Synopses & Reviews
The prizewinning educator's brilliant meditation on the misleading way generations of children have been taught the story of Rosa Parks.
One day Rosa was tired. She sat in the front. The bus driver told her to move. She did not. He called the police. Rosa was put in jail.--from an American elementary school textbook
When National Book Award winner and bestselling author Herbert Kohl first published a reflection on how the story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery bus boycott is distorted when taught to children, Vivian Paley wrote, Kohl urges us to look beneath our smug certainties and come closer and closer to the truth.
Now, in celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of that famous moment in the history of the civil rights movement, Kohl has expanded and updated his original discussion. Beginning with a new introduction by Marian Wright Edelman, She Would Not Be Moved also includes a contribution by Cynthia Brown on Septima Clark, Virginia Durr, and Rosa Parks.
The book also includes a teacher's guide explaining how to evaluate textbooks written for young people, an extensive resource guide to educational materials about Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement, and a dozen black-and-white photographs.
Synopsis
The prizewinning educator's brilliant and timely meditation on the misleading ways in which we teach the story of Rosa ParksPublished in hardcover in the fall of 2005 shortly before Rosa Parks died, She Would Not Be Moved is a timely and important exploration of how the story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery bus boycott has been distorted when taught in schools. Hailed by the New York Times Book Review when it was first published as having "the transcendent power that allows us to see . . . alternate ways of viewing our history and understanding what is going on in our classrooms," this expanded version of Kohl's original groundbreaking discussion "deftly catalogs problems with the prevailing presentations of Parks and offers a] more historically accurate, politically pointed and age-appropriate alternative" (Chicago Tribune).
In addition to Marian Wright Edelman's introduction, She Would Not Be Moved includes an original essay by Cynthia Brown on civil rights activists Septima Clark, Virginia Durr, and Rosa Parks; a teachers' resource guide to educational materials about Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement; and an appendix explaining how to evaluate textbooks for young people about this critical period in U.S. history.
Synopsis
Published in hardcover in the fall of 2005 shortly before Rosa Parks died,
She Would Not Be Moved is a timely and important exploration of how the story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery bus boycott has been distorted when taught in schools. Hailed by the
New York Times Book Review when it was first published as having "the transcendent power that allows us to see . . . alternate ways of viewing our history and understanding what is going on in our classrooms," this expanded version of Kohls original groundbreaking discussion "deftly catalogs problems with the prevailing presentations of Parks and offers [a] more historically accurate, politically pointed and age-appropriate alternative" (
Chicago Tribune).
In addition to Marian Wright Edelmans introduction, She Would Not Be Moved includes an original essay by Cynthia Brown on civil rights activists Septima Clark, Virginia Durr, and Rosa Parks; a teachers resource guide to educational materials about Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement; and an appendix explaining how to evaluate textbooks for young people about this critical period in U.S. history.