Office of Academic Affairs-- Medgar Evers College

Dr. Andree McLaughlin’s comments during the inaugural meeting of the American Democracy Project

INCLUSION:

Real democracy requires inclusion at all levels of governance.
In this respect, democracy also means doing the research for and promulgating laws and public policy, not only carrying out laws and policies (i.e., "civic participation").
A significant factor in the lack of civic participation is alienation from democracy because of the lack of inclusion. For example, the United States Senate does not have one Black member.

There is not just alienation on the parts of Black people, as this concerns civic participation, but also on the parts of different racial, religious, ethic and cultural groups for this same reason of exclusion.

TEACHING RESOURCES:

We need to examine, critically, the quality of teaching resources on the subject of democracy.
For example, the NY Times infrequently contains articles about the Caribbean region and its nation states which are members of the United Nations, yet the Medgar Evers College student body has a significant Caribbean American population.
Furthermore, we need to determine what teaching resources factually present the evolution of American democracy and the role of African Americans, taking into account that 5.5 million persons out of 6.5 million persons in the first nearly 300 years of Colonial America (from 1492-1776) were Black.
Additionally, we need sensitivity in selecting teaching resources about the subject of democracy. For example, Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers, is quoted in materials disseminated to us about American democracy but he was a slaveholder who had a Black girl child mistress with whom, DNA has proven, he conceived children, most of whom he later sold - according to scholars of American history. A suggested reading is Benjamin Banneker's 18th century letter to then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson.

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