I was once criticized as a high school English teacher for teaching “too many dead white guys.” The critique was leveled at me by a fresh, young female college graduate who was to be taking over my classes as I moved into an administrative position. While I was leaving the classroom, because I had a solid track record of pass rates for my AP Literature & Composition class, I was tasked with mentoring this new teacher. She in turn was asked to stick as closely as possible to my lesson plans and curriculum, even having me guest lecture periodically to cover specific skills and topics. In addition to AP, she also inherited my tenth grade English II classes and curriculum. I will admit looking back that my book list weighed more heavily in favor of dead, largely white, male authors: Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, Swift, Twain, Golding, Hawthorne, Conrad, Paton, Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, and others. I might have argued that there were also some dead women, and some live men. There were also short stories and poetry by a wider range of social, cultural, national, and gender demographics. But why so many dead, largely European, white guys?
If one looks at the whole of written language from the time of antiquity to present day, it’s fairly apparent that the majority of published works are still from men, and presumably white men, white being defined for these purposes as European or American descendants. I can’t go back in time and change society and culture so that men and women and minorities were all educated the same and provided with the same opportunities for success. If I were to teach a course dedicated solely to modern, or rather post-modern, works, I could more easily find balance in demographics. I read avidly today and probably from a higher percentage of female authors currently. I don’t necessarily pursue different races or cultures with any specificity, but I don’t choose against them either. I read what I enjoy as long as it is written well and carries my interest regardless of who wrote it. But when I had the responsibility of crafting a literature curriculum that spanned close to 3000 years and could only choose so many works to fill six different courses, the odds were ever in the white male favor.
The teacher I mentioned above took over for me in 2015. Now in 2021 it’s hard to not be familiar with the concept of cancel culture, but perhaps it’s been coming for several years. We’ve seen trends in history classes to wipe out entire units and eras to avoid causing hurt or offense. Monuments are being taken down or destroyed. What happens when we ignore our history? It does tend to repeat itself. Maybe if we listened to my dead white guys we would still learn some lessons that stand the test of time.
Girl with Dog 