The Autobiography of Citizenship
280 pages, 6 x 9
11 photographs
Paperback
Release Date:08 Feb 2015
ISBN:9780813570143
Hardcover
Release Date:08 Feb 2015
ISBN:9780813570150
The Autobiography of Citizenship
Assimilation and Resistance in U.S. Education
By Tova Cooper
Rutgers University Press
At the turn of the twentieth century, the United States was faced with a new and radically mixed population, one that included freed African Americans, former reservation Indians, and a burgeoning immigrant population. In The Autobiography of Citizenship, Tova Cooper looks at how educators tried to impose unity on this divergent population, and how the new citizens in turn often resisted these efforts, reshaping mainstream U.S. culture and embracing their own view of what it means to be an American.
The Autobiography of Citizenship traces how citizenship education programs began popping up all over the country, influenced by the progressive approach to hands-on learning popularized by John Dewey and his followers. Cooper offers an insightful account of these programs, enlivened with compelling readings of archival materials such as photos of students in the process of learning; autobiographical writing by both teachers and new citizens; and memoirs, photos, poems, and novels by authors such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Jane Addams, Charles Reznikoff, and Emma Goldman. Indeed, Cooper provides the first comparative, inside look at these citizenship programs, revealing that they varied wildly: at one end, assimilationist boarding schools required American Indian children to transform their dress, language, and beliefs, while at the other end the libertarian Modern School encouraged immigrant children to frolic naked in the countryside and learn about the world by walking, hiking, and following their whims.
Here then is an engaging portrait of what it was like to be, and become, a U.S. citizen one hundred years ago, showing that what it means to be “American” is never static.
The Autobiography of Citizenship grants us access to a range of fascinating archives and makes a valuable contribution to American literary studies, ethnic studies, and history.
A refreshing and compelling study … and one that contributes to an important intersection between the fields of education and multi-ethnic literary studies.
Tova Cooper details how minorities—Native, African, and Jewish Americans—used literature to cope with the modern U.S. demand that they assimilate or disappear entirely. How these writers and intellectuals overcame their formal educations to teach us different lessons is a heroic story.
Cooper provides a fascinating comparison of citizenship education programs aimed at molding American Indians, African Americans, and immigrants into 'good Americans.'
TOVA COOPER is an assistant professor of English at the University of South Florida, Tampa.
Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 On Autobiography, Boy Scouts, and Citizenship: Revisiting Charles Eastman’s Deep Woods
2 The Scenes of Seeing: Frances Benjamin Johnston and Visualizations of the “Indian” in Black, White, and Native Educational Contexts
3 Speaking the Body: German-Jewish Americanization Programs, Eastern European Jews, and the Autobiographical Work of Abraham Cahan
4 Curricular Cosmopolitans: W.E.B. Du Bois and Jane Addams
5 Emma Goldman, the Modern School, and the Politics of Reproduction
Conclusion
Notes
Index
