AP African American Studies Comes Under Fire
Last August, the College Board announced a new AP class to be offered moving forward: AP African American Studies. The class was created in an attempt to teach African American history from a more critical perspective, inspired by scholars such as Henry Louis Gates Jr. The proposal for the course was leaked early, immediately met with criticism, and soon became a political hot topic.
In the wake of criticism from Gov. Ron DeSantis, Majorie Taylor Greene, and other conservatives, the College Board has announced several changes to their AP African American Studies course. In addition to purging several prominent names from the curriculum, such as bell hooks, who wrote about race, class, and feminism, and Ta-Nehisi Coates, who has made a case for reparations for slavery, the Board has also stripped the course of writers and scholars who tackle critical race theory, the queer experience, class issues, and Black feminism. They also added a new idea for research: Black conservatism.
The move is not a total surprise. Since their unveiling of the course, the College Board has received pushback from several states, most prominently Florida.
The Proposed Changes
In the revised 234-page curriculum framework, the topics of Africa, slavery, and the Civil Rights Movement were included along with the study of redlining, discrimination, and Afrofuturism. And the study of contemporary topics such as Black Lives Matter, queer history, incarceration, and reparations were made optional and encouraged as individual research topics, though these topics will not appear on the AP exam. Furthermore, these contemporary topics can be challenged and/or banned based on state and local laws. In the more conservative states, these topics will likely be off-limits for students. After all, how can a student conduct a research project on queer Black life if the student is not allowed to “say gay”?
The revisions have been met with criticism from academics as well as several rights organizations such as PEN America, the National Parents Union, and CFT (a union of educators and classified professionals). David Blight, a professor of American history at Yale University withdrew his endorsement of the course after the revisions were released stating, “I withdrew it because I want to know when and how they made these decisions to excise these people, because that’s also an attack on their academic freedom.”
On the other hand, even though revisions have been made, many conservatives are still dissatisfied arguing that the curriculum does not offer any material from Black conservatives such as Thomas Sowell or Justice Clarence Thomas. They are also concerned that teaching the Black history from a more critical perspective may upset or cause distress to white students.
Where We Are Now
In short, neither side is happy with the changes to the curriculum. The class, though heavily sanitized, will still offer a Black perspective, though it will do very little to actually teach students the realities of the Black experience.
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