Yo, Miss! (No. 14)
United States of Grift
I am thinking a lot about grift lately, especially since I had the honor to be a guest on the Grifty podcast.
I spoke with two of the four regular hosts of the podcast, Azadeh “Azi” Ghafari and Baktaash Sorkhabi (Amanda Montell and Dr. Thomas Oden are also hosts of the show). I was honored to be their first-ever guest. We talked about how history and ideas are presented to us. Discussing Howard Zinn’s book "A People's History of the United States,” we explored how he offers a different perspective on American history and we also discussed the role this book plays in the current education system and modern-day historiography.
Of course, we also discussed the most recent grifts hitting the headlines. I can’t wait for you to listen to the podcast and let me know what you think!
Speaking of the headlines, my students were correct! If you remember, in my last newsletter (Yo, Miss! No. 13) I shared the poll results:
Turns out they were right! Trump was indicted before TikTok was banned and on Tuesday, former President Trump is set to appear in court in New York City to be arraigned.
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Trump will be the first U.S. president to face criminal charges. Some students were wondering if Trump could still run for President if he were to end up in prison and the answer is: YES. I made this TikTok where I shared about another time in history when a presidential candidate ran from prison, Eugene Debs in 1920:
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Honestly, I am sick of talking, writing, and tweeting about Trump…but it is always enlightening to contextualize all of this in history.
A few months ago, I had the honor of interviewing Mark Kurlansky for an episode of the PBS NewsHour Classroom Educator Voice series that I host. He recently published his book , “Big Lies: From Socrates to Social Media” and he is the author of an amazing catalogue of titles, including “Cod,” “Salt,” and “1968”
In “Big Lies,” Kurlansky outlines the history of lying and his book - written for young readers but I highly recommend it for ALL readers - serves as a how-to manual for seeing through big lies, media literacy, and thinking critically.
You can watch our full conversation here:
In the wake of yet ANOTHER school shooting, we have a new episode of the PBS NewsHour Classroom Educator Voice series scheduled for THIS Tuesday, April 4th at 7PM EST. I will be speaking with the co-founders of Teachers Unify to End Gun Violence, Abbey Clements and Sarah Lerner, (by the way, I am also a co-founder of Teachers Unify) and other teachers and school staff members to discuss the gun epidemic in America. Please register here and join us!
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a good week. Here is my LinkTree if you want to find me on other places on the internet.
Thank you to the amazing people who have sent me $$$ for coffee to keep me fueled teaching my students and creating content for y’all throughout the week.