2017-029-E Arts - Chapel Hill High School Arts Academy - Fall 2016 Arts Grant Agreement

Browse Search

DocuSign Envelope ID: CF1E5821-41D3-41CA-BE86-7063BD8D1470 DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS Purpose: This workshop is designed to explore identity--those that we feel we are confined to or even forced into,those we feel best describe us,and those we aspire to embody. It also gets participants to think about the unique perspectives that they hold,and to celebrate the value and validity of these perspectives. Models and Materials: • Excerpt on Double Consciousness from W.E.B. Dubois' The Souls of Black Folk • Iceberg model Overview of Activities: • Begin the workshop by showing the class the following quote about`double- consciousness'from W.E.B. Dubois' The Souls of Black Folk Explain that Dubois was an African American sociologist,historian, activist,and writer who helped found the NAACP and made many important contributions to the understanding of the black experience in the early 1900s. "It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in 9 y f f 9 Y P f amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness,—an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder." • Explain that in talking about double-consciousness Dubois was describing the way in which African Americans during that time period were always aware of the person they knew themselves to be, as well as the self that other projected onto them and which was constructed by stereotypes and assumptions. Explain that we all experience this in different ways,as we are often aware of the stereotypes and assumptions that others project onto us based on our race,gender, class, style of dress, accent,national origin, etc. �- • On the blackboard, draw the iceberg model below,and ask the class what percentage of an iceberg is usually showing (10 %). Explain that people are similar in this way,and that 90% of who we are lies below the surface of what people can tell when they see us. Have the class give examples of the aspects that would lie on the tip of the iceberg(race,gender, class, clothing,tattoos,piercings, accent, hairstyle,body type,etc.) and write these on the diagram you have drawn on the board.Then ask them to list some of the aspects that would fall below the surface (personality, struggles/experiences,talents,beliefs,dreams/aspirations, etc.).