Lesson CAA-1
Welcome! Please consider how your attitude affects your and other students' experiences of the lesson.
Be respectful, come prepared, and show interest to have the best possible educational experience.
Lesson goals
Learn about colonial history, postcolonialism and mimicry, cultural appropriation and the power dynamics behind it as well as how it can be understood today in an article on Americacore
Lesson activities
Warm-up exercise
Introduction lecture
Reading comprehension
Warm-up exercise
Warm-up exercise: This is fine
Time for the activity: ~5-10 minutes
On the floor is a range from this is fine to this is not fine. You are going to be given a series of statements to react to (these are not necessarily what we think).
Your task is to quickly stand on this line as a reaction to the statements. Please be prepared to motivate why you chose to stand there.
Introduction lecture
Video discussion
Time for the activity: ~5-10 minutes
Develops your listening comprehension and discussion skills
Quotes from Cultural Appropriation: Whose problem is it? BBC Stories
"I define cultural appropriation as taking something from a culture that isn’t your own and not giving the full or any sort of residue of credit back."
"At the end of the day that is someone’s heritage. And I think in order to understand that on a deeper level I think you almost have to understand racism on a deeper level as well."
"The same people that say it's racist to say that a white person can’t wear a bindi are probably the same people that don’t necessarily understand that people have been aggressively downtrodden on for wearing that item."
"I don’t usually go to festivals, but that was probably the most upset I’ve been about cultural appropriation because I felt powerless being there, being surrounded by a lot of people who wouldn’t understand. And it's just... when I see other people doing it without any repercussions It just makes me think, why can't I just be? I can’t wear that myself and just have people treat me normally."
"When you are part of a culture for example, that society has told you how you look is wrong, for someone to then take that and then say, "Well I’m going to do it because it's fashionable and its cool now but it’s a music festival so who cares?" It’s very ignorant to the people that have had to go through those things. "
"Definitely, if someone was telling me that they felt offended, I would definitely offer to take a seat and to talk about it. But I think being open minded also comes in both ways and maybe they have to understand it's not an offence it’s more like a celebration."
"When people say they are trying to promote diversity and acceptance, I think it's very important to remember that not everybody wants "white validation". The point isn't that white people need to wear things to normalise things."
"We also have to identify when it happens and white people aren't necessarily a part of it. Because I think there's always this demonisation of like, "White people have done this again", or: "White people don't get it". I think it's beyond white privilege and I think you can look at other examples like Nicki Minaj with "Chun Li". I think if you do it, you have to be consistent with it."