CR# 8 — Master Narratives and the Civil Rights Movement
This week our class focused on the Civil Rights Era. Our main discussion topic was “master narratives.” These are also known as “single stories” which is another term for stereotypes. When I was in grade school and middle school, we learned all about stereotypes. We learned it was wrong to think people of whatever groupings behaved in similar fashions. We were told to not “judge a book by its cover” and to get to know individuals. I suppose “stereotype” could pertain more to an individual rather than a topic. We tend to use the term “master narrative,” when we discuss an era or event in the past rather than a person. Though master narratives of a historical person’s life are out there.
If I were to ask the average American to give me a quick rundown of George Washington; I imagine they would include the cherry tree, crossing the Delaware River, and then he becomes President; the end. To tell the life of such a great man in such a truncated and uninformed fashion does his memory a great disservice. With only the master narrative to go on, few would know of his many fantastic exploits.
Like stereotypes, single stories and master narratives are broad generalizations or summarizations of a subject or group of subjects and is often incorrect, though sometimes it has some truth to it. All of history is subject to falling under a master narrative. In some ways they are not bad as they can server as summations of a life or era. The downside is that they can cause misunderstanding. Most, if not all people rely on master narratives for the vast majority of knowledge allocated in their brains. This is why we all specialize in an area of study or professionalism. It just is not possible to know everything about everyone and everything. And you are not expected to. That is what libraries are for. They are repositories of the immense amount of knowledge developed and collected by mankind over the centuries.
Moving much more forward from President Washington, our class’s discussion on civil rights brought much information to light. We discussed redlining city districts, segregation, student bussing, and school choice. Redlining was the practice of federal agencies denying various services or goods to residents based on their race or ethnicity. This was common in major cities in the north after the Great Migration where blacks had left the southern states to live in the northern cities and out west. Redlining was where a determined section of a city map was to have a red line drawn around it. That section was regularly denied loans, mortgage insurance, and several other services to everyone withing the area. It was said that Some purposes of this activity were to keep the people within that area contained or encourage them to move to a different city. It’s argued that the effects of redlining are still felt today.
We all know what segregation is. Millions of Americans of all races fought hard to end segregation and promote equality. For decades it seemed things were improving. Lately it seems segregation has regained popularity. There are dating sites for people of certain ethnicity only. There are school clubs, scholarships, grants, and programs restricted by ethnicity and gender. These are done in the name of equality, though promote anything but. Some stores have recently begun labeling the food on their shelves by the ethnicity of the owners who provide it. Goods and services should be purchased and consumed based on quality and merit, not a person’s skin color. In the job-world, hiring in the name of diversity inherently discriminates by ethnicity or gender. Again, people should be hired based on merit. These are all disgusting practices and are counter to equality and unity. Poor people in Oakland, CA. will soon be receiving $500.00 a month, but only if they are non-white. There is not even a current fallacy of “separate but equal,” just separate. And it seems America is being divided more and more every day. This is not all at what Dr. Martin Luther King would have envisioned for the future.
We also talked about school choice which includes bussing. Due to segregation, blacks and other minorities were designated the same school. It did not matter where they children lived, if they were to go to school, they were required to go to that school. The master narrative is that blacks realized their children were receiving a poorer education than white children and wanted to have access to the same level of education. People began to organize and gather support to integrate into schools. Protests were had and this movement was met with a lot of resistance in the form of protests and violence. Eventually, through civil suits and other avenues, the schools were integrated, though resistance was felt for years to come.
In many cases, the “black” schools were just as good as all white schools, but the distance children had to travel was unreasonable. A walk to school could take hours. It also made little sense for a child to be bussed all the way across the city when they lived in close proximity to a school. Much of the master narrative is correct, however it leaves out some of the intent of the children who at the center of this. Not all of them wanted to integrate. Many were terrified of going to a school where they would be routinely persecuted and made pariahs because of these social and political movements.
Master narratives can be good when they are truthful and well-constructed. When master narratives are correct, there is not much harm in them. People know there is much more to the story. It is up to the individual whether they wish to learn more or stick with the narrative. Time plays a critical role in the accuracy of master narratives as those who lived during the era can have distorted memories or have since passed. Even in current times, master narratives can be vastly polar in opinion. We can take many mainstream cases in the past year or so and nearly every case will have at least two narratives due to politics, biases, lack of information, etc. Misconceptions are bound to happen. Cultures and times change, leaving future generations struggling to see the past in the same light as their forbearers.
