YOUR RESERVATION FOR THE FEBRUARY PUBLIC FORUM HAS BEEN RECEIVED
USE THE ​LEARNING RESOURCES ON THIS PAGE TO PREPARE FOR OUR MARCH 3RD DISCUSSION
2018 FEBRUARY PUBLIC FORUM
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES AND UNEQUAL EXPERIENCES
Saturday, MARCH 3rd, 1pm to 4pm | Herndon Library: 4324 E. Colonial Drive 32803
Today, people are living closer together than ever before. Societies and cities are increasingly more diverse. Cultures that once were distant from each other are now only a short distance away or even in the house next door. We are so close that we can watch each other's movies and TV shows, listen to each other's music, wear each other's fashions, and eat eat other's cuisine. For some, this brings forth an excitement to meet people with different backgrounds, different perspectives, and different life experiences. For others, it brings forth fear and animosity.

Considering the technology we have to travel to the back side of the globe in a single day or video chat with 12 or more people who are in completely separate countries, isn't now the best time ever for us to respect and celebrate our differences, acknowledge our shared histories, and recognize the disparity in experience among us? Or, instead, is it a time to strengthen the barriers between us?
USE THE ​LEARNING RESOURCES ON THIS PAGE TO PREPARE FOR OUR MARCH 3RD DISCUSSION
LEARNING RESOURCES
RUBY'S STORY
Ruby Bridges Goes to School
PBS

Ruby Bridges integrates William Frantz Elementary School
The Times-Picayune, December 2011

50 years later, I'm still trying to integrate my school
Ruby Bridges, The Washington Post, November 14, 2010
SCROLL DOWN FOR MORE LEARNING RESOURCES
THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION
FULL TEXT
What the Declaration of Independence Really Claimed
Randy Barnett, The Washington Post, July 4, 2015
FULL TEXT
The Annenberg Guide to the United States Constitution
The Annenberg Classroom
A People's History Of The United States: 1492-Present
by Howard Zinn
​Chapter 1: Columbus, The Indians, and Human Progress
Columbus’ arrival to “The New World” and the destruction experienced by tribal people for the next three centuries

Chapter 2: Drawing the Color Line
African slavery from 1602 to 1741

Chapter 3: Persons of Mean and Vile Condition
Social and economic inequality in North America prior to 1700

Chapter 4: Tyranny is Tyranny
The founding of the United States of America, a nation rooted in Enlightenment principles

Chapter 5: A Kind of Revolution
The American Revolution, the Federalist Papers, and the Constitution

Chapter 6: The Intimately Oppressed
Women and the American experience

Chapter 7: As Long As Grass Grows Or Water Runs
The experience of tribal people between the American Revolution and Civil War

Chapter 8: We Take Nothing by Conquest, Thank God
War with Mexico and the taking of Texas
Chapter 9: Slavery Without Submission, Emancipation Without Freedom
Slave rebellions and the abolition movement prior to the Civil War and the condition of freed slaves after the Civil War

​Chapter 10: The Other Civil War
Rebellions and labor strikes against wealthy landowners and industrialists between 1839 and 1877

Chapter 11: Robber Barons And Rebels
The Industrial Revolution and the strategic oppression of working men and women of all races and ethnicities between 1877 and the start of the Spanish-American War in 1898

Chapter 12: The Empire and the People
Military expansion and conquest overseas and social unrest at home from 1890 to 1902

Chapter 13: The Socialist Challenge
Anti-industrialist unrest and the rise of labor between 1902 and U.S. entry into World War I in 1917

Chapter 14: War Is the Health of the State
World War I and the end of the labor movement

Chapter 15: Self-help in Hard Times
The massive growth of wealth and the worsening condition of workers following World War I, The Great Depression, and Roosevelt’s New Deal
SCROLL DOWN FOR MORE LEARNING RESOURCES
ARTICLES
Racism is “America’s original sin”: Unless we tell the truth about our history, we’ll never find the way to reconciliation
Jim Wallis, SALON, January 18, 2016
America’s Other Original Sin
Rebecca Onion, SLATE, January 18, 2016
Statement to the media by the United Nations’ Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, on the conclusion of its official visit to USA, 19-29 January 2016
The Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, 29 January 2016
UN Issues Scathing Assessment of US Human Rights Record
Jamil Dakwar, ACLU Human Rights Program, May 15, 2015
SELECTED QUOTES
Frederick Douglass, when asked to join the commemoration of the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, 1852, at a meeting of the Rochester Anti-Slavery Sewing Society: “What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sound of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants brass fronted impudence; your shout of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanks-givings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy - a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour.”
Chief Joseph in 1879: “I only ask of the Government to be treated as all other men are treated... We ask to be recognized as men. We ask that the same law shall work alike on all men. If an Indian breaks the law, punish him by the law. If a white man breaks the law, punish him also... Let me be a free man, free to travel, free to stop, free to work, free to trade where I choose, free to choose my own teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to talk, think and act for myself -- and I will obey every law or submit to the penalty... Whenever the white man treats the Indian as they treat each other then we shall have no more wars. We shall be all alike -- brothers of one father and mother, with one sky above us and one country around us and one government for all. Then the Great Spirit Chief who rules above will smile upon this land and send rain to wash out the bloody spots made by brothers' hands upon the face of the earth. For this time the Indian race is waiting and praying. I hope no more groans of wounded men and women will ever go to the ear of the Great Spirit Chief above, and that all people may be one people.
​Isabella Beecher Hooker in 1883 at the International Council of Women meticulously moving through the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution to prove that the rights presented in those documents are meant to apply to women and men equally but are not in reality applied equally: “There can be no true manhood nor true womanhood when men rule and women merely obey. Every mother in her home, every woman teacher in our schools, is at a discount to-day because of her political subordination.”
Eugene Debs writing in 1904 in a pamphlet called “The Metal Worker” on the treatment of workers in this country: “Ten thousand times has the labor movement stumbled and fallen and bruised itself, and risen again; been seized by the throat and choked and clubbed into insensibility; enjoined by courts, assaulted by thugs, charged by the militia, shot down by regulars, traduced by the press, frowned upon by public opinion, deceived by politicians, threatened by priests, repudiated by renegades, preyed upon by grafters, infested by spies, deserted by cowards, betrayed by traitors, bled by leeches, and sold out by leaders.”
SCROLL DOWN FOR ADDITIONAL LEARNING RESOURCES
CONTENT SUBMITTED FOR WEB PAGE UPDATES
The Power of Empathy
UNESCO

Diversity, Dialogue and Sharing
UNESCO

Interculturalism at the Crossroads: comparative perspectives on concepts, policies, and practices
UNESCO

Let’s Fight Racism
United Nations UN.org

Thanksgiving Is a Tradition. It's Also a Lie: Sure, it's a tradition. So is the Confederate flag.
Tommy Orange | Common Dreams | November 23, 2017 (reprint from the Los Angeles Times)

​The Two Asian Americas
Karan Mahajan | The New Yorker | October 21, 2015

Race-Baiting for the Presidency: Candidates have long used coded language to capitalize on subtle prejudices in the electorate—but will it work in 2016?
Theodore Johnson and Leah Wright Rigueur | The Atlantic | NOV 18, 2015

What About Racism?
Keenga-Yamahtta Taylor | Jacobin | 03.16.2016

Bryan Stevenson: Ending the Politics of Fear and Anger
​Equal Justice Initiative

How Political Fear Works: A decade ago, few Americans were interested in the risks dissidents face. Trump has changed that.
Corey Robin | New Republic | February 6, 2017

The Politics of Fear: Politics come first; facts come second
Jesse Marczyk | Psychology Today | Jan 03, 2016

Bill Moyers Interviews Douglas Blackmon, author of Slavery by Another Name
Bill Moyers Journal

​How to Get Americans to Talk About Race: Start with simple questions, and establish a baseline of trust
Alexia Fernandez Campbell | The Atlantic | Sep 7, 2016
​
American Forum: Equal Justice?: A Conversation with Douglas Blackmon and Bryan Stevenson
Miller Center Foundation | YouTube Video

Southern Slavery, Unsanitized
Chris Carmichael, Samantha Quick, Neeti Upadhye | New York Times, The Daily 360 (video)

Know your history: Understanding racism in the US
A'Lelia Bundles | Al Jazeera | 15 Aug 2015​

Democratic Differences in Sentences
United States Sentencing Commission | November 2017

Inside the mind of white America
BBC News (YouTube video) | June 20, 2016

Demographic Differences in Sentencing: An Update to the 2012 Booker Report
United States Sentencing Commission

On World Day, UN agencies urge countering threats to cultural diversity
UN News Centre | 21 May 2017

‘Discrimination against one is discrimination against all,’ says UNESCO on Day for Tolerance
UN News Centre | 16 November 2017

International Coalition of Inclusive and Sustainable Cities
UNESCO

South Africa grapples with reminders of apartheid
PBS (video) | 11/10/2017

Why America is wrestling with Confederate monuments
PBS (video) | 08/25/2017

What happened to monuments to fallen regimes around the world
Jennifer Hansler and Deena Zaru | CNN | August 20, 2017

For Many Native Americans, Fall Is The Least Wonderful Time Of The Year
Savannah Maher | November 23, 2017

​How Southern socialites rewrote Civil War history
Vox (YouTube video) | Oct 25, 2017

​Arabs, Race and the Post-September 11 National Security State
Salah Hassan | MERP Middle East Research and Information Project | Spring 2017