The Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) has joined its sibling organizations in landscape architecture and planning in opposing the concerted efforts of far-right lawmakers to prevent the inclusion of race and racism topics into curricula in states including Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, South Dakota, and Virginia.
"This united declaration stands as a strong objection to the legislation that silences educators from sharing the histories of the architectural profession. Practitioners, educators, and students must be granted access to the complete narrative. Being privy to only a portion of the story significantly disadvantages us all," Mo Zell, the 2023-24 ACSA President, said in a statement.
"The boards of directors of the three organizations representing university programs and educators in architecture, landscape architecture, and planning — ACSA, CELA, and ACSP, — jointly communicate our opposition to any legislation that prevents educators from teaching and sharing complete and accurate knowledge about the built environment for the purpose of shielding students from 'divisive' or 'disagreeable' content related to the impact of race and racism in American and global society, as well as other pedagogy related to gender and LGBTQ+ identities," a portion of the organizations' statement reads.
"These laws serve to suppress student exploration of pressing issues that affect the country and that are essential to preparing future practitioners in the built environment disciplines," it continues.
The states in question have been increasingly in thrall with the notion that any mention of racial inequality, gender studies, the existence of trans and nonbinary people, structural racism, or other related topics in the classroom is unacceptably biased and/or inaccurate and pernicious as certain lawmakers and governors look towards identity politics as a main talking point in their various reelection appeals.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Texas Governor Gregg Abbott have both been at the forefront of the movement, going as far as to initiate book bannings and other legislation that codifies an alarming culture of academic censorship, according to the ACLU.
Laws, in some instances, allow for the close administrative monitoring of professors teaching theories espousing views that "systemic racism, sexism, oppression, and privilege are inherent in the institutions of the United States and were created to maintain social, political, and economic inequities." Lawsuits have been enacted to challenge these crackdowns, but the push towards greater state government intervention, in many cases, remains difficult to keep pace with legally.
The joint statement goes on to note that "decisions to eliminate certain sectors of discourse in public institutions [are] especially concerning, because they impinge on students’ right to free speech, on the basic principles of faculty’s academic freedom, and on the ability of American citizens to participate fully in democratic use of our shared resources."
The ACSA has asked its members to share their statement as a "basis for advocacy in their local contexts." Additional information and resources can be found here.
9 Comments
The problem with where we are now is very few people actually seek out and read the actual legislation that is being passed.
I would encourage everyone to read Florida's HB 7 bill, for example. You might be surprised that it is the exact opposite (Costanza reference!) of what you have been told by the ACLU and others.
CS/HB 7: Individual Freedom GENERAL BILL by Education and Employment Committee ; Avila ; (CO-INTRODUCERS) Bell ; Borrero ; Byrd ; Fernandez-Barquin ; Fine ; Fischer ; Grall ; Latvala ; Maggard ; Massullo ; McClain ; Overdorf ; Payne ; Roth ; Shoaf ; Sirois ; Truenow ; Yarborough Individual Freedom;
Provides that subjecting individuals to specified concepts under certain circumstances constitutes discrimination based on race, color, sex, or national origin; revising requirements for required instruction on the history of African Americans; requiring the department to prepare and offer certain standards and curriculum; authorizing the department to seek input from a specified organization for certain purposes; prohibits instructional materials reviewers from recommending instructional materials that contain any matter that contradicts certain principles; requires DOE to review school district professional development systems for compliance with certain provisions of law.
Wtf are you talking about?
read the bill. it starts on page 3
https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2022/7/BillText/er/PDF
Lotta positive concepts blended in with explicit protections for racists. Flooding the zone with shit, as it were.
Honestly, you're either dim, or deliberately being stupid. That bill is written a hate group posing as a deliberative body. And I'm only two pages in and I can discern that.
Jebus
Textbooks should cover:
(h) The history of African Americans, including the history of African peoples before the political conflicts that led to the development of slavery, the passage to America, the enslavement experience, abolition, and the history and contributions of African Americans of the African diaspora to society. Students shall develop an understanding of the ramifications of prejudice, racism, and stereotyping on individual freedoms, and examine what it means to be a responsible and respectful person, for the purpose of encouraging tolerance of diversity in a pluralistic society and for nurturing and protecting democratic values and institutions.
From the bill, linked above.
The DeSantis administration also spurred one publisher to remove a section in a middle school textbook about “New Calls for Social Justice,” which mentioned the Black Lives Matter movement and Floyd police killing in 2020. This piece of text detailed that “while many American sympathized” with Black Lives Matters, “others charged that the movement was anti-police.” Florida determined this content broached “unsolicited topics. . . .”
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/09/florida-k-12-textbook-publisher-00096000
Of course, because the cause of Black people ended after the civil war.
An act relating to individual freedom. . . .
The first words of the bill, linked in the above comment.
They are as far as you need to go. The rest is smoke and mirrors. In light of current discussions by reactionaries, along with recent Supreme Court decisions, the context is the assumption that affirmative action is a violation of civil liberty and individual rights. Race theory, any theory, is categorically discarded—and replaced with what?
This is not subtle decoding on my part: the spokespersons here have been loud and clear. They may pay lip service to certain principles and facts, but you need to see how the bill is put into practice. See my example above. It is a tool for censorship and conformity.
And how contorted and evasive the language gets after those first six words.
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