CHAPTER 6
APPLIED EPISTEMOLOGY:
INCREASING THE HISTORICAL AWARENESS
OF AFRICAN AMERICAN YOUTHS

It is imperative that people understand their ontological and historical existence in order to reach their fullest potential, argues Paulo Freire (1970:52). He posits that provided with the proper tools, humans can perceive gradually their personal and social realities as well as the contradictions in them, and critically transform their lives. This chapter highlights a process of increasing the consciousness of African American youths in St. Petersburg through Project La Churasano (Churasano means culture in Mandinka). It recounts how the social history of the community was reconstituted and transmitted to adolescents. This discussion includes a context and a rationale for this aspect of the research by particularly emphasizing the crisis of drugs in the community and the desegregation of the schools.

This applied research project sought to achieve three goals. One was to help African American youths to understand the social contexts that shape them and the life of their communities. The second intent was to give students opportunities to assess critically the development of their neighborhoods from 1920 to 1990. The third purpose was to stimulate students to transcend the barriers of race and to take proactive roles in their futures. It was anticipated that an exploration of their cosmologies, historical origins, and social and economic policies which mold their existence would help students to negotiate structural barriers which restrict their lives.

A Contextual Framework

In 1985, the city of St. Petersburg dismantled the oldest neighborhoods in the African American community and African Americans found themselves in another cauldron -- crack cocaine. Some of their teenagers began to use this drug and became entwined in the violence associated with it. Two thirds of youths involved in a study sponsored by the Juvenile Welfare Board of Pinellas county reported that they had killed or harmed someone through their association with cocaine (Dembo 1989:14). Since the mid 1980s drive-by shootings and open drug deals have become common place on many streets in the African American community.

Research shows that the use of crack is significantly linked to the economy of St. Petersburg. Richard Dembo (1989), a criminologist at the University of South Florida, conducted a study of youths who were involved in drugs and lived in Laurel Park and Jordan Park. He found that they were attracted to crack because of its financial rewards. Some of these teenagers reported making more than $600 a day as drug dealers (Dembo 1989:19). Almost 70 percent of the youths who sold cocaine reported that they dealt the substance initially, and later began using it (Dembo 1989:12). Dembo (1989:14) reports that African American males sold cocaine because they desired to earn lots of money and the jobs available to them paid too little.

Many of the leaders in the community have argued that poverty and the limited availability of jobs for African American youths are insufficient reasons to become involved in drugs. They suggest that a depressed job market has been a consistent problem for African Americans. However, prior generations sought more culturally acceptable measures to make a living. News articles in the St. Petersburg Times (9.1.58) show that bolita and alcohol were sold illegally during previous eras. However, community members are quick to argue that children were not involved in these trades. Reverend Garrett posits that those youths who have chosen drugs as an option are divorced from the "traditional values" of their community (Peterman 8.13.91). Therefore, prevention groups have been organized to instill the values of the community into African American youths.

In 1986, Blacks Against Dangerous Drugs (BADD) became an organized entity of concerned citizens. Initially, the members of this grassroots organization marched through the streets in order to drive drug dealers out of the community. Later the group incorporated and founded a treatment center for drug addicts and established prevention programs for African American youths. BADD began to train elementary and middle school students to resist drugs.

Positive Arrangements for Interpersonal Role Models (PAIRS) another program also adopted this philosophy. Wilkins Garrett, the pastor of Mount Zion Church and director of PAIRS matched males between the ages of 11 and 17 years with adult males, taught them economic principles, and introduced them to the Junior Achievement Program (Peterman 8. 31. 91). He suggested that the goal of the program is to help the students to acquire a sense of self and responsibility.

Many African Americans have blamed school desegregation for the drug crisis among the youths. African American students are suspended disproportionately and a significant percentage have dropped out of school. Dembo (1989:10) discovered that 56 percent of the school-aged youths who sold drugs had dropped out of school. Many of this study's informants contend that a lack of sensitivity to the cultural heritage of African American students is shown in the schools. Howard Hinesley, superintendent of Pinellas county schools acknowledges that "whites do not have as good an understanding or appreciation for difference in culture and respect for the history of the African Americans" (Peterman 6.23.92). Peggy Peterman (12.15.89), a columnist for the St. Petersburg Times writes that it is common knowledge that Black youngsters are burdened by integration.

A "bi-racial" task force comprised of prominent African American and White community leaders has suggested some of these problems may be solved by transmitting knowledge of African American culture and history to African American youths. In 1992, this body requested that Gibbs High become a magnet school with a curriculum that focuses on African American cosmology. This self-appointed task force of doctors, retired teachers, business persons and community leaders also suggested that court ordered busing be rescinded. (The local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People disagreed with the proposal). African Americans who advanced the proposal argue that desegregation disrupted the traditional role of African American teachers and schools -- of instilling pride and a sense of place in the community to African American children. Hence, they assert that the displacement of African American youths in the school made them vulnerable to social maladies such as pushing drugs.

During the past ten years many African Americans have fought for some form of resegregation. They contend that desegregation left them without a universal medium for transferring their indigenous epistemology to their children. African Americans are seeking permission to enculturate their children from the school board -- the agency they accused of damaging their youths. Twenty years after desegregation, African Americans are trying to regain control of their youth and find a mechanism for inoculating them against assimilating non-productive values.

Program Description

In this environment project La Churasano was created. It was directed at youths between ages 11 and 17 years old. Two four-week classes which addressed African American migration, rapping and preaching, the Civil Rights movement, the Sanitation Strike of 1968, and the city's urban policies toward African American neighborhoods were offered to middle and high school students. The adolescents were grouped by two cohorts -- fourteen and younger and fifteen and older.

Students were recruited through local Black culture clubs, teachers, newspaper articles, and community service agencies. The sessions were free but students had to register with their parents' permissions. Group attendance was open and voluntary. An average of six students attended each group.

Classes were held two times a week. Students met on Thursdays, and Saturdays. Thursday classes lasted for two hours, while on Saturdays the group met for three hours, because field trips were taken often. Therefore, students met for 5 hours each week for a total exposure of 20 hours.

Prevention: A Process Of Discovering Our Realities

Distinct characteristics emerged between the two groups of students. The initial group consisted of six students. These five males and one female routinely came to the library and the Enoch Davis center after school, primarily because their parents were working. They ranged from ages 11 to 12. Two of the students were enrolled in classes for "emotionally handicapped." All of the students were from working- and lower-middle-class families. Two of the students' parents were college educated. Most of these students were encouraged to attend by their parents.

The second group of students was also from working- and middle-class families. However, they lived outside of the immediate environs of the center. The majority of these students' parents had either high school diplomas or college training. The average student in this group was 15 years old with a parttime job. All of the students except three were members of a Black culture club. One student's family had migrated from Jamaica. Families of the other students relocated from other parts of Florida and Georgia decades earlier.

Many of the high-school students were involved in other activities. One was the president of her student body and the Black culture club. She and three other group members also sang in a school choir. This particular student even had a part-time job. Another senior was a writer for her school newspaper and participated in an annual city-wide Black History month pageant. Three males attended. Each of them played school sports and had part-time jobs. One of the males also attended a leadership training for high-school students at Eckerd College. Their participation in the classes was motivated by their interest in Black history.

The age differences between the groups helped to differentiate their attitudes towards the project. The younger students frequently saw African Americans in pejorative terms, while the older students sought to know more about their ancestry.

The project began with the younger students. They seriously challenged the project format and resisted any attempts that linked their identities to Africa. The task of encouraging these African American students seemed quite formidable. They were poorly informed about the history of African Americans but well inculcated into the stereotypical images which are portrayed of them. Disregarding their blackness and Africanness, the students made negative comments about blacks and Africans,.

The students perceived their African heritage to be alien and derogatory. During a session concerning the historical origins of African Americans, there was a consensus that their families did not come from Africa. James2, a rather outspoken young man, indignantly said, "I didn't come from no Africa. Africans ain't got no sense. They don't even have sense enough to put on clothes!" I used maps, drums, baskets and other cultural artifacts from Africa to show their connections with African Americans.

Their body language suggested that they did not believe any of the information. The children nervously giggled at such ideas. Their disbelief was confirmed when James, who seemed to speak for the others, said, "Next she is going to tell us that Jesus was black!" It seemed impossible for them to consider that such "primitive people" as Africans were a part of their ancestry.

The students were questioned concerning the source of their beliefs and attitudes about Africans. They said that these things were shown on television. I asked, if they believed everything they saw on television. In unison they replied, "Yes!" They offered the violence in their neighborhoods as an example. They rationalized that what they saw on television news was not too different from what they saw in their neighborhoods. They argued that blacks were always robbing, killing each other and doing drugs in their neighborhood just like on television. I countered their examples with models of people in the community who were not engaged in violence. Nevertheless, the students reasoned that if the information was not true, it would not have been shown on television.

Later during the session, I pursued James' comment about the color of Jesus. I anticipated that such examination would help the students understand that race was socially constructed. The students were instructed to locate on the map the place Jesus was born. I asked them if they thought Jesus was "black" or "white." Each of the four students attending that day said, "White!" I suggested that people from that region of the world most often referred to themselves as Jewish or Arabic. Again, I pursued the question and asked them if they considered color to mean the same thing in the area where Jesus was born as it did in the United States? No answers were given.

I was curious to know what motivated the students to see Jesus as "white." I inquired how they reached such conclusion. The students acted as if they could not believe that I was asking this question. James said, "All you have to do is look at his picture over the pulpit in the churches." Their observations were true. In the majority of the African American churches in St. Petersburg, Jesus was drawn with long blond hair and with Nordic features. For them, the church was the final word of truth.

My analyses confronted their realities I perceived that I was not only defying their beliefs but also the teachings of the church. Therefore, I was treading in dangerous waters. The students regard the church to be above reproach along with the television. This problem could not be resolved in one class session, I concluded.

It was difficult to discuss the history of African Americans in St. Petersburg without providing background information concerning the larger African American struggles. For example, students knew Martin Luther King, but their knowledge of him and his role in the Civil Rights movement was largely unknown. Therefore, I included the "Eyes on the Prize" series and other documentaries to provide context and content.

Toward the end of the four-week session a shift in James' attitude was observed. Before class one day, he told me that he hoped to be an engineer. He wondered if I had any books about Black scientists that he could read. The following session, I gave him a list of black inventors and a copy of Van Sertima's (1990) Blacks in Science. This author traces African scientific innovation from 2,000 B.C. to African Americans who are present-day nuclear scientists. Although Van Sertima's (1990) work is somewhat advanced, James read some excerpts. While discussing the book, he wondered how was it possible for early Africans to know about astronomy and build pyramids. His question seemed more of wonderment than inferring the impossibility of such feats existing among Africans.

During another session on the sixties, the younger students raised serious questions. The class included a video presentation about the student rebellion at Howard University, Mohammed Ali's fight against the draft board and a guest speaker. The speaker discussed his experience as a student protector at Florida A & M University during that period. The relationship between the striking students and the police was a concern of the students. They wanted to know how Ali was able to resolve his troubles with the draft. The sixties, however, seemed like ancient history to those youths. "How was it back in those days?," they would say. They seemingly realized that these struggles were a part of their parents' realities but not theirs.

The second series of classes with the older adolescents were strikingly different from the first group. These students were willing to analyze the African American community and its relationship with the larger community. They also perceived that structural barriers affected their lives. Naturally, they were more mature than the younger group.

The perceptiveness of the older students was shown during the first session. These youths were given the responsibility of video taping interviews with each other. The goal of the session was to help the students to become acquainted with each other. They were instructed to question their counterparts about some aspects of their culture and their families. The students chose to explore family backgrounds, family rules about dating, sex, education and career goals.

Inquiry into the Jamaican student's family's attitude about pregnancy generated a cross-cultural perspective concerning the rearing of young women. Melody was asked if her mother consistently warned her not to get pregnant and stay in school. She informed the group members that in her culture, it was not automatically assumed that a teenage girl would get pregnant. She reported that her mother emphasized education. She reasoned that her mother never doubted that she and her sister would attend college. The experiences of the four girls who had grown up in St. Petersburg were contrasted. These girls unanimously stated that their mothers continually warned them against getting pregnant. Their mothers feared that they would have children before finishing school. Thus the admonishment not to get pregnant was stronger than the advice to get an education. I asked the students to consider which factors may have shaped these different cultural responses. Students from both cultures agreed that economics play a key role in these approaches. The Jamaican student and the local students suggested that women were expected to be able to take care of themselves. Their analyses implied that these different African cultures were motivated by the same goal even if their methods were different.

A class on the African Diaspora and the origins of African Americans gave students a greater understanding of the relationship between AfroCaribbean people and African Americans. Although these African American students understood and accepted that African Americans came from Africa, neither of them considered that many Jamaicans and people from the Caribbean were of African descent. They concluded that the slave experience was unique to blacks in the United States. They thought that Afro-Caribbean were indigenous to that area. African Americans students born in the United States wondered, why, if Caribbean blacks came from Africa originally, did people from the Islands act as if they were better than African Americans. The local students seemed to infer that if people from the Caribbean had similar histories as African Americans, then their status was the same as blacks in the United States. Such comparison of African Americans with Afro-Caribbean was framed in the context of race and competition between "Island blacks" and "blacks in the United States." Students were asked to consider how these groups were pitted against each other and stereotyped in this country. They offered the Haitian and Cuban refugees as examples. The group suggested that race was the predominant factor that prevented Haitians from being accepted in the United States. Tanya, the student body president, reminded the group that the Haitians were further stereotyped as having AIDS. Tanyaspeaking of Afro-Caribbean people, said, "They, ain't no better than us." She implied that race was also a burden for Afro-Caribbean people in this country.

A salient issue during these discussions was: "Why no one told us about these things before?" This question led to a discourse about the roles of schools in their education. Students disappointedly expressed that their schools never addressed the origins of African Americans. "They only talk about slavery," Jamal (pseudonym), a high school junior student mocked.

This student argued that when he sought to introduce an African American perspective in the class he encountered difficulties. Jamal described a teacher's response to a paper he wrote on Malcolm X. He contended that the teacher criticized him for writing about Malcolm X. The teacher allegedly told Jamal that Malcolm X was a racist and a radical who hated white people. Also, he argued that many people feared Malcolm X. The student tried to explain to the teacher that the image was a misconception that had been portrayed by the media. The teacher prevailed nevertheless. Jamal commented that he would continue to read but keep his ideas to himself. This African American student perceived the school environment to be restrictive rather than nurturing.

He further pointed out that the African American students at his school did not embrace the idea of a Black culture club. His school, located in an ethnically-mixed upper-middle-class neighborhood, has been unable thus far to organize a Black culture club, although several attempts had been made. He reasoned that the black students were too busy "being white" and assimilating into the dominant middle-class culture of the school. Jamal felt that students were too embarrassed to join a black culture club. Agreement with his observations concerning the club was later expressed by one of the counselors at the school.

By contrast, the other students in the group attended the historically all Black Gibbs high school, and they were members of the Black culture club. African Americans now comprise 25 percent of the student body and the school has a Black culture club. The Black culture club is an organ that African American students have used since desegregation to counter alienation, assert their collective presence, and provide a sense of belonging. The Gibbs students expressed that the Black culture club gave them opportunities to discuss issues concerning their history and community which otherwise may not be discussed in the classroom. They felt that this venue provided a safe haven for their thoughts. The Gibbs students indicated that their history teacher was instrumental in helping them to organize and sustain the club.

The students recognized that this teacher, who had spent his entire professional career at Gibbs, was their advocate in the system. They bragged to the other students that he developed and taught a course on African American history after Reconstruction in the winter term 1991. They compared him with other teachers and suggested that he actually understood them. This teacher also encouraged these students to attend my program.

The community-based program and Mr. Solomon's (pseudonym) guidance were mutually supportive. My program allowed students to localize the information they learned in their classes and clubs.

The students were given opportunities to investigate the consequences of the displacement of the Laurel Park community by urban redevelopment. A field trip was taken to the site of the Florida Suncoast Dome. The students were charged to video tape the area and to interview residents and the remaining business owners to determine how these persons felt about the removal of the community.

Before interviewing the community members, the students had the chance to discuss the politics of hazardous materials and poor communities. Our arrival at the site was welcomed by a red ribbon that warned: Danger Asbestos. The cordoned off plot of land was the site of a future parking lot for the Suncoast Dome. The students had many questions. They wondered if the workers had been sufficiently protected while they removed the asbestos. If the St. Petersburg Housing Authority knew that Laurel Park complex which it owned, had asbestos, why did the agency allow people to live there, they asked. Were the remaining residents and businesses informed that Laurel Park had asbestos when the demolition occurred. Not all of the students' questions were answered. However, a business owner told us that he had not been informed prior to the demolition that harmful substances were at the complex.

Adjacent to area where the housing complex once stood, remained six homes, one five-unit apartment building, and two businesses. One store was owned by a Vietnamese family and the other by an African American man.

Interviews with the remaining residents and store owners showed that urban policies can disrupt peoples' lives even if they are not required to move. The residents and the storekeepers expressed a sense of loss over the dismantling of their community. The residents of Laurel Park had been a source of income to the store owners. They were barely able to break even without this revenue. The African American owner told the students that he now supplemented his income by selling parking spaces on his property when events were held at the Dome. He acknowledged that activities did not occur often. Two of the remaining residents said that the neighborhood had little choice in determining the course of events. One gentleman who appeared to be in his late thirties suggested that the city viewed the area as a crime-ridden eyesore. Another homeowner in her mid-sixties informed the students that she had lived in her home for over twenty years. However, she said that the current chaos had led her to decide to return to Georgia.

These direct encounters increased students' awareness concerning the ethics of urban redevelopment and policies. As the group was leaving the neighborhood, Sam, a junior who had been videotaping the scene, excitedly turned to the rest of us while pointing at the huge columns that supported the interstate exchange above. "This is not the first time this community has been torn up. Look, at how this place has been cut- up by the interstate," he said. Other students surmised that the city had targeted this community a decade earlier and the latest removal was another aspect of its plan to remove African Americans from the area. Sam concluded that it was not possible for the city to build a stadium across from this community and allow the people to stay there. He and other students argued that the presence of Laurel Park would have discouraged Whites from coming to the area. Hence, the students realized that not all of the goals of urban policies are explicitly expressed.

"How could the black community let this happen?" asked Tanya, president of the Black culture club. There was an overwhelming consensus among the students that poverty and image were directly linked to the dislocation of the Laurel Park residents. Sean, a junior suggested that if the residents had not been poor, they would not have been removed. Tomeka, a senior perceived that the black community did not support the Laurel Park residents because of its image as a housing project. It was home to "welfare mothers and their children". The students inferred that the "black leaders" also felt that Laurel Park was a blot on the black community's image. Therefore, they did not fight its removal. This discussion helped students to understand that in this case, the divided views of the community concerning Laurel Park and an imposed stigma contributed to their removal.

Kari reminded the students that the director of the St. Petersburg Housing Authority was a "black man" and he played an instrumental role in removing the residents by selling the building to the city. This statement led the students to question the director's allegiance. The students believed that the director should have done more to prevent the removal of the residents rather than contributing to their dislocation. The director's behavior was not so unusual suggested the students. "Blacks in high positions often forget where they came from." Through the students eyes, the director's role seemed straight-forward. They felt he should have supported the residents of Laurel Park rather than selling their home to the city.