment, but this time actually be coherent instead of this incoherent jumble of words which seems to be a poor attempt at insults?
Katie was way too liniment to Barbara Smith and Robin G Kelley. She allowed them to constantly interrupt Norman. She framed the entire discussion around Smith and Kelley
To be fair, Katie herself is on their level. She isnt even close to the level of Norman. Norman is a world renown scholar by merit. These other 3 are not, again by merit. Likely never will be on Norman's level of scholarship. He is a real scientist who writes, while they are just writers who write.
Amen Norm! We need more working-class stories. The rest of the panel sounded condescending and elitist to me. What was that tirade about the geniuses in prison that was so demeaning and dehumanizing.
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned. Barbara Smith
Point taken. The American wealth protection and perpetuation system has always been racially biased. Institutional Christianity is also contributive to the creation and expansion of the system. At the root is the imperative of preserving the material advantage of the owning class.
Norman takes them apart n they just respond with vacuous babble. The lady goes "we didn't go to our geniuses in the prisons", how insulting, go talk to Chris Hedges who teaches in prisons and how incredibly driven n smart some of those ppl are, she in fact confirmed the bl8nd spot of the professional managerial left, they don't know about the plight of working class n they don't wanna know.
I haven't read the Curriculum but the panel have said that there is nothing on black housing. Access to loans to buy houses and start businesses makes a major significance to generational wealth transfer and quality of education but black people were denied this for decades through redlining. You really can't have an African American Studies curriculum without mentioning redlining.
There's a whole section about housing and redlining and how one of the major avenues to establishing middle class security and respectibility--home-ownership--was systematically denied to African Americans. I'm all for bashing extreme instances of woke-ism gone too far, but this curriculum as outlined does not fit that description. On the whole, it's pretty good.
I didn't know of Norman Finkelstein until yesterday, when I read an interview with him in an alternative Dutch newspaper. He is great, at least on this subject.
We can't ask prisoners to do anything productive even though it's literally 1% of the US population. This is what academics in the clouds think about vast important issues.
@@busessuck1 um, the prison labor industry's existence refutes your claim. Kamala Harris argued in court that prison labor was so important to California's economy, that prisoners had to be illegally held past their release date so as not to interfere with the State's economy.
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
@@barbarasmith3961 wow, you got through writing a dissertation on mass incarceration without mentioning Joe Biden wrote that racist Bill, and Bill Clinton signed it in to law. It takes skill to be so disingenuously partisan.
@@johnkayoss5422 I am not sure why you assume that I do not know how bad the Clinton administration’s criminal justice polices were. The 1994 Crime Bill promoted three strikes and you’re out and mandatory minimums, just two examples that come immediately to mind. I am also not sure why you assume that I support Clinton or Biden when I never have, especially since I stated during the show that I worked on Bernie Sanders’ campaign in 2016 and was a national surrogate for his campaign in 2020.
"Theoretical interventions." I was an academic. I've never heard anyone use that jargon then follow it up with anything worth listening to. 8:15 - The black working class? C'mon, Norman--that would involve feminists speaking to and acknowledging the lives of black working men. You don't really think that's going to happen in 2023, do you?
I'm an African-American, and I agree with what DeSantis did. Based on what Robin is saying, I can tell that the curriculum pretty much diminishes black men and their contributions to our history, while pushing black feminists and LGBT issues.
So, I think the whole woke thing is a political chew toy. it's divisive and ultimately not the point. On the other hand, Norman's analysis seems spot on concerning the biases of the people creating any curriculum. And I definitely can't fault his list of issues not included in the curriculum that should be. I don't think either of the two who defended the curriculum managed to dent Norman's basic criticism. All in all, I'd have to give this one to Norman.
That’s literally all it is..a distraction to keep people from understanding who the real enemy is. The democrats LOVE arguing with desantis about this stuff so that the can continue to bend over the working class and bang them every single day
Don't forget the others came across as juvenile or elitist. He disrespected Norman for no reason, like an upset child, and she randomly went on an elitist rant attacking the intellect of prisoners.
@@nowayjosedaniel People often confuse authority with expertise. Norman demonstrated expertise... the other two rested on authority. One o the main problems we have in the USA is our "empty" authority. Our country does so few things that are informed by merit and character.
I have absolutely no idea what discussion was about, as it sounded like three different people addressing three different topics concerning an black studies curriculum in Florida (I presume, from the mentioning of DeSantis).
That's bc after Norman spoke, the other two were incoherent and just ignored everything he said. But only after the woman showed us how elitist she is by insulting prisoners and the man showed us how he knew he was losing the argument by disrespecting Norman.
Didn't hear the whole interview, only this excerpt. But it might come across as if Finkelstein is singling out this African-American history (or studies?) curriculum for criticism to the exclusion of so much else in academia. I listened to his comments, and my reaction was: but hasn't there been a trendy emphasis on 'the cultural' across the history profession in recent decades, not just African American history? And in what academic discipline is bourgeois / professional-managerial bias not a problem these days? But in fairness, I would expect that in his latest book, he does connect the kind of criticisms he's making of this curriculum here to broader critiques of the academy. Again, it just doesn't really come across that way in this segment.
He does know what woke means. You're the one out of touch here. You can't create your own personal definition of a term and then get all butthurt when 99% of society uses the version they already created. It doesnt matter if your definition is based on older usage of the word dating back further. Words are just symbols used to convey ideas. The term Woke has 1000+ meanings and they are all correct. Don't be so salty. (And no, that comment isnt about your iodine levels).
@@busessuck1o usually I just think of woke as like a right wing slur against liberals generally. But I mean is there any practical purpose to taking African American studies like does any of that information help anyone materially. I feel like at it's core it's a woke class you can't change that really. Despite all that I think it's a perfectly fine class and if someone wants to learn it they should be able to. Desantis is an idiot
Then re-listen to what he actually said. He is perhaps the clearest speaker in the world, so unless you didnt listen I have no idea how you didnt get what he was saying.
Culture is part of history too. It can be religion poems etc. Sometimes songs can be an important historical source of information. This course seems to try and cover a huge territory. When the breadth is so broad the ecominc history of people who cannot work is left out.
Was Martin King middle class? Yet, he focused on education,housing, class struggle and poverty. what was the Chicago freedom movement about? Fair and equal housing. I agree with Norman. As Rosa Luxemberg said that working class people must organize working class people. This needs to be class struggle. DeSantis is a diversion away from what needs to be discussed. Class struggle.
I have enormous respect for Prof Finklestein, but his use of the word "woke" does nothing to further his argument, but rather belittles him. I find myself completely turned off from the entire conversation as a result. He could have articulated his critique in a much more eloquent and engaging manner, which is what he is known for.
He's not my favorite communicator either, but the use of a single word--one that, no matter your expertise or opinion, clearly suffers from social/political ambiguity, manipulation, and semantic abuse in this moment--should not deter you from seeing his larger point. To me, it seemed he was alluding to a whole side argument, and reminding the other three left-wing people in the room that there is also a right-wing half of the country. Even his voice is painful for me, but that did not stop me from agreeing with him here
His usage of the term Woke was perfect here. You are just triggered. It's just a term, but my money would be on him using it correctly while you likely use a poor definition not reflective of most usage in this context.
Evidently, the curriculum didn't represent the slave trade accurately. Before Transatlantic slave trade, and DURING, African tribal leaders were conquering weaker tribes and enslaving them. Also, facilitating European slave trade and benefiting financially from it. I agree with Norm with his point about exclusion of important people and phenomena.
This is kind of a dumb discussion. The issue regarding course content is secondary here. The primary issue is the intrusion of public officials whose job has nothing to do with the writing of curriculum interfering inappropriately in the educational system for purely political reasons. American students don’t get enough history to have a very solid grasp on anything other than the most basic and fundamental aspects of any given historical period. Whenever these sorts of discussions take place it always gets down to personal views of what should or shouldn’t be included which is a dead end and quite u productive. There needs to be a recognition that we need to to have significantly greater time given to history in American public education from K-Graduate school. One could spend an entire career solely on the importance of just the slave trade, just black women, just reconstruction, just Jim Crow, just on the daily life of ordinary black families from 1619-present. History is an enormous and endlessly complex, interesting subject that takes in all of human experience. We should all get behind more history, lots more history for all students at every level because the truth is students are not well served by the paltry survey of history-even in AP classes that is presented in this country. There is enormous ignorance on both the left and right about the history of this country and the world. More history!!
All the comments are interesting, but it really feels like these people are talking past one another instead of engaging a common point - I think more clarification was maybe needed beforehand re what exactly the question was to be addressed - what is being decided here
Re: Geniuses in Prison. I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
The criminal justice system doesn't target any race at all. It targets males and the poor. The racial bias is almost non-existent. And the average IQ of those in prison is 90. Much lower for blacks. There aren't many black geniuses in prison. Stop being ridiculous. Meanwhile, blacks are dominating every sport in existence. Stop with the identity politics nonsense. It's all class. The fact you didn't one in your polemic mention MEN is hilarious. And illustrates the absurdity of identity politics and your biases. 90% of the prison population is male. And studies examining potential biases in the criminal justice system suggest the sex bias is magnitudes higher than the race bias. But in neoliberal identity politics land, males cannot be a victim group, can they? Only women can.
I agree entirely as someone who has taught regularly in the prison system. What I will add is this: I interpreted Norman's comment as: the blindness of someone who is not considering class issues and who has never been involved in any concrete struggles (so as to know they don't happen in generalizing terms like "black power") could have written that curriculum. I would also add: the people who run Collegeboard, as I've had the unfortunate reality of meeting some, are lifelong private schoolers from the utmost wealth and they are the ones making the final decisions.
So I guess she doesn’t think that Mumia couldn’t write a chapter or two…..I would beg to differ on that one as imagine many would. How elitist. Can’t even imagine how many brilliant people are behind bars. That’s part of the curriculum that should be explored
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
Why can't the left walk and chew gum at the same time? Finklestein is a solid guy but he’s missing the point and not reading the room. This is Robin Kelley and Barbara Freakin Smith. This is Hammer and Hoe and the Combahee River Collective. The point is that they are not defending the curriculum, its about framing and critiquing what they removed. Robin Kelley advised Barbara Ransby who wrote the greatest book on Ella Baker. Finklestein should know this and it should inform his critique in an effort to have a more generative conversation and exchange. Also, Finklestein has ceded over the term Woke to the right. Woke is a progressive term that has a long history in the Black Freedom Movement. Finklestein began by conceding his ignorance when it came to Black Studies, but his misguided and counter-productive critique did not reflect that he really believed what he opened with. He should have asked questions and just listened. That was embarrassing. Free Palestine 🇵🇸 And before ya’ll come for me I own four of his books and he is my go to guy on Gaza!
I confess to detesting Norman Finkelstein because of his irrational hatred for Israel, which leads him to say such things as Hamas being guilty of no more than using "fireworks" in its terror rocket attacks from Gaza. It startles me, therefore, yo find myself unwillingly agreeing with his points here. While he comes from a traditional left wing perspective, that’s not a crime when it means he is interested in the American working class, their issues of labor, housing, health, and the like. His critique on wokeness is quite cutting, he’s really accurate as to how condescending and ideologically trite it is. I may not agree with his class based notions, but he’s right that wokeness has done a great disservice to the traditional debate between appreciating traditional American foundational thought (a conservative approach) and those seeking reforms at the expense of those traditions (left ideas). Woke undermines the rational debate between these two positions by radically changing both substance and style of the interchange.
I have no idea why Finkelstein is speaking on this subject to be honest. He really should stick to Israel's apartheid and torturous treatment of Palestinians. His views & opinions are not helping here. He is only holding water for the conservative & right wing views.
@@MrWhiskeycricket I’m all for organic wokeness. The only problem I see is with politicians who play identity politics and that’s only a problem because words without actions ends up being hypocrisy
@@wnnfrhrw4452 I’d have to relisten to defuse you but if my memory serves right, what he said on these subjects was utter bullshit. There are many people who are insightful and great on one subject but awful on others. Finkelstein has struck me as one of those.
@@standingalone001 Actually, he mentions that this new curricula is not substantive [e.g., Uninformed by Sound, Comprehensive Reasoning; Not Practicable; Uniformed by The Plight by Working-Class; etc. ---------> Elitist].
@@priceandpride No. No objective person would think this. Their rebuttals were incoherent and didnt even address Norman's argument. Their statements just made them look bad. Especially the woman, whose gross elitist rant makes you want to get a prisoner to spit on her for being such a pretentious snob. I'd love for Katie to have corrected her about prison intellect, citing Chris Hedges or MLK in Birmingham.
Norm is a brilliant and dedicated man I've always admired and read, but his old fuddy-duddy obsession with 'woke' that he clearly doesn't understand is not helpful.
All curriculum is written by the middle class. I don't know why leftists like Norm think we'd have to ask the janitor for input, but if any demographic would be open to input from the janitor it would be Black people. Norm has PhD brain. He's thinking about a PhD seminar when the subject is a freshman survey course. That gets back to the middle class writing the curriculum. A curriculum writing team, I've been on several, is composed of experts in pedagogy and assessment working with subject matter experts. We make less than everybody in this video.
Imagine thinking people with PhDs are less qualified than those without... Class analysis/interpretation of history and literature is not a PhD-level topic; it's no more complex than racial or gender critical techniques. It shouldn't matter which class is writing the curriculum, as long as it accurately reflects the nature and magnitude of problems relevant to the topic of the course. If we're talking about qualifications, I have three degrees in the arts, and from my cultural perspective, a course with that little attention on economic/class matters would not appropriately cover even a cultural history course, let alone a broader course with sociological elements. To the extent that there were SMEs on the curriculum board in this case, they should not have included cultural experts alone, but also political scientists, lawyers, sociologists, economists, doctors, and even environmental scientists whose research focuses on the African American community, in order to represent the full suite of disparities across civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights. And by including this broader array of topics, curricula might become more of the survey course you're talking about because there would be no time or opportunity to go further in depth.
It wouldn't be a problem if the curriculum coming out of universities that is supposed to address social inequality didn't reek of class blindness and prejudice.
@@2001abassodysseyUnfortunately, the knowledge producing institutions are corrupted by wokeism. I wouldn’t trust what a PhD in the ‘soft sciences’ had to say by their credentials alone.
@@katelyn9677Curriculum is not meant to produce solutions but to give people the ability to find solutions. If they’re producing the solutions in the curriculum, it is most certainly a politically biased endeavor.
I looked over that curriculum and it definitely didn't seem egregiously woke to me... it covered, what I consider to be most of the major, mainstream eras of African American US history and you literally cannot tell that story without at least mentioning aspects of the Civil Rights Movement that remain contentious (aka Malcom X, black nationalism) and the emergence of disciplines like critical race theory, and contemporary works and movements. So yeah, if one were to design a truly "woke" AA studies curiculum, it would look a whole lot different. This is fairly middle of the road, similar in its substance to what you'd get at any university, and I thought that's what the whole point of AP classes were--to give kids a taste of the college experience while in highschool.
Except most colleges are poisoned by woke ideology now. It’s not scientific and it doesn’t survive open scrutiny/the process of free inquiry. It’s protected material, which is the nature of ideological capture.
Norm actually reading academic papers all day and they're all about nappy hair and shit whilst the planet and global society is on the brink of collapse
What's cringe about what he said? Can you people ever be specific about anything, and be able to describe what you're saying? Or are people just supposed to interpret your feelings in the way you want them to be interpreted through magic?
neverthless, i'll tell you why it was cringe. the whole start of his talk really. he's all like, 'lets have a nice fair reasoned discussion. lets try to have an honest conversation and not just bromides and feel good, and to really engage with each other.' the type of bull shit vague appeal to rationality and civility that those like D.G. Kelley rightfully critique. For being a critic of left moralism, Finkelstein sure does his own kind of moralism, thinking he's better than people cuz he wants to talk 'reasonably.' its virtue signaling as fuck. not to mention him just generally taking up a lot of time talking, always jumping in to challenge Kellley without giving him the equal amount of space/time that he has with his long winded talking points that Kelley has undoubtedly heard before
This was frustrating to watch cuz you can tell that norman just doesnt get it. I even quedtion why he was brought on. Also, can we please stop giving non+black people who have not done the work(which norman stared he hadn't) thw space to debate black people on black issue? Like i just feel that should be a bare minimum. Next time invite a non-black person who has actually done the work
Chris Hedges who teaches in a prison to mostly black and brown people: "my students have 'zero time' for woke politics"
Why would that be true?
@@Individual_Lives_Matter people with real troubles have no time for woke nonsense
@@Individual_Lives_Matter My hunch is that liberal / conservative weaponizing of woke politics insults the original leftist meanings of the term used by Marcus Garvey in the 1920s then by MLK in the 60s.
@@Brianbeesandbikes Maybe that's because women and blacks have full equal rights now so it has to be about bullshit at this point.
@@BrianbeesandbikesHow do you weaponize a weapon? 🤨
Finkelstein is a great guy - a scholar and a gentleman
Buy Norm's book guys, it's great, and he deserves the praise.
His point -- about the necessity of class-based understanding for serious politics -- is probably the most timely thing that is possibe for people in the US who want to try and make the world a better place.
Can we achieve meaningful change? It seems like we have lost so much ground. I'd love to find some encouragement.
Which book are you referring to?
@@23DanielVincent "I'll Burn That Bridge When I Get To It!"
So Norm is pretty much saying the entire curriculum has nothing about the material conditions the majority of black ppl live under. No shocker there loll.
Yea but the real shocker is the two elitist professors saying working class blacks dont matter.
@@nowayjosedaniel You mean the 'geniuses in prison'? (I think that's how Smith put it.)
"You're taking a lot of time to say this."
The level of disrespect and unintelligent stink in that comment alone was unbelievable and immediately tainted everything he said from that point on.
Norman is such a coherent and elegant speaker. This level of specifics is desperately needed in all discourse.
Idk who the other guy is, but his disrespect of N.F. right in that first sentence was unbelievable - especially after Norman did so much to make sure he knew he was being civil.
Kelley is the most foremost historian of the black freedom struggle and Norm is whining without knowing anything about teaching history, but okay.
@@adamazzalino5247 You are extremely emotional here and disrespectful as well.
What you said has absolutely nothing to do with how he showed such a high level of disrespect to Norman.
And further, you show disrespect as well. For what reason? Because of a disagreement?
You are so juvenile. Did your parents not teach you basic social skills? You dont insult your own peer in a professional conversation, especially after they go so far to be kind and respectful to you.
Also we all saw who won this conversation. It was Norman, without question. The other two weren't even coherent in addressing his argument. Just dismissive and disrespectful to Norman or Prisoners.
Kelley can be a good historian, but he is a very disrespectful person and seems very disingenuous in this conversation. Norman is more respected than him for a reason: merit.
It just goes to show the difference between people like Norman who are accomplished scholars first and teachers second, and people like the other two who are teachers first.
The woman was especially elitist and gross in her words. Kelley was disrespectful and a jerk. Norman was a class act all the way.
@@nowayjosedaniel Your comment rings true - clear and forthright. Unlike the 'arguments' of the American 'historian'
@@adamazzalino5247 Lmao. He's an idpol quack. You only need to listen to him for 2 minutes to recognise that.
The idea that MORE THAN HALF of "black" history should be about women is absurd. Women were historically infantilised and their role was marginal. It would be as ridiculous as saying over half of history should be about children. In addition to which, black men were the ones most persecuted, by far.
Like all wokies, he's observably sexist and racist.
@@adamazzalino5247Kelley was mad and acting childish.
"Okay, can I jump in here because, because you're taking a lot of time..." They had 45 minutes before Norman and this is the first thing Robin says. Why so hostile?
That’s what you do when you’re losing the argument
Norm does sound like he is giving a lecture at times, rather than having a discussion. He is good about not interrupting and listening however.
Tbh he takes a long time to make his point, and when you can already tell where he is going with it, it must be incredibly frustrating
@mattsimpson6493 Agreed, but that is the nature of debate. Let your "opponent" make his argument, and then you refute it. You don't interrupt to blow his point up. That bugged me.
Fwiw I thought the point he was trying to get to is that focussing on the personal concerns of the intellectual and then complaining about populist interference, isn't useful. Populists gain ground because established elites, of Left or Right, ignore the concerns of the masses.
You can bet Adolph Reed and Gerald Horn would rip this curriculum up hard too.
Gerald Horne is a charlatan who's willing to falsify history to support his race war theory of history. He's exactly the same kind of opportunistic identity politics peddler that Norm blasts in this video, and there's a very good reason the New York Times boosts his shoddy work. Please don't insult Adolph Reed by naming him alongside with Horne.
Cedric Johnson too
Oh, yes! That Garbage curriculum, Gerald Horn would tear it up!! Those Black history or studies professors Do Not want to debate Gerald Horn.
Norman Finkelstein is just being nice; his expertise is way beyond that of an "African American history curriculum". He s telling you , focus on the working class , but they don't get it;
Some people are always on the defensive; can't reason ...
Ad an 'e' to turn Horn to Horne ...and I 1000% agree w these views...
@@Brianbeesandbikes for shame, thanks for calling out my omission of Horne's 'e'!
I think Norman was spot on. His criticisms should be addressed in good faith.
This illustrates the misguided racial attitudes in America: the bourgeoisie hyperfixates on cultural and symbolic interraciality (DEI/wokeness) in order to ignore the more tangible economic and social human rights of the black working class. By and large, Americans run screaming from any whiff of Marxist/economic analysis and think, 'if we just give the black poor some more visible cultural heroes, they'll be motivated to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, too!' Plenty of minority leaders have risen to the upper classes only to collaborate with former oppressors to enrich themselves at the expense of their minority brethren. And for all the talk of 'systemic racism,' the idea that the American economic system would also need reform is never on the table. There is a time and a place for cultural rights, and a time and a place for economic and social rights--not that either is more important, just everything has its place. I side with Finkelstein on this one.
There's an online documentary you might appreciate that makes similar points, called 'Represenation Matters, Right!?,' by Peter Coffin. Came out in late 2021.
@@ronmackinnon9374 Peter Coffin is based.
Fink is absolutely brilliant, thank you ❤
Norman probably already knows more about black history than 99% of us.
It's as if this post was spoken by a charter member of the professional managerial class. Typical elitist tripe that phartzz in da face of everyone who is lower than them. You're so much better than us aren't you, love? Koont.
@@J3unG You have nothing but ad hominems. Which is typical.
@@J3unG Care to retry this comment, but this time actually be coherent instead of this incoherent jumble of words which seems to be a poor attempt at insults?
Carter can’t you read? Quit naval gazing and smelling your own farts...
Na. Norman is a mad reader.
"We aren't going to our prisons to ask imprisoned geniuses to write advanced courses."
*Chris Hedges has entered the Chat*
MLK with the Letter from Birmingham Jail 🤦♂️
@@waaaghmasta5019 George Jackson too.
haha
Not a lot of MLK’s in prison right now.
@@Individual_Lives_Matter there is an entire generation of them still in prison... tf you talking about?
Finkelstein, as ever, is spot on.
Katie was way too liniment to Barbara Smith and Robin G Kelley. She allowed them to constantly interrupt Norman. She framed the entire discussion around Smith and Kelley
To be fair, Katie herself is on their level. She isnt even close to the level of Norman.
Norman is a world renown scholar by merit.
These other 3 are not, again by merit. Likely never will be on Norman's level of scholarship. He is a real scientist who writes, while they are just writers who write.
Amen Norm! We need more working-class stories. The rest of the panel sounded condescending and elitist to me. What was that tirade about the geniuses in prison that was so demeaning and dehumanizing.
Ask Chris Hedges.
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned. Barbara Smith
Why did they not seek out the input of black and working class people?
@@barbarasmith3961 Is it impossible for middle class people to write about the working class? I believe Karl Marx did it.
Point taken. The American wealth protection and perpetuation system has always been racially biased. Institutional Christianity is also contributive to the creation and expansion of the system. At the root is the imperative of preserving the material advantage of the owning class.
Buy his book! Not only was it really good but also funny. I laughed and cried. Cliche but true.
Always great content from Sheikh Norman
Sheikh?!
What??! 😂
Please have Norm on more
Finkelstein's criticism of the curriculum is on point.
Norman takes them apart n they just respond with vacuous babble. The lady goes "we didn't go to our geniuses in the prisons", how insulting, go talk to Chris Hedges who teaches in prisons and how incredibly driven n smart some of those ppl are, she in fact confirmed the bl8nd spot of the professional managerial left, they don't know about the plight of working class n they don't wanna know.
I haven't read the Curriculum but the panel have said that there is nothing on black housing. Access to loans to buy houses and start businesses makes a major significance to generational wealth transfer and quality of education but black people were denied this for decades through redlining. You really can't have an African American Studies curriculum without mentioning redlining.
There's a whole section about housing and redlining and how one of the major avenues to establishing middle class security and respectibility--home-ownership--was systematically denied to African Americans. I'm all for bashing extreme instances of woke-ism gone too far, but this curriculum as outlined does not fit that description. On the whole, it's pretty good.
Exactly. ✔️
Economic history is always a tiny footnote in history. I agree with you.
I didn't know of Norman Finkelstein until yesterday, when I read an interview with him in an alternative Dutch newspaper. He is great, at least on this subject.
He is great on many subjects
Man, the balls you must have to debate this issue with two black professors, as a white (albeit Jewish) dude. Norm is fearless as ever.
So good see Normen Finkelstein
Why don't they go to prisons to have the geniuses give input?
"That's just how it is" is a lame as hell excuse.
We can't ask prisoners to do anything productive even though it's literally 1% of the US population. This is what academics in the clouds think about vast important issues.
@@busessuck1 um, the prison labor industry's existence refutes your claim. Kamala Harris argued in court that prison labor was so important to California's economy, that prisoners had to be illegally held past their release date so as not to interfere with the State's economy.
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
@@barbarasmith3961 wow, you got through writing a dissertation on mass incarceration without mentioning Joe Biden wrote that racist Bill, and Bill Clinton signed it in to law.
It takes skill to be so disingenuously partisan.
@@johnkayoss5422 I am not sure why you assume that I do not know how bad the Clinton administration’s criminal justice polices were. The 1994 Crime Bill promoted three strikes and you’re out and mandatory minimums, just two examples that come immediately to mind. I am also not sure why you assume that I support Clinton or Biden when I never have, especially since I stated during the show that I worked on Bernie Sanders’ campaign in 2016 and was a national surrogate for his campaign in 2020.
“IT’S WAY TOO WOKE!” Absolutely, the best line ever.
Norman,your my hero!
"Theoretical interventions." I was an academic. I've never heard anyone use that jargon then follow it up with anything worth listening to.
8:15 - The black working class? C'mon, Norman--that would involve feminists speaking to and acknowledging the lives of black working men. You don't really think that's going to happen in 2023, do you?
Are there any black working class women?
Telling Finklestein, "yer taking alot of time." And cutting him off. "I'd like to interrupt you now..." Charm
I'm an African-American, and I agree with what DeSantis did. Based on what Robin is saying, I can tell that the curriculum pretty much diminishes black men and their contributions to our history, while pushing black feminists and LGBT issues.
So, I think the whole woke thing is a political chew toy. it's divisive and ultimately not the point. On the other hand, Norman's analysis seems spot on concerning the biases of the people creating any curriculum. And I definitely can't fault his list of issues not included in the curriculum that should be. I don't think either of the two who defended the curriculum managed to dent Norman's basic criticism.
All in all, I'd have to give this one to Norman.
That’s literally all it is..a distraction to keep people from understanding who the real enemy is.
The democrats LOVE arguing with desantis about this stuff so that the can continue to bend over the working class and bang them every single day
Don't forget the others came across as juvenile or elitist. He disrespected Norman for no reason, like an upset child, and she randomly went on an elitist rant attacking the intellect of prisoners.
@@nowayjosedaniel People often confuse authority with expertise. Norman demonstrated expertise... the other two rested on authority.
One o the main problems we have in the USA is our "empty" authority. Our country does so few things that are informed by merit and character.
@@blogintonblakley2708 This is sadly so very, very true.
Actually, Kelley was not defending the curricuulum. He criticised it for not being based on the contributions of women.
I'm a simple man. I see Norman, I click on video. (nd katie ofc)
Best intro on RUclips‼️👏😂👏
Sounds like you need to 'calm down, man!' 😁
"Ill burn that bridge when i get to it" was coined by my friend bob 30 years ago.
Nice one Bob 👍
Just bought his tome of a book. One hour in and loving it, especially the preamble at the beginning.
Until we can recognize our faults, we can never transcend them. China has a beautiful "one world" vision, while we have no vision at all !
Bravo Norman. Sharp as a tack. Good discussion all around.
'Woke', the very word brings my brain to a halt. I think we need to go over the etymology before we start using it in critiques.
First for Norm
I have absolutely no idea what discussion was about, as it sounded like three different people addressing three different topics concerning an black studies curriculum in Florida (I presume, from the mentioning of DeSantis).
That's bc after Norman spoke, the other two were incoherent and just ignored everything he said.
But only after the woman showed us how elitist she is by insulting prisoners and the man showed us how he knew he was losing the argument by disrespecting Norman.
Didn't hear the whole interview, only this excerpt. But it might come across as if Finkelstein is singling out this African-American history (or studies?) curriculum for criticism to the exclusion of so much else in academia. I listened to his comments, and my reaction was: but hasn't there been a trendy emphasis on 'the cultural' across the history profession in recent decades, not just African American history? And in what academic discipline is bourgeois / professional-managerial bias not a problem these days?
But in fairness, I would expect that in his latest book, he does connect the kind of criticisms he's making of this curriculum here to broader critiques of the academy. Again, it just doesn't really come across that way in this segment.
It's fascinating how Norm gets this 100% right, and also has no idea what "woke" means. Folks should learn the very Black origins of the term.
He does know what woke means.
You're the one out of touch here.
You can't create your own personal definition of a term and then get all butthurt when 99% of society uses the version they already created.
It doesnt matter if your definition is based on older usage of the word dating back further.
Words are just symbols used to convey ideas. The term Woke has 1000+ meanings and they are all correct.
Don't be so salty. (And no, that comment isnt about your iodine levels).
Even The Term "Woke" is a peversion of expressions like "Satori" or "Nirvana" or "Hetep" etc.
I have no idea what he means by too woke in this context
It's obfuscating more important learning with content serving an agenda which doesn't help people materially.
@@busessuck1o usually I just think of woke as like a right wing slur against liberals generally. But I mean is there any practical purpose to taking African American studies like does any of that information help anyone materially. I feel like at it's core it's a woke class you can't change that really. Despite all that I think it's a perfectly fine class and if someone wants to learn it they should be able to. Desantis is an idiot
Then re-listen to what he actually said. He is perhaps the clearest speaker in the world, so unless you didnt listen I have no idea how you didnt get what he was saying.
Middle class, PMC, garbage focusing on the abstract symbolic concerns rather then the material conditions working class black folks face.
When more course material is dedicated to hair texture than to housing policy
Culture is part of history too. It can be religion poems etc. Sometimes songs can be an important historical source of information. This course seems to try and cover a huge territory. When the breadth is so broad the ecominc history of people who cannot work is left out.
Norman was so reasonable !
Finkelstein really behaved himself so proud of him lmao
Was Martin King middle class? Yet, he focused on education,housing, class struggle and poverty. what was the Chicago freedom movement about? Fair and equal housing. I agree with Norman. As Rosa Luxemberg said that working class people must organize working class people. This needs to be class struggle. DeSantis is a diversion away from what needs to be discussed. Class struggle.
Wow, really disturbing how that woman equates the working class with prisoners????? WTF
It's African studies. Not a study of current trends (of African American thought) within establishment circles.
I have enormous respect for Prof Finklestein, but his use of the word "woke" does nothing to further his argument, but rather belittles him. I find myself completely turned off from the entire conversation as a result. He could have articulated his critique in a much more eloquent and engaging manner, which is what he is known for.
He's not my favorite communicator either, but the use of a single word--one that, no matter your expertise or opinion, clearly suffers from social/political ambiguity, manipulation, and semantic abuse in this moment--should not deter you from seeing his larger point. To me, it seemed he was alluding to a whole side argument, and reminding the other three left-wing people in the room that there is also a right-wing half of the country. Even his voice is painful for me, but that did not stop me from agreeing with him here
His usage of the term Woke was perfect here.
You are just triggered.
It's just a term, but my money would be on him using it correctly while you likely use a poor definition not reflective of most usage in this context.
Woke is seeing the world through the ideological lens of intersectionality. It is Victocracy.
Evidently, the curriculum didn't represent the slave trade accurately. Before Transatlantic slave trade, and DURING, African tribal leaders were conquering weaker tribes and enslaving them.
Also, facilitating European slave trade and benefiting financially from it. I agree with Norm with his point about exclusion of important people and phenomena.
This is kind of a dumb discussion.
The issue regarding course content is secondary here. The primary issue is the intrusion of public officials whose job has nothing to do with the writing of curriculum interfering inappropriately in the educational system for purely political reasons.
American students don’t get enough history to have a very solid grasp on anything other than the most basic and fundamental aspects of any given historical period. Whenever these sorts of discussions take place it always gets down to personal views of what should or shouldn’t be included which is a dead end and quite u productive. There needs to be a recognition that we need to to have significantly greater time given to history in American public education from K-Graduate school. One could spend an entire career solely on the importance of just the slave trade, just black women, just reconstruction, just Jim Crow, just on the daily life of ordinary black families from 1619-present. History is an enormous and endlessly complex, interesting subject that takes in all of human experience. We should all get behind more history, lots more history for all students at every level because the truth is students are not well served by the paltry survey of history-even in AP classes that is presented in this country. There is enormous ignorance on both the left and right about the history of this country and the world. More history!!
All the comments are interesting, but it really feels like these people are talking past one another instead of engaging a common point - I think more clarification was maybe needed beforehand re what exactly the question was to be addressed - what is being decided here
Re: Geniuses in Prison. I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
The criminal justice system doesn't target any race at all. It targets males and the poor. The racial bias is almost non-existent. And the average IQ of those in prison is 90. Much lower for blacks. There aren't many black geniuses in prison. Stop being ridiculous.
Meanwhile, blacks are dominating every sport in existence. Stop with the identity politics nonsense. It's all class.
The fact you didn't one in your polemic mention MEN is hilarious. And illustrates the absurdity of identity politics and your biases. 90% of the prison population is male. And studies examining potential biases in the criminal justice system suggest the sex bias is magnitudes higher than the race bias. But in neoliberal identity politics land, males cannot be a victim group, can they? Only women can.
I agree entirely as someone who has taught regularly in the prison system. What I will add is this: I interpreted Norman's comment as: the blindness of someone who is not considering class issues and who has never been involved in any concrete struggles (so as to know they don't happen in generalizing terms like "black power") could have written that curriculum. I would also add: the people who run Collegeboard, as I've had the unfortunate reality of meeting some, are lifelong private schoolers from the utmost wealth and they are the ones making the final decisions.
The lady in the green shirt correlated black working class people with prisons.. let that sink in for a minute..
Finkelstein always well read and sees the full picture
what a rich conversation, thanks Katie!
So I guess she doesn’t think that Mumia couldn’t write a chapter or two…..I would beg to differ on that one as imagine many would. How elitist. Can’t even imagine how many brilliant people are behind bars. That’s part of the curriculum that should be explored
I was not being condescending. I was telling the truth. People who understand and are appalled by mass incarceration since 1980 know what I meant. In 1980 the U. S. prison population was around 500,000. Today it is around 2,000,000 people, one of the highest in the world. Because of poverty, racism, and a legal system that disproportionately targets poor people of color, many of the most talented individuals in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities end up being incarcerated. The school to prison pipeline, three strikes and you’re out, and cash bail are a few examples of how mass incarceration is perpetuated. As someone who has worked on issues of criminal injustice since the 1970s, I meant what I said. There are some highly intelligent people inside who would be fully capable of designing African American Studies curricula, especially if their intellectual gifts had been nurtured instead of ignored. Norman was upset that middle class academics created the A. P. African American Studies course outline. I pointed out that the system was not seeking the input of poor and working class people to create such courses and that a disproportionately large number of poor and working class Black people are in fact imprisoned.
Why can't the left walk and chew gum at the same time? Finklestein is a solid guy but he’s missing the point and not reading the room. This is Robin Kelley and Barbara Freakin Smith. This is Hammer and Hoe and the Combahee River Collective. The point is that they are not defending the curriculum, its about framing and critiquing what they removed. Robin Kelley advised Barbara Ransby who wrote the greatest book on Ella Baker. Finklestein should know this and it should inform his critique in an effort to have a more generative conversation and exchange. Also, Finklestein has ceded over the term Woke to the right. Woke is a progressive term that has a long history in the Black Freedom Movement. Finklestein began by conceding his ignorance when it came to Black Studies, but his misguided and counter-productive critique did not reflect that he really believed what he opened with. He should have asked questions and just listened. That was embarrassing. Free Palestine 🇵🇸 And before ya’ll come for me I own four of his books and he is my go to guy on Gaza!
I’m so sick of hearing about “black history”, “women’s history”, “gay history”, etc..
I confess to detesting Norman Finkelstein because of his irrational hatred for Israel, which leads him to say such things as Hamas being guilty of no more than using "fireworks" in its terror rocket attacks from Gaza. It startles me, therefore, yo find myself unwillingly agreeing with his points here. While he comes from a traditional left wing perspective, that’s not a crime when it means he is interested in the American working class, their issues of labor, housing, health, and the like. His critique on wokeness is quite cutting, he’s really accurate as to how condescending and ideologically trite it is.
I may not agree with his class based notions, but he’s right that wokeness has done a great disservice to the traditional debate between appreciating traditional American foundational thought (a conservative approach) and those seeking reforms at the expense of those traditions (left ideas). Woke undermines the rational debate between these two positions by radically changing both substance and style of the interchange.
Damn. Finkelstein shredded these people. ❤❤❤
But if women had not done any thing in taht field how can one put there names in book
Norman "Burn Everything" Finkelstein
Not a good idea to quibble with Norman. “Studies” means social construction according to the pov of the author. Totally ahistorical curriculum.
Why bring up DeSantis though.
"The genuises in prison"?! Is she really being sarcastic there? Is she that much of a snob?
Katie, you are starting to sound as though you have things people want to hear. I am sure many of them would want to read it
I have no idea why Finkelstein is speaking on this subject to be honest. He really should stick to Israel's apartheid and torturous treatment of Palestinians. His views & opinions are not helping here. He is only holding water for the conservative & right wing views.
He is arguing that this new currciula/curriculm is not substantive.
@@MrWhiskeycricket I’m all for organic wokeness. The only problem I see is with politicians who play identity politics and that’s only a problem because words without actions ends up being hypocrisy
@@wnnfrhrw4452 I’d have to relisten to defuse you but if my memory serves right, what he said on these subjects was utter bullshit. There are many people who are insightful and great on one subject but awful on others. Finkelstein has struck me as one of those.
@@standingalone001
Actually, he mentions that this new curricula is not substantive [e.g., Uninformed by Sound, Comprehensive Reasoning; Not Practicable; Uniformed by The Plight by Working-Class; etc. ---------> Elitist].
@@wnnfrhrw4452 When I have some time, I’ll give it another listen.
Simpin
Barbara Smith and Robin D. G. Kelley, brilliant analysis, brilliant push-back.
Was it?
@@priceandpride No.
No objective person would think this. Their rebuttals were incoherent and didnt even address Norman's argument.
Their statements just made them look bad. Especially the woman, whose gross elitist rant makes you want to get a prisoner to spit on her for being such a pretentious snob.
I'd love for Katie to have corrected her about prison intellect, citing Chris Hedges or MLK in Birmingham.
Norm is a brilliant and dedicated man I've always admired and read, but his old fuddy-duddy obsession with 'woke' that he clearly doesn't understand is not helpful.
It's more the diminishment of class consciousness that irks him
But he does understand it. You just get triggered when people tell you that you're wrong.
You know you're wrong, dont you?
All curriculum is written by the middle class. I don't know why leftists like Norm think we'd have to ask the janitor for input, but if any demographic would be open to input from the janitor it would be Black people. Norm has PhD brain. He's thinking about a PhD seminar when the subject is a freshman survey course. That gets back to the middle class writing the curriculum. A curriculum writing team, I've been on several, is composed of experts in pedagogy and assessment working with subject matter experts. We make less than everybody in this video.
Imagine thinking people with PhDs are less qualified than those without... Class analysis/interpretation of history and literature is not a PhD-level topic; it's no more complex than racial or gender critical techniques. It shouldn't matter which class is writing the curriculum, as long as it accurately reflects the nature and magnitude of problems relevant to the topic of the course. If we're talking about qualifications, I have three degrees in the arts, and from my cultural perspective, a course with that little attention on economic/class matters would not appropriately cover even a cultural history course, let alone a broader course with sociological elements. To the extent that there were SMEs on the curriculum board in this case, they should not have included cultural experts alone, but also political scientists, lawyers, sociologists, economists, doctors, and even environmental scientists whose research focuses on the African American community, in order to represent the full suite of disparities across civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights. And by including this broader array of topics, curricula might become more of the survey course you're talking about because there would be no time or opportunity to go further in depth.
It wouldn't be a problem if the curriculum coming out of universities that is supposed to address social inequality didn't reek of class blindness and prejudice.
Elitist professors may not be getting paid ruling class bucks, but they certainly see themselves as part of the rich elite. Dat Ego.
@@2001abassodysseyUnfortunately, the knowledge producing institutions are corrupted by wokeism. I wouldn’t trust what a PhD in the ‘soft sciences’ had to say by their credentials alone.
@@katelyn9677Curriculum is not meant to produce solutions but to give people the ability to find solutions. If they’re producing the solutions in the curriculum, it is most certainly a politically biased endeavor.
I looked over that curriculum and it definitely didn't seem egregiously woke to me... it covered, what I consider to be most of the major, mainstream eras of African American US history and you literally cannot tell that story without at least mentioning aspects of the Civil Rights Movement that remain contentious (aka Malcom X, black nationalism) and the emergence of disciplines like critical race theory, and contemporary works and movements. So yeah, if one were to design a truly "woke" AA studies curiculum, it would look a whole lot different. This is fairly middle of the road, similar in its substance to what you'd get at any university, and I thought that's what the whole point of AP classes were--to give kids a taste of the college experience while in highschool.
Except most colleges are poisoned by woke ideology now. It’s not scientific and it doesn’t survive open scrutiny/the process of free inquiry. It’s protected material, which is the nature of ideological capture.
Why are Indians from India the most successful people in America and any other country?
Never seen Norm so old man yells at cloud.
@@profd65 To paraphrase: I’ve never seen Norm mirror the “Old man yells at cloud” meme from The Simpsons so well.
I've been saying this. Fucking language evolves Norm. Take a nap.
@@matttriano lol, what a total non sequitur.
LOL
Norm actually reading academic papers all day and they're all about nappy hair and shit whilst the planet and global society is on the brink of collapse
Finkelstein is incredibly cringe here
Get back in your cradle kid.
Very
What's cringe about what he said? Can you people ever be specific about anything, and be able to describe what you're saying? Or are people just supposed to interpret your feelings in the way you want them to be interpreted through magic?
@@villageidiot8661 dont do a 'you people' and expect a generous response back from me
neverthless, i'll tell you why it was cringe. the whole start of his talk really. he's all like, 'lets have a nice fair reasoned discussion. lets try to have an honest conversation and not just bromides and feel good, and to really engage with each other.' the type of bull shit vague appeal to rationality and civility that those like D.G. Kelley rightfully critique. For being a critic of left moralism, Finkelstein sure does his own kind of moralism, thinking he's better than people cuz he wants to talk 'reasonably.' its virtue signaling as fuck.
not to mention him just generally taking up a lot of time talking, always jumping in to challenge Kellley without giving him the equal amount of space/time that he has with his long winded talking points that Kelley has undoubtedly heard before
This was frustrating to watch cuz you can tell that norman just doesnt get it. I even quedtion why he was brought on.
Also, can we please stop giving non+black people who have not done the work(which norman stared he hadn't) thw space to debate black people on black issue? Like i just feel that should be a bare minimum. Next time invite a non-black person who has actually done the work
Bayard Rustin was a fed