Jonathan Kozol: Amazing Grace
"What is it like for children to grow up here? What do they think the world has done to them? Do they believe that they are being shunned or hidden by society? If so, do they think that they deserve this? What is it that enables some of them to pray? When they pray, What do they say to God?"
I'm not crying, you're crying
Reading this text was very humbling. It's hard to make yourself blind to a certain issue when you see children involved. When we imagine children, we picture loud, happy, tiny humans playing games and laughing. What we don't imagine, is that they might be doing these things in a neighborhood where 3 shootings have occurred in one day.
The children that live in Mott Haven, mostly minorities, do not always give off the appearance of being sad. For example, the young boy named Cliffie does not seem bothered at all by his surroundings. In a way, that makes this whole situation a lot more grim; the reason being that cliffie must simply not know of any other way of life. When children are born into Mott Haven, they do not realize that their living situation is abnormal or unfair, until they are introduced to the living conditions of others. They simply adapt to their environment and become desensitized to it.
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| Basically Cliffie |
In Kozol, the children that live in Mott Haven likely have less access to a proper education. Not only do these children have to live in awful conditions, but they also can only attend schools in that same unsafe neighborhood. The "white" neighborhoods are allotted the better books, and overall better education.
How can a child rise up from poverty without the knowledge to do so?
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